15. Something Big
15
SOMETHING BIG
Diana
“ You don’t have to change!” I shouted down the hall. “ I’m not changing.”
We needed to leave imminently for dinner.
I was in the kitchen, trying to fashion a bow around Dad’s bottle of gin.
Maybe the bow was overkill, but I was nervous.
I didn’t want Dad to be a dick to Hugger , for one. That would end the night real soon, because I wouldn’t put up with it.
I didn’t want Dad to be a dick to me, either.
Of course, that would suck for me, but I wasn’t sure how Hugger would respond to it. Though , I did know neither Dad nor I wanted to find out, but Dad might want it less than me.
I was also nervous about Hugger .
There’d been a change in him since Madison left.
There was something almost fatalistic about him.
Sure , I could see how we’d started was weird. We hadn’t had a date. We’d had one kiss. Police and the FBI were a part of our lives. And we were living together and sleeping together without the fun sex parts that came with those.
And onward from all of this, our road was pretty rocky.
Hugger would have to go back home.
I would have to stay here.
I could say the emotion I felt was hate at the knowledge that, eventually, he was going to leave.
Just that. Him leaving.
This was how used to having him around I’d become.
And how much I liked it.
It got worse thinking we’d have to try to get to know each other over phone calls and texts, and figuring out times for visits, and then there was the expense of that.
I didn’t know a thing about motorcycle clubs outside what I learned when watching that documentary about Chaos , but I suspected, if you were in one, they wanted you to be in it , not living with some chick in another state. And what I learned in that documentary pretty much confirmed that suspicion.
As for me, well, it wasn’t like jobs in art conservation and preservation were a dime a dozen. They were pretty damned thin on the ground.
I was set here. I’d lived here my whole life, outside the time I spent in London .
But I’d really liked the time in London . The different food, weather, people.
Oh , God , I was becoming one of those women who searched for reasons to uproot her life for a man.
And the man for whom I was searching for these reasons I hadn’t even known a full week.
“ You also look good and have a nice outfit on,” Hugger’s voice came at me, so I looked up from not quite tying the bow to see him walk into the kitchen.
He had nice jeans on, a caramel-colored button-down that did great things for his tan skin, blond-brown hair and brown eyes. And his shoulder-length hair was back away from his face, not hanging in it, like usual. It didn’t look like there was any product in it. It appeared dry, but it stayed away from his face, and there were cute flips at the ends.
At the sight of Hugger’s version of cleaned up, I clamped my thighs together and prayed the padding of my bra was doing its job.
“ Don’t meet a woman’s dad lookin’ like a bum,” he finished, coming to a stop beside me.
“ You never look like a bum,” I retorted.
“ You know what I mean,” he said.
I did, and it meant a lot he made an effort.
Hugger , I had absolutely not failed to note, was all about effort, bringing me coffee, pitching in with the dishes, making the bed (really well, I fell into a thirty second freeze of shock that morning when I saw how, while I’d been doing my hair, he’d made the bed exactly like I did).
I was stunned he’d never lived with a woman. He acted like a man who’d been trained.
Then again, it was clear his mother had meant the world to him, so maybe it was her who did the training.
If so, I thanked her, because by all evidence gathered thus far, she did a phenomenal job.
Cautiously , because he didn’t hide anything (not a thing), but still, I could tell he sometimes felt awkward with some of the things we’d talked about that day, I asked, “ Have you met many parents?”
“ Dated a lot in high school,” he stated freely. “ Dads of high school girls tend to want to meet the boys their daughters are hanging out with. So yeah. Also met Mandy’s folks.”
“ Mandy ?”
“ The woman who lasted a coupla months.”
“ Ah .”
“ You ready to go?” he asked.
Guess we weren’t talking about that anymore.
“ I need to tie this bow,” I answered.
He looked to the bottle. “ Why ?”
Excellent question.
I pulled the ribbon off and grasped the bottle.
“ Ready to go,” I told him.
He smiled right before he frowned.
I understood his frown when he said, “ Probably need to take your fuckin’ car.”
I burst out laughing.
When I was done, I said, “ I think we just need to be us for Dad . We can take your bike.”
“ It fucks me to say this, and I’ll deny that I did until my dying breath, but I didn’t do shit to my hair to have it fucked up on a bike ride to your dad’s.”
I burst out laughing again.
And boy, one could say it warmed many parts of me, mostly around my heart, that it was clear he wanted to make a good impression on my father.
Hugger grabbed my hand, led me to my tote, let go of my hand and gave me the tote. I threw it over my shoulder. He claimed my hand again, and we walked out.
“ I’m drivin’,” he said when we were in the elevator going down.
After he made that declaration, before I knew what he was about, he reached and pulled the keys out of my fingers. I’d dug them out of my tote in order to fob us to the parking level.
“ You don’t know where Dad lives,” I stated the obvious.
“ You got a mouth. You can direct me,” he returned.
“ Women have been driving since there’ve been cars,” I pointed out.
“ I know,” he said as the doors opened.
He said no more.
He simply grabbed my hand again and pulled me out.
“ Can you explain then why I’m apparently not driving my own car?” I asked after he pushed through the vestibule doors and led us into the garage.
He stopped and looked down at me. Since we were attached, I stopped too and looked up at him.
“ No . Got absolutely no rational explanation for that.”
Well , that was honest.
He kept going.
“ What I can say is, I’ve never had a woman of my own, but I know there are some things that are gonna go down if I do.”
Oo .
Interesting .
“ And what are those things?” I asked, trying not to sound too eager for this information.
“ I drive.”
I frowned.
He grinned and added, “ And she won’t take out the garbage. Ever .”
Hmm .
I liked this.
I wasn’t sure anyone enjoyed taking out the garbage, but what I knew was, I didn’t.
“ Unless she’s got some knowledge of them, any vehicles we own are my domain,” he went on.
I liked this too because I had no knowledge of them, but also because the maintenance and purchasing of them was a pain in the ass.
“ I don’t do yards, but she’s not gonna either. We’ll hire out,” he continued.
“ What if she likes doing yards?” I asked, regardless of the fact that I’d never done yardwork in my life, and I hoped I lived the rest of it not doing any.
He narrowed his eyes on me. “ You like doing yardwork?”
“ I’ve never done it, but even so, I feel I can safely proclaim that I do not.”
“ So in this context, does the answer to your question matter?”
“ Kind of. I mean, if she likes mowing and trimming and all of that, would you not let her do it?”
He thought about this.
And then he said, “ Yeah , but then I’d have to do it with her.”
“ Why ?”
“ Multiple reasons.”
“ Name two,” I challenged.
“ One , because she might like doin’ it, but it’s still work. Shit can get under your skin, you think you’re carrying more than your share of the load. So I’d pitch in so she didn’t think she was carrying me.”
That was a ridiculously good answer.
“ Two ,” he carried on, “because my guess is, if she’s my woman, I like spending time with her, so even if you don’t dig everything she digs, you find ways to spend time together.”
Oh my fucking God .
That was a ridiculously good answer too.
How was this guy all that was this guy ?
“ We done with your interrogation?” he asked.
“ I’m not interrogating you,” I declared.
His head tipped to the side and one side of his lips hitched up.
I rolled my eyes and tugged his hand to get us going again, admitting, “ Okay . Minor interrogation. Relax . I didn’t pull out the thumbscrews.” I paused for maximum comical effect. “ This time.”
He chuckled and beeped the locks on my car.
I got in the passenger side of Baby Shark , a seat I’d never taken.
It was comfy.
As I put on my belt, Hugger adjusted the driver’s side before he even attempted to fold in.
It seemed he did it without too much trouble, however, he looked squeezed in once he closed the door.
And now I was considering buying a new car…for a man. Even if it’d be my car and only sometimes would he be driving it.
Yeesh .
I had it bad.
The thing was, deep down, I didn’t really care.
No .
I was pretending to care because I felt like I was supposed to, even though it felt totally right having it bad for Hugger .
“ Are you comfortable?” I inquired while he was latching his belt.
“ No . Because I’m scared as fuck one of Phoenix’s desperado drivers is gonna make us become one with this scrap of metal.”
That was when I chuckled and leaned forward to program Dad’s address into the satnav so Hugger could get us there without me having to direct him.
We headed out.
“ Do you only own your bike?” I asked.
“ Nope . We get weather in Denver , so I also got a truck.”
“ What color is it?”
“ Silver .”
“ Do you like snow?”
“ Lanie and Hop got a place up in Vail . They let anyone use it if they aren’t up there. I like to head up when it snows. Their place is away from the slopes. Peaceful . Seems more of that when snow is on the ground.”
I could see that.
“ Don’t like drivin’ in it,” he continued. “ I know how. Others don’t. They’re the problem and you got no control over it.”
“ I’ve never driven in snow, and I need a jacket if it gets close to seventy degrees,” I shared.
He busted out laughing.
I reveled in it because I was noticing he didn’t laugh all that much.
There were smiles, chuckles, but not much laughter.
Through it, he asked, “ Seventy degrees?”
“ I’ve got desert girl blood.”
“ I guess so,” he murmured, and chuckled anew, saying. “ Seventy degrees. You must have been in hell in London .”
“ Oddly , no. I grew to form a great appreciation for jumpers and boots.”
“ Jumpers ?”
“ What they call sweaters.”
“ Why do they call them jumpers?”
“ No idea. Though it was fun learning all their different words for things,” I told him, then asked, “ Have you been out of the country?”
He took a turn on Lincoln Drive . “ Nope .”
“ Ever want to go?”
He shifted his ass in his seat and said, “ Never really thought about it.”
He “never really thought about” what he wanted to be when he grew up either.
I found that alarming when I learned it, as I thought it alarming that he hadn’t thought about vacationing outside the US .
If he said, “ Nothing I want to see outside this great country,” I would get it, even if I wouldn’t agree with it, because I wanted to go everywhere. It was part of who I was. It was part of why I became who I became.
“ I’d already been to London ,” I shared. “ Dad took me when I was, I don’t know, I think thirteen. We also took a cruise down the Rhine when I was fifteen. It started in Amsterdam and went through Germany , Belgium and Switzerland . And for my sweet sixteen, he gave me an Italy trip. Rome , Milan , Florence . Seeing the architecture, going to the museums was why I decided to do what I do for a living.”
“ What was your favorite place?”
“ Probably Florence , for the art. But Switzerland is crazy gorgeous, so there for the landscape. Lucerne seriously is downright magical.”
“ Would you go back, or would you want to try something new?”
“ Both . Though , the new stuff first.” I took a beat then asked, “ Would you go?”
“ Fuck yeah,” he said. “ Hire a bike, ride through Europe . Reckon that would be the shit.”
I relaxed.
Because yes.
That would be the shit.
“ Did you have fun with your dad on those trips?” he queried.
I thought about it, then it was me shifting in my seat.
“ Yeah ,” I said, realizing I’d been so busy holding my grudge, I’d forgotten something important. “ He’s a different man away from the office, and he loves to travel. His family wasn’t destitute, but they didn’t have a lot, and he’d always wanted to go places and see things. I mean, part of it was Dad being Dad . He wanted me to experience stuff that wasn’t my every day, so there was a lot of urging to try foods I wasn’t sure I wanted to try, and no matter how much I loved it, he could spend years in museums, and as a kid, that got tired. But he says a mind narrows when a person narrows their world. Like they don’t travel. They don’t try different foods. They don’t expose themselves to different things, like music or theater or whatever. We used to have this?—”
I stopped speaking abruptly because I forgot about this too.
And I’d loved doing it with my dad.
Hugger held his hand my way, palm up.
I placed mine in it.
Once he’d curled his fingers around and rested it on his (very hard, though I’d discovered that already with all our snuggling) thigh, he asked gently, “ You used to have this what?”
“ Monthly movie night,” I croaked out, then cleared the sudden emotion that clogged my throat. “ It was sacrosanct. Even if he had a big case happening, he carved out two hours to watch a movie with me. One month was his choice, and I had to watch whatever it was. One month it was mine, and same. We did that for as long as I can remember. Even before he and Mom divorced. And that was the last thing we did together, the night before we moved me to school. It was our thing.”
“ He pick good movies?”
“ It’s how I know about Monty Python . So , yeah.”
His fingers closed tighter around mine. “ Baby , people fall out. We’re headed to dinner with him. All isn’t lost.”
I hadn’t told him about my mom’s texts, or my conversation with Big Petey , and I hadn’t had the time to dive into some of the weirdness I was feeling around that.
I didn’t have the time now, because Hugger was turning right on Tatum , so we were maybe five minutes from Dad’s place.
But I had to focus on the present because he was right.
All wasn’t lost.
Man , I really hoped my dad wasn’t a dick to Hugger .
Though , since we had this getting-to-know-time, I wanted to go over one more thing.
“ So , I saw it in the documentary, that insignia tattooed on your back. That’s Chaos , right?” I asked.
“ Yup . Chaos’s mark. All the guys got ’em.”
Ah .
“ And the one under your shoulder at the front?” I continued.
“ Chaos history. A lesson. All the brothers have it too. You saw the story in that doc, though Rebel kept some stuff that’s personal to us, like that tat, just for us. What it means is, we lost Black , Dutch and Jag’s dad, we almost lost Cherry , or Tyra , but Tack calls her Red , and this happened when the men were messed up in seriously stupid shit. But it isn’t play stupid games, win stupid prizes. It’s , be stupid and do stupid shit, lose what matters.”
That tat was a scale, with one side saying Black with a grim reaper type figure floating above it, and the other side saying Red with blood dripping off it.
It was way cool, but a little scary.
Now I understood why.
“ No other tats for you?” I asked.
Since I’d seen most of his body, but not all of it, I was just checking.
“ I’m not a tat guy. Wouldn’t have these if it wasn’t for the brotherhood. I don’t mind it, but I don’t have a hankering to get more.” He glanced at me. “ You got any?”
“ Nope .”
“ Not a tat gal?” he queried.
“ Tattoos are art, like yours are, so I like them. I just guess I never had a hankering for one either. Though , if I do, I won’t hesitate.”
“ Yeah ,” he murmured and flipped on the signal to indicate our turn into Dad’s community.
His community was gated, but he left our names at the gate, thus the attendant let us through with no issue.
The reminder of the gate, however, made me wonder how Hugger’s brothers were looking after my father when he was home.
“ Might not have grown up with much,” Hugger began, “but he found his way to it.”
He had, and the mini mansions in Dad’s neighborhood screamed it.
Not long later, Hugger pulled into Dad’s hacienda style home on a low whistle.
“ You okay?” I asked as he parked.
He turned to me and asked in return, “ You mean, am I intimidated by the fact the man who owns this home doesn’t have to have a big dick?”
I burst out laughing again.
I stopped when he drew the backs of his fingers down my jaw and said, “ No , babe. Learned a long time ago, I am who I am, I got what I got, and if people think shit about it, fuck ’em. Also , no good comes from wanting what you haven’t got. If you want it enough, get it. If you don’t get it, you either didn’t want it bad enough or it wasn’t yours to have.”
Okay , we were in my dad’s driveway, a place I hadn’t been in a decade, and the imminent dinner was anxiety-inducing, to say the least.
It didn’t matter.
I let my seatbelt fly and leaned across the short expanse to press my lips to Hugger’s .
He caught me at the back of my neck, so I tilted my head and opened my mouth.
He angled his head and accepted my invitation.
And I had Hugger’s tongue back, his taste, the darkness of it, the manliness of it, the thrill of it.
All of it was sublime.
Fortunately , he ended the kiss before I crawled into his lap, which was what I was keen to do, but I figured dry humping Hugger in my Fiat in Dad’s driveway might not lend to us having a successful mending-fences dinner with my dad.
“ Let’s do this,” he whispered.
I nodded.
He touched his mouth to mine then got out of the car.
I took hold of the gin, my tote, got out, rounded the hood, and there was no hand holding as we walked to the front door.
Nope , Hugger threw his arm around my shoulders and guided me there. He also hit the bell.
We didn’t stand there for very long before Dad , wearing casual gray trousers and a silvery-blue long-sleeved polo shirt, opened the door.
He looked at me first, smiled, then looked up at Hugger , his smile vanished and his eyes got huge.
Oh boy.
“ Hey , Dad ,” I greeted.
Dad tore his attention from Hugger and looked back at me.
“ I got you some gin,” I announced, then pushed the bottle his direction.
Dang , I was nervous.
He stared at the bottle.
He glanced at Hugger .
Then he looked at me with such relief and warmth in his eyes, my legs nearly buckled.
He took the bottle from me like it was priceless crystal and bid, “ Come inside.”
We did, but I did it shakily due to Dad acting like Hendrick’s was priceless.
I mean, he lived in a seven thousand square foot pad in Paradise Valley , he could afford better than Hendrick’s , even if Hendrick’s was great.
“ This is Harlan ,” I said, indicating Hugger with a weird, restless flick of my hand. “ Harlan McCain . Harlan , this is my dad. Nolan Armitage .”
Dad offered a hand. “ Harlan .”
Hugger took it. “ Nolan .”
“ Let’s get in and get you some drinks,” Dad invited when they broke.
As we followed him, I noticed Dad had added a few pieces to his collection of art, but other than that, the home I shared with him when we moved into it when I was fifteen hadn’t changed much.
We hit the back family room, which was close to the kitchen, and on the other side was the dining room, all of which had views to the beautifully landscaped courtyard and the equally beautifully landscaped pool in the backyard, and Dad offered, “ What can I get you to drink?”
I wanted to mainline vodka, so I said, “ A dirty martini.”
Dad nodded and turned to Hugger .
“ I’m drivin’, so nothin’, unless you got a pop,” he said.
“ I’ve got Coke and Sprite ,” Dad told him.
“ Coke’d do me,” Hugger replied.
Dad went to the built-in bar, saying, “ Make yourselves comfortable.”
God , this was so strange.
I kinda grew up here. This had been my home. And as far as I knew, a person’s childhood home, no matter they moved into it when they were a teenager, and moved out of it still as a teenager, was always their home.
But I felt like a stranger here, and it made it worse when Dad urged me to make myself comfortable.
Hugger pulled me to one of two white couches facing each other perpendicular to an adobe fireplace.
We sat, doing it close at Hugger’s physical command, and Hugger remarked, “ Nice house.”
“ I’m thinking of downsizing,” Dad said from the bar.
That sorta hurt.
Why did that sorta hurt?
“ It’s a lot for one man,” Hugger noted.
“ Precisely ,” Dad agreed.
Okay , the strange quotient kept climbing, considering Dad hadn’t even roused himself to look askance at a big dude with long hair and an unkempt beard wearing nice jeans and a shirt, but doing this with motorcycle boots.
Dad approached with a fancy tall glass filled with chipped ice and Coke and gave it to Hugger .
“ Thanks , man,” Hugger muttered, taking it.
Dad returned to the bar asking, “ How did you two meet?”
“ In an elevator,” I said quickly, glancing sideways at Hugger .
He was smiling into his Coke .
Dad had no more to say, even when he came to me with a filled martini glass that included a silver pick stabbed through four fat olives.
I took it from him with murmured gratitude and tried not to down it in one.
He made his own martini (with the Hendrick’s ) and moved to sit opposite us.
Now the strange quotient was off the charts, because my father was sitting opposite me, but I had no clue what to say.
“ How is Suzette ?” Dad asked.
“ She’s been moved to protective custody,” I told him.
Was it me? Or did his shoulders slightly slump with relief?
“ I think that’s wise,” he remarked. “ Was she okay with it?”
“ She’s with her parents, so yes,” I said.
Dad’s brows drew together. “ She’s with her parents?”
“ Actually , her name is Madison . She was abducted in Texas , trafficked, purchased by Imran Babi?’s son, who was the one, along with a couple of his buds, who violated her,” I shared.
Dad winced.
“ Imran got in touch with her, threatened her, forcing her to make a false report,” I went on. “ All that’s straightened out now.”
“ In the end, you should know, I was pleased you encouraged me to drop him as a client. I can’t say all my clients are angels, but, particularly, Babi? is not a good man,” Dad proclaimed.
I didn’t exactly encourage him.
But if he wanted to look at it that way, I’d take it.
Dad kept going.
“ His son is…” a long hesitation before he finished, “worse.”
I’d never met the guy, didn’t want to, but I knew he was definitely… worse .
Dad then looked to Hugger . “ Thank you for looking after my daughter and, erm, Madison through that.”
“ My job as her guy,” Hugger replied smoothly before sipping from his Coke .
I bumped him with an elbow.
He made no show I did it except I caught an upward twitch of his beard.
“ All right,” Dad said, suddenly talking in his booming lawyer voice, which made me jump.
Hugger slid an arm along my shoulders.
Dad kept talking, and he did this directly to me.
“ I’d like to get past this first part as it might be something that will make you annoyed, but it must be done, so let’s do it and move beyond it.”
Here we go.
Before I could waylay him in possibly being a dick, Dad kept going.
“ I’ve set up a trust with what I’m assuming was your tuition, and also rent and an allocation for food and sundries,” he began. “ This for both your undergraduate and graduate degrees. There will be tax implications for any income and distributions you get from it. But you don’t have to pay taxes on the principal. If you have any questions about any of that, you can speak to my accountant.”
I sat very still and said not a word.
Because I very well knew that if he was covering those expenses, that trust had to be well over a hundred thousand dollars.
“ I would really rather you not attempt to refuse it, Diana ,” Dad stated. “ It’s yours. It was my privilege as your father to offer it to you. I didn’t get that chance, and I understand why. This is simply me, in part, rectifying my mistake.”
When the silence stretched so long after he stopped talking, I forced myself to say something.
“ I , uh… Dad , that has to be a lot of money.”
“ It was set aside for you already,” he returned. “ At least for your undergraduate. I just added to it when I heard you got your master’s.”
I was processing a lot, but…
Hang on a second.
This wasn’t the first time he noted stuff about me that he shouldn’t know.
I mean, he said he had friends who were clients of Annie’s , but, although I was on Annie to update her website, which was barely functional outside giving people contact info and a list of services, she did not have bios of staff on there. And as far as I knew, she didn’t hand my CV to current or prospective clients.
In other words, this was fishy and gave me a funny feeling.
“ Who told you I got my master’s?” I asked.
He sipped from his martini before he murmured, “ Your mother delighted in keeping me informed of all I’d been missing.”
Uh -oh.
Color me still raw about the situation with Mom and her defunct visit, but I was getting mad.
And freaked.
“ She didn’t tell me she did that,” I noted.
Dad said nothing.
“ Why would she do that?” I asked.
Dad took another sip from his martini, and again said nothing.
“ Dad ,” I prompted.
Dad sighed.
“ I’m sorry for it, been sorry for it nearly your entire life, Diana ,” Dad said. “ But me and your mother not getting along is not something you’re unfamiliar with.”
“ You’ve been divorced for over two decades,” I pointed out. “ She’s remarried, lives in another state, and I’m grown. There really isn’t any reason you two should be speaking at all.”
“ I was glad to have the updates.”
“ I can see that. But Mom knew we had a falling out, and the way you said she shared intel about me makes me think it was something she was lording over you.”
Hugger’s arm around my shoulders tightened.
“ I should have chosen different words,” Dad murmured.
“ But she was lording it over you,” I stated.
“ She didn’t make it a secret she was pleased we weren’t speaking,” Dad allowed.
“ And she told you stuff that, if I wanted you to know, I would have told you. Topping that, she didn’t mention once in ten years she was keeping you apprised of my life.”
“ Diana —” Dad tried.
“ She bought a plane ticket to come down here and have a shopping spree this weekend,” I announced.
Dad’s lips thinned.
Mm -hmm.
Hugger moved his hand so it was wrapped around the back of my neck.
That was sweet, supportive, but still.
“ And she didn’t ask me. I told her she couldn’t come. I didn’t know we’d have that breakthrough with Maddy and get her safe. She wasn’t pleased.”
“ Your mother tends to like to get what she wants when she wants it, this isn’t something you don’t know either, Diana ,” Dad said.
I made another announcement.
“ Nicole encouraged me to mend fences with you.”
Dad looked to his crossed knee and muttered like Hugger and I weren’t sitting right across from him, “ Now , Nicole was a good woman, and I fucked that up.”
“ Are you serious?” I asked.
His eyes came to mine. “ Diana? —”
“ She said there was something I’m now old enough to know. What is that?”
Dad’s face blanched.
Oh God .
It was something.
Something big.
“ What is that?” I demanded.
“ Baby ,” Hugger whispered.
“ What is it?” I pushed Dad , ignoring Hugger .
Dad looked me right in the eye and asked, or more like pleaded, “ Can we have a nice dinner, Buttercup , catch up and leave the harder stuff for later?”
The “ Buttercup ” was a good touch.
But …
No way.
“ Let’s get it all out there,” I suggested.
“ I’m not sure you want your man hearing this.”
Now I was less mad and more freaked.
Because …
Hearing what?
“ Dad —”
“ Diana , really?—”
“ Dad !” I snapped.
Hugger made a move to get up, which meant he let me go, and I didn’t like that at all.
“ Maybe I’ll just—” he began.
“ No .” I was still snapping. “ You want to know me, you get to know this.”
“ Diana ,” Dad bit.
I stared Hugger in the eyes and whispered, “ I need you, honey.”
A sort of manly wonder washed over his handsome face, a look I instantly adored.
It was quickly followed by a rush of warmth, and I adored that look too.
After gifting me with those, Hugger settled back in.
“ Harlan and I are very honest with each other. We don’t hold anything back,” I declared to Dad , and I realized then we didn’t, and that was awesome.
“ Fine then, maybe we can get into it later,” Dad replied.
“ Is it something big?” I asked.
Dad took another sip of his drink.
Avoiding the question.
“ Dad , is it something big?”
Again , my father locked eyes with me and he said, “ Your mother was having an affair with Brendon Malley well before I began things with Nicole .”
I gasped so hard, I nearly choked.
“ In fact, I’d already obtained a divorce attorney and had asked her for a divorce by the time I started things with Nicole ,” Dad continued.
My mouth dropped open.
“ Brendon came from family money,” Dad kept at it. “ We were raising a daughter on one income and scraping together the money for me to buy in as an equity partner, and as such, I had to say no to Margaret too often for her liking. Brendon didn’t say no.”
The single most sucky part of this?
I believed it.
Every word.
“ She cheated on you first?” I whispered, and Hugger’s hand was back at my neck, warm and snug.
I wanted to feel better with his touch, and I did.
But my father just rocked my world.
“ She did,” Dad affirmed.
“ She told me you did.”
“ I know.”
Oh my God .
I jumped from my seat and shouted, “ Why didn’t you tell me?”
Dad stood too, as did Hugger .
Hugger’s hand lighted on the small of my back and immediately commenced stroking.
Dad spoke. “ Why would I do that?”
“ Why ? ” I all but screeched.
“ Diana —”
I slammed my glass down on the table between me and my father, thankful it didn’t shatter, and straightened, saying, “ She made you out to be the bad guy.”
“ And what was I to do?” Dad asked. “ Cast your mother in that role?”
I threw out both hands and cried, “ Yes ! Since she earned it.”
“ When you have children, sweetheart,” Dad said quietly, “you’ll understand.”
“ You protected her,” I whispered.
“ No . I protected you.”
Holy shit .
I turned into Hugger and he wrapped his arms around me.
I was not going to cry.
I was not .
Instead , I deep-breathed as Hugger smoothed his hand up and down my back.
It was like he felt I was getting a lock on it because I’d just started doing that when he bent and murmured into my ear, “ Not sure it’s me you should be hugging, baby.”
I looked up at him.
Then I turned to Dad . “ Were you going to tell me when I got old enough?”
Dad shook his head. “ I was never going to tell you.”
“ I always blamed you for the divorce.”
“ I know, Buttercup , and you always loved your mother unreservedly. Girls need their mothers like that.”
“ They need their dads too.”
Dad’s face fell and he said, “ Maybe I mishandled it.”
“ No ,” I said fiercely. “ No . No , Dad . You didn’t mishandle it at all.”
And with that, I walked around the coffee table and threw myself in my father’s arms.
He caught me, of course.
He’d done that all my life.
I just didn’t know.
And when I did know, I either didn’t notice or didn’t give him credit for it.
That was about the time I got mascara all over his shiny, silvery-blue polo shirt.
Dad didn’t mind.