Reckless (Mason Family #3) - Adriana Locke Page 0,54

what in the hell I'm going to do.”

“I... I don't even know how to say it right now. You have a kid? Are you kidding me right now because this is not funny.”

“I’m standing in Boone's kitchen peeling potatoes for dinner while Rosie paints on her stomach with purple fingerpaint.”

Libby laughs in disbelief. “So, what's your plan? I mean, do you have one? No judgment, ’cause clearly I don't have one either.”

“Heck if I know,” I say, moving on to the celery. “We're staying with Boone right now until I can figure it out.”

I can hear the pause—a pregnant moment of silence as Libby tries not to squeal in the phone.

“Should I read into that in the way that I want to read into that? Because you know I’m already shipping you together.”

I laugh. “You probably should not read into that but …”

“Okay. Keep going.”

I set the knife and potato on the countertop and look around the kitchen.

None of this feels real. It feels like I'm playing house—like I'm Cinderella and the part where she's the stepdaughter and the part where she's the princess are all sort of blended together in some weird collaboration.

The more I see of Boone, the more I like him. And I know if things were different, I would already have folded at the way he looks at me or the heat in the glimpse of a touch as we clean up the table or sort laundry.

But things are not different. I can't use Boone to escape a situation the way that I escaped my mom and Pete by leaving with Shawn. If I'm ever going to have something real with someone, it has to be right. And now, not just right for me but for Rosie too.

I sigh.

I remember what it was like when my mom left the guy she was with before Pete. That guy wasn't my dad, but he was the closest thing to one that Jeanette and I had, considering neither of our fathers was even in the picture. I remember vividly the pain of watching my mom choose Pete over her two daughters and thinking that Nettie and I weren't worthy of being chosen.

In second grade, my teacher asked me if I had any siblings. I said a sister, and her name was Jeanette Hannigan. The teacher looked at me and said, “What is your mother's last name?” And it occurred to me for the first time that my mother's last name was Randolph. Jeanette was Hannigan. I was the only Thorpe that I even knew.

I don't know what all Rosie has gone through in her life, but something tells me it's just as bad, if not worse, than what I went through. And come hell or high water, that’ll stop with me.

I'm going to give her the permanence that she deserves. Boone is great to her and with her, but he is not bound to her. If something would happen between him and me, and things go sideways, it’s not fair to have her positioned to get hurt by my mistakes.

“We'll see what happens,” I tell Libby. “After everything that's happened in the past few weeks to me, I'm a little leery of making definite plans.”

“That totally makes sense, Jax. And who knows how Rosie will adapt to losing her mom, you know?”

My heart sinks. “I know. I keep waiting for it to get harder. I’m not sure how this works. Does time make it harder—will it hit home for her eventually? Or will it just drift from her mind because she’s still so little?”

“I don’t know.”

I think about it, just as I have since the day I got Rosie. I don’t want her to forget her mother. Although I’m afraid that bringing her up will make her sad, I want her to be able to hold on to things about Nettie so she can remember them when she’s older.

“Have you figured anything out?” I ask Libby, changing pace. “Are you coming back to Savannah?”

“I think I'm going to stay in Nevada. My attorney says I'll get alimony, but I don't know how much or for how long. And I can force Ted to either sell the house or buy me out of it, and I'm going to. I should be set for a little while, but I'm definitely going to have to get a plan together because I can't live on that money forever.”

“Once I get settled, I'm coming out there to visit you. We can go to the