Chapter Eight #2
The playfulness drains from my body. My hands grip the counter until my knuckles turn white as memories flood back—not the ones she's asking for.
Not the lives taken under my command. Not John bleeding out in my arms. Not the hospital bed where I learned Tommy and Sarah were gone while I was overseas with no way to have protected them.
"Trey?" Her voice softens, concern replacing the teasing. "Are you okay? Did I say something wrong?"
Am I okay?
Is something wrong?
How do I answer that? Where would I even begin?
And if by some miracle, I could somehow unload a lifetime of everything that's wrong with me, where would that leave us?
Would she pity me? Would she see the massive canyon between our upbringings?
How I was raised with an outstretched hand for spare change my parents made us beg for as kids, while she grew up in a mansion with everything she could have wanted?
Will she see that I don't have the charisma and polish that Jameson has? Will she judge me for enlisting and leaving Tommy behind with my parents, forcing him to play hockey and live in the shadow I left? Will she think I'm broken—unfixable?
Am I broken and unfixable?
"Vivi… I—"
"Uncle Trey," Adeline's voice drifts down from upstairs, followed by the sound of small feet on stairs. "Is Vivi here?"
Vivi's eyes meet mine, understanding passing between us. Some stories aren't meant for nine-year-old ears. My stories aren't meant for anyone.
Yeah, I have skeletons. Skeletons that I'll never let anyone see.
"Yeah," I call out. "She's here."
Adeline appears in her penguin pajamas, rubbing sleep from her eyes.
The sight of her like this, innocent and young.
She looks so much like Tommy at this age that it almost hurts.
His eyes would search mine, looking for me to fix everything.
To tell him that we'd be okay until mom and dad showed back up.
He believed me…every time. And then I left him.
I was supposed to protect him. To keep him safe. I failed him then, but I won't fail his daughter now.
"You're up early, squirt." I force lightness into my voice.
"I'm sorry, Adeline. Were we too loud?" Vivi moves to her side, gentle hands guiding her toward the kitchen.
"No, you didn't wake me. I was just so excited that you were going to be here this morning." Adeline's whole face lights up. "And you said if I got up early enough, we could make pancakes before school. I didn't want to miss it."
Vivi catches my eye, her smile soft. I can't help but notice how natural they look together.
"That's true, I did say that." She grabs a stool from under the island and Adeline follows her to the stove. "You're just in time because I was about to start them. Why don't you take a seat right here, and I'll let you add the chocolate chips? I'm almost done with the batter."
Adeline practically bounces onto the stool. "Yes, please!"
"I'd better go," I say to Adeline. "I'll see you later."
I head for the hallway but can't resist one last look at them—Vivi measuring ingredients while Adeline chatters about chocolate chip placement strategy. They look like they belong there, together, in my kitchen, in my life.
Then I hear a honk from outside. Shit… I almost forgot.
"What was that for?" Vivi asks.
I glance at her and then down to Adeline. "I forgot that Kaenan is coming by this morning to drop off something from his friend who owns a dealership downtown," I glance down at Adeline. "Should we go see what it is?"
Adeline's eyes light up, practically jumping off the stool and races past me towards the door.
"Come on," I wave at Vivi to join us.
"What dealership did Kaenan go to downtown?" she asks as we head down the hall. Adeline opens the front door and leaves it wide open, and I grab Isla’s car keys that Vivi set on the key ring.
I watch the second that Kaenan pulls into the driveway, driving a brand-new Range Rover.
"Kaenan bought a new car for Isla? Because he's not the Range Rover type,” Vivi says.
"Nope." Kaenan steps out of the front seat. He tosses me the keys, and then I toss him Isla's keys for him to drive back to his house.
"Morning Adeline. Have a good day," he tells her and then heads for Isla's car and gets in, pulling out of the driveway and heading home.
"I'm so confused. What just happened?" Vivi asks.
I toss her the keys to the new Range Rover. She stares down at the key fob as if it's a foreign object that she doesn't know how it got there.
"The car is for you."
She whips her vision from me, back to the car. "For me? You borrowed a car for me to use while I nanny?"
"No, I didn't borrow it. I bought it for you. It's yours. Consider it a perk of the job, and I'll sleep better knowing that you have a reliable car of your own."
She stares back at me. "Wait…you're serious? You just went out and bought me a brand new Range Rover? The same make and model as the one I had before?"
"It's not a big deal."
"Not a big deal?" She gives a non-comical laugh as if that's the craziest thing she's ever heard.
"You think a two-hundred-thousand-dollar car is not a big deal?
I think you and I have different definitions of the meaning," she says, taking me off guard since, from what I know about her, she was spoiled with expensive cars, luxury clothes, and private schools most of her life as a Newport.
Her reaction is surprising but also endearing.
"This is a huge deal, and I can't let you give me a car. "
"Too late. I put it in your name when I paid for it cash last night at the dealership. It's yours.”
“It’s so pretty!” Adeline’s squeals, running for it. “I call front seat.”
“I don’t understand how this happened.”
"Kaenan knows the Range Rover dealership owner. I asked if they had a brand-new white Range Rover on the lot. Like the one those assholes took. They did so I asked them to hold it for me. Kaenan drove down this morning and met him to get the car so I could be home when you got here."
"Oh my God… Trey. This is too much. Take it back. This is too much."
"Too late. It’s already in your name. I signed the documents electronically last night. Consider it a bonus."
"I can't accept this."
"I'll feel better knowing that you have your own transportation and that you're safe."
I walk over to Adeline, who checks every pocket, every cup holder, oohing and awwing at everything.
"I have to go to practice. Love you. Be good." I say, bending into the passenger front side of the car and giving Adeline a kiss on the top of her head.
"We're not done with this conversation," Vivi says, walking up carefully towards the car as if it might bite her if she turns her back on it.
"You can't just buy me a car with cash and act like it's nothing—no strings.
What happens in two months when you get a new nanny and I go back to being the CEO of Newport Staffing? "
"Then I guess you'll have two cars, but at least one they can't ever take away from you again."
"Trey, this is too extravagant."
"I have more than enough money to buy you a car.
I was paid well in the Army, and I made a lot when I was on active duty.
I lived on base and didn't spend hardly anything.
And now with my contract guarantee from the Hawkeyes…
I'd need two lifetimes to spend all of it.
I'm sure you're worth ten times my net worth, but I can assure you that I have more than enough to buy you a car. "
She tilts her head at me as if this whole thing is ridiculous. "Trey—"
"Just consider it a signing bonus. You're grossly overqualified for the job anyway." I say, walking back to the house to grab my duffel bag that sits just inside. Vivi’s on my tail the entire time, a little shadow I can’t shake, and maybe I like giving her a reason to follow me around.
Maybe I need to piss her off with expensive grand gestures more often so she’ll follow me around nagging at me. I’d take a lifetime of Vivi nagging…just tell me where to sign.
"Well, I don't know about ten times your wealth, but I can assure you that right now, that net worth isn't doing shit for me. In fact, it sort of has a noose around my neck."
I slide the duffel bag strap over my shoulder and then turn to face her, anger toward her board members bubbles up in my veins again like yesterday, when she said that her company took away her car.
"If anyone is threatening you Vivi, or forcing you to do something you don't consent to, you'll tell me, right?
I'll take care of it. You never have to know. "
She looks up at me and blinks twice as if I just threatened to kill someone—which I sort of did.
Sometimes I have to remember that when people see me, I can make them uneasy.
My size, my tattoos, my military background.
The last thing I want her to be is scared of me, but I do want her to know that I won't stand by if anyone ever tries to hurt her.
She sucks in her bottom lip, and then I see it—the kind of interest I see in some women when they know what I'm capable of. What I was trained for over the last fifteen years in the Army's special forces.
“This conversation still isn’t over,” Vivi threatens.
"Yes, it is because we've butchered the conversation at this point, but nothing will change the fact that the deal is already done and signed for. Now you two had better go in or the pancakes are going to get cold.”
I force myself to leave before I can think too hard about how empty this house will feel when she's gone and how I need to fill it with someone else that Adeline likes to make the transition as easy as possible for her.