had to go home.”
“Kitchen emergency?” Dave slapped his knee in amusement.
“They probably had to serve frozen chicken instead of fresh,” Ian said, getting in on the Cole bashing.
Penn looked over at Pete, trying to ground herself.
Keep your cool, Penn.
“Madewood restaurants serve sub-par food.” Beth joined in, too. “News at eleven.”
Penn crossed her arms over her chest. “You really shouldn’t trash talk someone who’s not here to defend themselves.”
“What’s Celebrity Chef going to do?” Dave held out his arms as if welcoming a confrontation. “Force feed me cheesecake until I puke?”
She tried to take her brother’s joking in stride, but all she saw was red.
“No, you douche,” she spat out the words. They rolled off her tongue so easily.
Damn that felt good.
“I will.” She eyed her family, one by one, taking a deep breath before saying, “Because I love him.”
“I knew it!” Beth yelled out, jumping from her seat.
With the exception of her, the rest of the family was silent.
“I love him.” The more she said it out loud, the more her heart tightened because she knew it was a lost cause.
She stepped forward, wanting to make sure the next words out of her mouth were heard loud and clear, but the flames were damn hot. She settled for moving to the outer edge of the pit, opposite Beth.
“I shouldn’t have lied about us. Although, we weren’t really an us, still aren’t an us, but I don’t want to lie anymore. Not about Cole. Not about who I am. Never again.”
“I don’t like this one bit, Pennie,” her father said. “That boy—”
“That boy is kind,” she interrupted. “Ambitious. Selfless and supportive. He likes me just the way I am, which is a hell of a lot more than I can say for you.”
She’d thought she’d made some progress with her siblings the other night at the club. She’d thought she’d given them enough to realize on their own that she wasn’t the little girl they thought she was. But it hadn’t been welcomed.
These were the people who were supposed to love her no matter what. And it was damn time they started.
“If you love each other so much,” Dave retaliated. “Why did he leave you, Pennie?”
At the sound of her nickname, something snapped. All of the anger she’d been holding back exploded.
“For the last time, my name is not Pennie!” She spit out the nickname with as much contempt as she could muster.
Dave jerked back at her outburst. A gasp sounded on the opposite side of the bonfire. She didn’t blame them; she barely recognized her own voice.
“It’s Penn or Pennelope.”
She wanted to believe it was the use of her nickname that had sparked her outrage, but if she was honest, Dave’s comment had hit too close to home. She did love Cole, and he’d left her.
Her failure to stand up and fight for him had forced him to relive his traumatic past. How was she ever going to get him to trust her, love her, after that? She only hoped that when she returned home, they might be able to salvage some kind of a friendship.
“Look at me. I am not the chubby, nerdy, uncoordinated wallflower I was when I was fifteen years old. I have a tattoo. I own fifty-six pairs of stilettos that probably cost as much as a year’s college tuition. I dance on tables. I’m the bad influence.” She looked over at her father, trying to prove a point. Her behavior had nothing to do with Cole.
She glowered at them. Maybe just at Dave and Beth.
“And I like to say fuck.” She held her arms out and let her head fall back. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.”
“Aunt Pennie said a bad word,” Andy yelled out.
“Yes, Andy. I did.” She turned to look at the little ones who were off by themselves away from the fire. “And one day, you will, too.”
“Penn, really.” Ian thrust up his arm and let it fall down to his knee with a thump. “Do you have to encourage my child to swear?”
“I’m just telling it like it is.”
Other than Pete and Christine, the rest of her family stared at her in shock. Dave’s mouth was practically on the sand. Her father’s jaw twitched. He was holding in his anger. She could see it clearly even through the dancing flames. She couldn’t decipher the look on her mother’s face.
“That was five F-bombs,” Dave yelled, then turned to her father. “So fifty pushups, right, Dad?” His current expression was the same one she’d seen