to talk in the hallway. Not that time. It only took her a second to notice they were in his bedroom.
“We can’t have sex with the kids in the next room,” Poppy hissed and tried to reach for the door.
Turner intercepted her hand to pull her around to face him. “Where’s Faye?”
“She has a job interview this afternoon,” Poppy said, twisting her head toward the door. “I’m supposed to be watching them. What if something happens when I’m not in the room?” She gasped as a thought panicked her. “Did you lock the front door?”
“They’re not gonna walk out the front door.”
“No, but they’re father might come back,” she said. “He’s not a fan of mine.”
“Whoa, hey,” Turner said, grabbing her arm to pull her back again. “Kev was here?”
Wondering if maybe she shouldn’t have told him, Poppy didn’t have much time to figure out what of the sisters’ secrets she should keep from Turner.
Her eyes didn’t want to go anywhere near his. “A little while ago.”
“What did he want?”
Unsure what to say, Poppy tried to come up with something and in the end went with just exhaling. “You should talk to Faye about her marriage. I have to get back to the kids.”
“Kev wouldn’t walk into this apartment without knocking unless he has a death wish.” He exhaled in sneering disbelief. “Bet Faye had to promise him I wasn’t around before he came over.”
Something Poppy knew to be true. “Stop hating him,” she said, laying a palm on his cheek to bring his attention to her. “That’s not where your focus should be.”
“Where should my focus be?” he asked, holding onto his anger.
“On supporting your sister,” she said. “I said I’d look after the little ones while she got something to wear for her interview. But she’s really nervous and feels alone.”
“I’m here,” he said, almost offended by the implication he wasn’t. “I won’t let her be alone or hurt by that bastard. We don’t need him. The kids will be just fine without him. And Faye doesn’t need to work, I’ll support them, all of them.”
Sometimes he was just too swoon-worthy in how blind he could be. “Supporting your sister means supporting her choices. Has she ever worked?”
His frown was fierce. “When she was a teenager.”
“She’s choosing to go to this interview. She’ll need help with the kids and probably somewhere to stay, but you shouldn’t rush in and take over. Be gentle, First. Listen to her… like you listen to me.” That seemed to soften some of his anger. “If she wants to stay here with the kids and you’re willing to pay for everything, then fine. But if that’s not what she wants… Think about what it will do for her confidence, for her self-respect, if she can build a life without him.” Poppy knew exactly how that felt because she was going through it. “And if she chooses to go back to him—”
“No,” Turner said, rejecting that possibility. “No fucking way I’ll support—”
“So you’ll bar her from your life? Shun the kids?” she asked, watching him falter. “She’s your sister and she loves you… Just love her in return, no matter what she chooses.”
In the next few seconds, he just considered her, scrutinizing her face and hair. “For a woman who doesn’t get along with her family, you’re pretty good at this stuff.”
She smiled. “Your sisters aren’t like my sisters… They want to care about each other. All of you want to care about each other.”
He came closer to wrap both arms around her. “Aunt Poppy, huh?
“That wasn’t me,” she was quick to reassure him, though he did seem to be amused rather than mad. “They’re adorable, Turner, I don’t know how you ever leave the apartment. Don’t you just want to play with them all day?”
“Someone has to put food on the table,” he said, bending his knees to come lower and brush his mouth across hers. “You look good with them.”
Flattered, she returned his next kiss. “I keep imagining letting them loose in my grandmother’s house. Emmie would go nuts with my grandmother’s jewelry.”
“How would she feel about that?”
Poppy just shrugged. “Grammie never cared about things like that… The only material thing that ever really meant anything to her was her engagement ring… and that only cost my grandfather a couple of hundred bucks.”
“That much, huh?”
Leaning back, Poppy refused his next kiss. “That was a lot of money back then… It was more money than he’d ever spent on anything. He didn’t have