Singled Out

Chapter 27

“Max.”

I jolted from a heavy, agitated sleep at the sound of my sister’s voice and tried to figure out when and where the fuck I was.

In my house.

With Danny asleep beside me. On the sectional.

“What time is it?” I asked quietly. My eyes burned with grittiness and deep fatigue.

“Time for you to pull your head out,” Dakota said from my kitchen.

Scowling, I raised my arm to check my watch, being careful not to disturb my son. “Quarter after nine?”

A few more seconds passed while I racked my brain to recall what day it was. Sunday night. Dark outside.

I closed my eyes when I remembered my shit show of a day.

After Harper left, I’d sat on that dock for hours, trying not to think. I’d been reluctant to go inside to an empty house.

Levi had brought Danny home early this morning as we’d agreed. He’d taken one look at me, concluded the single dads had tied one on, shaken his head, and left. I hadn’t corrected him. Because at least that would be a valid excuse for looking like shit.

Sleep-deprived and weighed down by a heavy sadness I couldn’t kick, I’d switched into get-through-the-day mode for both Danny and myself.

We hadn’t left the house, and I hadn’t showered. We’d admittedly eaten like crap, but we’d eaten. For most of the day, football had been on the TV, toys had been strewn everywhere, and Danny was no worse for the wear. It would’ve been a chill day at home, just father and son and the NFL, except I was a fucking mess in my head.

I felt like shit for hurting Harper. She had every right to be pissed at me, but I suspected she was beating herself up too. I hated that even more.

And fuck if I didn’t miss her, which didn’t even make sense. It was Sunday. We’d never spent daytime hours together, Sunday or otherwise, so the only time it made sense for me to miss her was in the dark of night. Check. I’d missed her so much last night I’d avoided my bedroom and dozed on the sectional.

Now I was over an hour late getting Danny to his crib. My sister was clanking around in the disaster that was my kitchen. And I felt like hell. We’re talking bottle-of-tequila hell, but I’d only consumed two beers over the course of the day.

I summoned my last ounce of give-a-fuck and eased off the sectional. I could see from here my sister was on a mission in the kitchen, so I elected to get Danny to bed before I faced her.

She kept her mouth shut when she saw me with my son in my arms, heading toward his bedroom.

Danny wore a diaper and a Dragonfly Lake football jersey, which was as dressed as I’d gotten him today. Guys’ day, I’d told him. He’d giggled and clapped his hands when I pulled out his favorite shirt.

He opened his eyes when I laid him in his crib, so I changed his diaper and put some clean pajamas on him. He was nearly back asleep by the time I snapped his pj’s up. I leaned over and kissed him.

“Night, Danny boy.”

“Nigh’, Dada.”

I tiptoed out, hoping like hell this was a sleep-through-the-night night. We made it about eighty percent of the time, but it’d serve my ass right if he woke me up. That’s what I deserved for blowing off his routine today.

“What are you doing here?” I asked Dakota as I entered the kitchen.

“I could ask you the same.” She was scrubbing off the pizza pan I’d left on the stove after lunch.

“I live here.”

“But what are you doing, Max? Your kitchen is a wreck. You broke your no-sugar rule with Danny.” She held up the empty animal cracker bag. “Pizza, popcorn, beef jerky? You ate like a couple of broke college students or hungover bachelors. You had him up past his sacred bedtime. Is this how it’s going to be?”

“We had a guys’ day,” I snapped.

“You’re father and son. Every day is guys’ day in this house. This feels more like guy-who-knows-he-screwed-up-big-time-trying-to-cope day.”

I narrowed my eyes at her, wondering if she knew about Harper. “What are you getting at, Dakota? You never said why you’re here.”

“I’m here because you need help seeing the light.”

I raised my brows at her boldness. I was beginning to suspect Harper had talked to her, but I wasn’t going to out myself.

She put away the pans then looked me straight in the eyes. “For being a pretty smart guy, you sure have some dumb-assery in you.”

“I don’t have the energy to stand here and listen to you insult me. If you have something useful to say, get on with it.”

“Breaking up with Harper was a big mistake. Huge. Like, I can’t figure out what the hell you were thinking, Max.”

“That’s between Harper and me. She knows what I was thinking because I told her. It doesn’t concern you.”

“Oh, I know what you told her.”

“I thought she was keeping our business to herself,” I muttered.

“She never breathed a word to me about the two of you before today. She went out of her way to protect you and your job even when you didn’t need it. She held up her end of the bargain, but that deal disappeared the second you broke her heart.”

“I didn’t break her heart,” I said automatically.

Had I?

“Keep telling yourself that.”

I wanted to argue, but I couldn’t get the look on Harper’s face, that flash of hurt, out of my mind.

“If that’s true, I’m deeply sorry,” I said, feeling a hundred years old. “I assure you I didn’t need you to come over to rant. I feel bad enough as it is.”

My sister set aside the sponge and studied me. Her shoulders lowered, her expression gentling. “I didn’t come here to rant, even though I am mad,” she said, her voice softer.

“I don’t see how it’s any of your business.”

“It’s my business because two people I love are hurting.”

“You can’t fix this,” I told her. I wanted to say I wasn’t hurting, but I realized the scene she’d walked in on probably said otherwise. I did feel like utter fucking shit.

“No, but you can.”

I didn’t know where she was going, but I was sure I didn’t have the energy for it. I sauntered back to the sectional and flopped down.

Dakota followed me and sat more sedately on the other side.

“Dad messed all of us up,” she said. “Why else would none of us have any history with a single serious relationship?”

I nodded because she was spot on.

“I think you need to get over what Dad did and embrace what’s right in front of you.”

I raised a brow at her ridiculousness. “Just like that? Just snap my fingers?”

“Whatever it takes, Max.”

“Your words don’t hold a lot of weight seeing how you’re in the same position.”

“I’m not though. I’ve never fallen in love.”

“I haven’t either.”

Dakota tilted her head and stared me down. Then she smiled indulgently, as if she were explaining the basics to a three-year-old. “You can deny it, but that doesn’t mean it’s not true.”

I crossed one leg over the other knee. “Let me get this straight. You’re advising me on relationships and love even though you’ve never had either one?”

“I guess I am, because I know you love Harper.”

“I care about Harper, but we’ve only ever been a fling.”

“Doesn’t matter. You love her. I saw it the day we moved. You tried so hard to hide everything, but any time you looked at her, it was there in your eyes, in the look you got on your face.”

“I thought you didn’t know about Harper and me.”

“I said she never told me. You gave yourselves away that day.”

“We weren’t serious, Dakota.”

Even as I said the words, I heard Harper’s declaration that she loved me. I’d spent hours last night questioning whether it was true. What I’d concluded was that she had no reason to say the words if she didn’t believe them to be true. I knew her well enough to understand a part of her probably hated that she’d developed feelings. She’d basically said as much.

“You might not have set out to be serious. Hate to tell you, brother dearest, but if you didn’t love her, you wouldn’t be in this condition, with your house a shambles, your kid eating crap food all day, and yourself a smelly, disgusting mess.”

I narrowed my eyes again, about to argue, but her words struck a chord. I’d had short-term, nonserious connections with plenty of women. There wasn’t a single one that had made me do more than blink when it ended.

I lowered my leg and leaned forward, elbows on knees, running my hands over my face.

“I wouldn’t know what love was if it smacked me upside the head and yelled at me,” I said eventually.

A quiet chuckle came from my sister. “From where I’m sitting, it has.” She pulled her legs up beneath her. “Tell me something. When was the last time you let a woman stay overnight at your place?”

I stared at her without answering. I didn’t let women stay overnight, not now that I had Danny, and not before he was in my life either.

“That’s what I thought,” my sister said. “Harper’s different from everyone else. You’re different with Harper.”

“What if that doesn’t matter?” I said, not fully convinced she was right.

“It matters, Max. If you love her, you shouldn’t let her go. What if she could make you and Danny happy?”

I let myself think about that for maybe five seconds before shutting it down. “Danny’s exactly why I can’t take a chance. If I let her in and she leaves…”

“You would get through it, and so would Danny,” she said. “But what if she doesn’t leave?”

“Chances are good she’ll leave.”

“I understand that fear, but Harper is not Dad. With Dad, the surprise was he stayed as long as he did.”

“Who told you that?” She’d been barely older than Danny when our dad took off.

“Mom. You should ask her about it sometime.” Dakota shrugged and stood. “I need to go so you can get to bed. You look like hell.”

“Gee, thanks.” I walked her toward the door, my mind reeling with the crapload she’d put in my head.

“You know I’m not some big romantic in love with love. I just have a feeling about you and Harper. I hope you don’t screw yourself and my roomie and, most importantly, my nephew out of fear, Max.” She rose to her toes and kissed my cheek. “Love you, big dummy.”

“Get out of here, shorty. Thanks for caring. I think.”

I shut the door as she walked toward her car, so bone-tired I wanted to ignore everything my baby sister had said. Unfortunately some of it hit too close to home.

What if she was right that I was in love with Harper?

I reminded myself that wasn’t the point. Protecting Danny—and okay, I could admit it, protecting myself—was the point. I needed to figure out how to get over it all and move on.