25. Sophia
Chapter 25
Sophia
“We’re heading to bed. Night, Mom. Night, Daddy.” Sophia gives them each a hug, then takes my hand in hers.
“Good night. Thank you again for opening your home to me even after everything that happened.” I wince, still hating how much I shocked everyone this morning. It doesn’t feel possible we’ve only been here one day.
“Stop beating yourself up, son. We talked about this,” Dad murmurs, bringing a smirk to my face. He’s the best.
“Yes, sir. Where would you like me to sleep?”
“Is Sophia’s bed not good enough?” He lifts his gaze to meet my boyfriend’s.
“You’re ok with me sleeping in her bed?” His brows reach high up on his forehead and I crack up laughing.
“Pecker, do you really think I'm an idiot? Do you expect me to believe she hasn’t slept in your bed? She was scared and you didn’t know where Jimmy was. I’d be more upset if you let her sleep in another room by herself.”
“Wes and I lived together in college with all the other guys. There were only two bedrooms on the first floor and we had them. Blake, Nick, Hunter, Nate, Lincoln, and Cole slept on the second floor. Do you want to know where Wes spent every night?” Mom presses a kiss to Dad’s arm that’s wrapped around her.
“Right fucking next to her. She was mine and I wasn’t going to let her forget that after she asked me to hold her one night. Plus, it made it so much easier when Charlie came to live with us.”
“When she came to live with you?” Pecker’s face scrunches in confusion.
“Damn, Soph, didn’t you tell him anything?” Dad chuckles.
“I didn’t think it mattered.” I lift my shoulders in a half-hearted shrug. Peck stares down at me waiting for me to continue. “Charlie isn't my sister, Peck. She’s my cousin, my mom’s niece. Aunt Kasey died when Charlie was four and Mom took custody of her. They weren’t even married yet.” I motion to my parents.
“We had barely even started dating. She turned our lives upside down.” Mom pinches her lips together. She still misses her sister and she’s never going to stop, but I think she’s happy she can call Charlie her daughter.
“Let’s be honest here, she turned the entire house upside down. Those men you met today,” Dad points towards the back of the house, “All of their lives would be wildly different if it weren’t for Charlie. We were all changed because of her and I don’t regret it one bit. Now, go get settled in for the night. You have to be exhausted after such a long and emotional day.” Dad waves us off without another word and turns his attention back to Mom.
She’s always been the center of his world and he doesn’t act any differently now than when they started dating according to Mom. I’ve always wanted what they have. A man who loves me with his whole heart and always puts me first. I think I might’ve found him.
I lead Peck up the stairs and down the hallway to my room. There are three empty rooms with the doors wide open and I smile. I love how Dad doesn’t expect us to sleep in separate rooms. It never even crossed his mind.
I open my door and gasp. From the floor to the ceiling, the room is packed with balloons. Each one has Jax’s face printed on it and he has a devilish grin on his face.
“I'm going to kill him!” I groan, knowing it’s going to take forever to clean this up. “Daddy! I thought you locked the door!” I yell down the stairs.
Within seconds, there are two sets of footsteps moving up the stairs until they stop behind us.
“Well, shit. It was locked this morning.” He scowls and scratches his bearded chin.
“Can we just put them in one of the spare rooms? I don’t want to hear a hundred balloons pop right now.” Mom sighs, looking really tired. I'm sure it’s been a long day for her.
“Yeah. Pick a room and shove them in there. We should make Jax come and deal with them tomorrow.” Dad grabs an armful and throws them in Jax’s old room. “We can tell him we found some of his things we think he wants and put them on his bed.”
Dad grabs a piece of paper and a pen. He scribbles something on it, then drops it on Jax’s old bed. We start loading the bed with balloons, making sure it gets covered completely. It takes the four of us almost fifteen minutes to get my room clear.
After Mom and Dad head to bed, we go through our bathroom routine and then climb in bed. I'm wearing one of Pecker’s shirts with nothing else on. He’s wearing boxer briefs. He wanted to wear sweatpants, but I promised he was fine without them.
“Thank you for coming to visit my family,” I whisper, running my fingers over his torso.
“You have no reason to thank me, Soph. I wanted to meet them. I just didn’t expect to find a brother I didn’t know existed here too.”
“He’s so excited to have other siblings. He has two little sisters and a little brother, but I think he likes having someone he’s biologically related to too. How are you feeling about it?” I snuggle a little closer.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, you thought it was just you and Sydney. Now, you have a whole other brother who has a family of his own.”
“I don’t know. I'm not sure it’s hit me yet… Is it weird that I'm dating my brother’s sister-in-law?”
“Only if it’s weird I'm dating my cousin’s husband’s brother.” I grin, even though I know he can't see me in the dark.
“Your family sure is complicated.” He chuckles.
“And yours isn't?”
“Touché.” He’s quiet for a few minutes, then he breaks the silence and I can hear the vulnerability in his voice. “I just don’t get it. My mom was the greatest. It’s so hard for me to imagine her giving up her first born.”
“Maybe she was doing what was best for him , not her. You don’t know where she was in life. If she couldn’t take care of him, she might’ve felt it was better for her to let someone else raise him. I know for a fact, Wyatt was loved by his previous parents.”
“How could she not tell us though? Didn’t we deserve to know we had a brother?”
“Maybe it hurt for her to think about the child she’d never meet. If she told you and Sydney, you’d have questions.”
“But she did tell Sydney. She just didn’t tell me,” he whispers.
“I'm sorry. I don’t have any answers for you, I wish I did. I'm here whenever you want to talk about it. I’ll listen and offer whatever advice I can. I’ll be by your side through all of this.”
“What did I ever do to deserve you?” He murmurs as he presses his lips against mine.
“You tripped all over yourself and had no flirting skills.” I grin as he kisses down my neck, sucking on the skin gently.
“It was embarrassing. I’ve never acted like that around a woman.”
“Are you normally a smooth talker?”
“Not at all,” he chuckles against my skin. “But I'm not that bad either.”
“Plus, you fed me all the sugar on our first date.”
“I’ll feed you sugar for the rest of your life if it keeps you around.”
“Nothing could take me away from you,” I whimper as he kisses over my collarbone and slips his hand under my shirt.
“Good… How quiet do you think you can be?”