Tattooed Troublemaker - Elise Faber Page 0,49

sure what to make of the pieces left behind.

I don’t know how long I sat out on the tiny balcony before Lane came out, a bottle of water in his hand.

He thrust it at me. “Hydrate, dude, before this humidity kills you.”

I grabbed it. “Try living in Miami for a few months.”

Lane shuddered. “There’s a reason I never moved from California,” he said, leaning back against the wall, cramming his large frame into the sliver of shade. “I’m guessing by your face that you talked to Mom?”

“Yup.” I twisted the cap off, glugged down half the bottle.

“Mind fuck, huh?”

“Yeah,” I muttered, staring down at the condensation dripping over my fingers.

“But it seems like you’re an expert at mind fucks of late.”

Unfortunately, that was true.

“When did you find out?” I asked.

“Mom sat me down about a week after you left. Apparently, she told Jake, who said it was time to stop keeping secrets.”

“About thirty years too late.”

“Word,” Lane said.

“Does it make you feel any different?” I was still trying to put the pieces together in my mind, to sort out how I felt. Did I feel better knowing that I wasn’t the cause of my parents’—my mother’s—marriage imploding? Maybe? But her keeping that big of a secret for so long certainly didn’t feel good.

“I’ve had almost a year to get through it. I won’t say that I didn’t have to sift through some dark ass thoughts, but”—Lane shrugged—“our father was never there for us, knowing that the name is a different one doesn’t really change anything.”

That was true, but also, “Mom said he paid child support.”

“Yeah.” Lane took a sip of water. “There is that.” He capped it, sank down on his ass, bottle at his side. “So, the ex-husband was good, the bio-dad is trash.”

Cheating then not being involved in the life of his kid . . . twice? Not exactly earning that gold star in behavior. I nodded. “It appears that way.”

Lane was quiet for a long time. “Did you really think our dad leaving was your fault?” he asked carefully. “Even before we knew all this went down. When we were growing up and—”

I nodded. “Kind of hard not to feel that way when the person you thought was your dad disappeared the week after you were born.”

“I can see that.” Quiet words, quiet understanding.

And for as much as Lane had a big, boisterous personality, he could also be like this. Easy-going, pensive, a good listener. I’d forgotten about that, forgotten that he could be so still and calm when he was so often the opposite.

My lips curved, memories drifting to the forefront of my mind.

“I remember that Mom always used to say you had two speeds. What were they again?”

Lane turned his face in my direction, eyes dancing. “Sleep-mode and warp speed.”

I grinned. “That’s it.”

“Remember how she tried to learn to bake when you asked her to make a tuxedo cake for your birthday?”

“I remember that she didn’t realize she’d swapped salt for sugar,” I replied, lips twitching.

Lane snorted. “Worst shit I’ve ever eaten,” he said. “And that’s something, considering I survived her pork chops.”

I laughed outright. “I couldn’t eat pork for the longest time after that.”

“Word.”

The memories continued to float around in my mind, but I didn’t talk about them aloud, lost in my own thoughts. Lane was quiet as well and I assumed he, too, was remembering our childhood.

Summers spent in the backyard running through a giant sprinkler, gorging ourselves on Otter Pops, and still chasing the ice cream truck down the street whenever we heard the tinkling music come into our neighborhood.

Christmas, our tree loaded with ugly ass ornaments we’d made in school, the presents under the tree wrapped with joyful patterned paper.

My mom at every soccer game.

Lane practicing my kicks with me for hours after school. Sam playing goalie even though he wasn’t the least bit athletic.

My mom coming home after work and struggling her way through cooking dinner.

Sam smuggling PB&Js up to our rooms so we’d have something edible when my mom’s food proved anything but.

My mom helping me with my math homework—a hopeless endeavor.

Sam letting me cheat off him. Lane telling me I didn’t need math anyway because I was going to be a famous artist.

My mom encouraging me in that art and not being disappointed when I apprenticed under a local tattoo artist instead of going into the fancy post-graduate art program where I’d been given a scholarship.

“I get it now,” I told Lane.

My brother nodded. “I knew you would.”

Constant.