Chapter Twenty
Tuesday, November 22
Hernandez Home
Abilene, TX
Ian
T he next morning starts early with the smell of cooked bacon and pancakes. Everyone sits at the breakfast table with their food in front of them.
“Morning, everyone,” I greet as Kami and I walk into the kitchen.
“Good morning, you two,” Maria greets us with a smile. “Eggs are on the stove, bacon is in the microwave, and pancakes are on the island, so feel free to help yourselves.”
“This all looks so good. Thank you, ma’am,” I reply.
Kami only gives a brief wave before making her way to the coffee pot. “Hi, y’all.”
After I grab Kami and myself each a plate of breakfast, we sit next to each other at the crowded table.
John seems to be talking about fishing lines with Aaron while Sofia and her mother are collaborating on some kind of list.
“How did you sleep?” I speak to Kami softly. It’s strange how I could sleep next to someone yet not know this.
“Fine, I guess. You?”
“About the same.” I lay awake for what felt like hours. My heart raced and my dick stood at attention every time I felt her toss and turn. She was right there, yet I couldn’t touch her. So close, yet so far away.
Kami and I are almost done eating when her mother rises from her seat. “Okay, everyone, we have a plan,” she announces. “Kami and Sofia will go to the grocery store to get some last-minute items. John, Aaron, and Ian can start prepping the turkey, and I’ll be baking the goods.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Aaron quips.
John raises a hand. “I appreciate the help, Maria, but I don’t think I need that many hands to help me with the bird.”
He does have a point. The turkey is more of a two-person job.
I realize this could also be a good opportunity to spend time with Kami’s mom. No doubt with her I’ll get more straightforward answers. It’s clear Kami isn’t going to tell me what she’s going through emotionally. I might be grasping at straws, but it’s better than being stonewalled by the woman I’m desperate to know, love, and claim as mine.
I interject, “If you don’t mind, ma’am, I’d like to help you with baking today.”
“You would? Oh, that’s so sweet of you. Kami, your man is such the southern gentleman. I’m almost positive you’ve hit a gold mine. We’ll get started once breakfast is over.”
I let out a chuckle. “Thank you for the flattery, ma’am. I just want to help in any way I can.”
“Do you know the first thing about baking?” Kami challenges in a whisper.
I turn my gaze to her. “There’s a lot of things you still have yet to know about me, darlin’.”
She blinks at my clapback as I rise from my seat, kiss her forehead, and grab both of our now-empty plates.
Once the rest of the dishes are clean and put away, Aaron and John start working on the turkey outside on the back patio. Kami and Sofia head out the door shortly after.
After saying her goodbyes to her girls, Maria walks into the kitchen and claps her hands together. “Let’s get to work, Ian.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I chime. “Where should we start?”
I watch as Maria grabs a small booklet out of a nearby drawer and sets it on the island. Once she opens it, I see it’s a scrapbook with a variety of recipes.
She and I stand on opposite ends of the island as she quickly flips through one recipe after the other. I catch glimpses of different Mexican cuisine that make my mouth water. Every so often, she’d stops and plucks out a recipe.
Once she’s done, there are three recipes lying beside each other. One is for chocolate cake, one for pumpkin pie, and one for lemon bars.
And suddenly I’m hungry again.
“Lots to do today. Good thing I have an extra set of hands. Makes things easier and go faster.” She smiles to me as she ties a pink apron around her waist.
Once she’s done, she hands me a black one. I look at the front of the apron and chuckle. “Is John a Batman fan?”
The front shows an illustrated Batman suit from the pecs and abs and down to the groin.
She looks at me amused. “No, but my ex from a couple of years ago was. The only thing he graciously left behind was this apron.”
“Seems like he had good taste in superheroes.”
Grabbing large mixing bowls, she starts to prep. “Superheroes, I’m afraid, were the only things he had good taste in.”
“Poor guy.”
She shrugs. “His loss.”
“Well, you and John look great together,” I compliment, changing the subject.
“Thank you. Took a lot of frogs in my life after my ex-husband left to find my prince charming.” She looks out onto the back patio, watching John hold the turkey while Aaron begins to season it. “But in the end, he found me.”
Sending her a warm smile, I gather flour, eggs, and every other ingredient, then place them on the island.
There are so many questions that float in my mind. Where is Kami’s dad? Why did he leave? Why doesn’t Kami ever want to talk about her childhood?
“If you don’t mind my asking, Maria, what was Kami’s childhood like? I’d ask her myself, but she never seems to want to talk about it.”
“It’s no trouble at all. Kami is a very private person, even when she was little. She’s always been a bit shy.”
“I want to take care of her, but she hardly lets me.”
She nods with understanding lining her face. “That girl has always had an independent streak, especially after her father left. It’s nothing personal.”
I recall the vague reply Kami gave me when I asked about her father back in October.
My dad was never really in the picture.
Maria continues, her face growing somber. “How much has she told you about her childhood?”
“Just that her dad wasn’t really there in her life.” Out of respect, I decide to leave out the part where Kami called her mother a serial monogamist.
A long line etches across the woman’s face. “Since you’re basically family, you ought to know the truth. Her father and I were young when we had Kami. Taking care of a toddler as a college student working part time was not easy, but we made the most of it. Our marriage became strained though, after I had Sofia. I thought if we had another kid, our marriage could mend. But then I realized after some time, we weren’t the same people as when we met. I didn’t want to be with a man who chose work and hookups over his own family. He left a year later. Kami was only seven at the time.”
“Do Kami and Sofia see him?”
She shakes her head. “Sofia was barely a year old when he left, so she doesn’t remember him. Kami, though, would often ask to visit him, but he never responded when I asked him on her behalf. He paid child support and had shared custody with me, but he acted like we never existed. The last I heard from him, he just renewed his vows with his new wife.”
I stand there in surprise. I can’t imagine how hard it must have been for Kami to watch her dad walk out of her life. A man who she loved and thought loved her back no matter what, only for him to act cold toward her, wanting nothing to do with her. My blood starts to boil.
“When was the last time they talked to their father?” I do my best to hold in my anger.
Maria grimaces. “When Kami was seventeen, she traveled across the country to go see him for the summer.” She sniffles. “She came back home the next day. She told me later it was because he wouldn’t open the door.”
What an asshole.
I bunch my hands into fists.
She asked him to want her, but he said no. How soul-crushing that must have been for her. Is that why she didn’t think I’d stick around? Is that the reason she refuses to commit? Hearing her heartbreaking past makes me want to scoop her up in my arms, tell her that it’s going to be okay, and make damn sure she never has to experience that pain ever again.
While that answers most of my questions, it still doesn’t explain her annoyance with her mother and sister. Sure, they have a somewhat fairy-tale mentality when it comes to love, but I’m trying to understand why she’s made their relationships, or at least her mother’s, her business.
“It must have been difficult for Kami and Sofia to grow up without a father.”
Guilt forms on her face. “After he left, I went into a depressive state. I didn’t want to see his face, I didn’t want to talk about him, and I didn’t want to so much as hear his name or the word ‘dad.’ So I took all the photos of him out of the house. I didn’t want us, Kami especially, to miss him.”
“I can’t imagine going through a divorce while raising two girls by yourself,” I sympathize.
My mind goes back to the conversation Kami and I had the week before when her mother called her about John.
Your mom has dated a lot recently? I remember asking.
More like my whole life.…that woman wouldn’t know what a serious relationship was if it hit her in the face.
“It was just the girls and me for a bit.” Maria’s voice pulls me back to attention. “But then I started missing someone to sleep next to at night, and at the same time I still wanted my girls to grow up with a father figure. One of the first guys I met had me convinced we could be one happy family. He was with me for a year. But I woke up one morning to him packing his things. When I asked what was wrong, he completely ignored us. Even when Kami went to give him a hug like she always did in the mornings, he shoved her to the side, told her something that made her cry, and walked out of our lives. I found out later that he left us because he was already married and discovered his wife was pregnant. I didn’t always make the best choices in men, but things happen for a reason, right?”
Kami was a child when her dad left, and just when she thought she had a new father figure, that asshat pretended like she never mattered. Has she always felt like she doesn’t matter to any man? I can’t imagine being introduced to someone supposedly important to my mother, getting to know them, and growing attached to them, only for it all to be ripped away from me. The worst part is Kami and her sister never got a say. The relationships seem to have ended solely on their mother’s or her at-the-time boyfriend’s at the time, terms.
I’m also positive Maria’s revolving love life affected Kami’s views on love and relationships. It explains everything: her refusal to commit, her criticism of her mom’s choices, and her reluctance to consider being with me.
I don’t entirely blame her for faulting her mother for her actions. She is, in some part, at fault. She had a choice of who she dated and how she incorporated a man into their lives. What she didn’t have any control over, though, was being so coldly rejected.
I need to make Kami see I won’t walk out on her. Show her that I’m here to stay. Use not just my words, but also my actions. Right now, she thinks I’m like any guy, sexually or otherwise, who has come and gone throughout her life. If I want to convince her otherwise, I’ll have to prove myself to her.
I paste on a smile. “Yes, they do.”