Chapter 31
Chapter Thirty-One
Bennett
My parents are big on weekly family dinners, so I figure I’ll just tell everyone tonight, then take Wren for a long walk around the lake on the way home and tell her that her new best friend is actually her sister.
“Hello!” I call when Wren opens the door to my mom and dad’s place.
Mack, Lottie and Brooks’s dog, saunters over, and Wren falls down to her knees, giving him a hug. I didn’t even think about using Mack, but he might be my tool to get Wren out of the house.
“Hey, why don’t you play with Mack outside?” I say, tossing the tennis ball at her that’s always covered in drool.
“Okay!”
“I’ll go with her,” Lottie says before kissing Brooks as if they can’t be apart for more than ten minutes.
“Actually, um… I need you here.” She stops, then glances at Brooks.
“Let’s go, Wren, you’ll never guess how far I threw the ball the other day.” Brooks kisses his wife’s cheek, and I try not to roll my eyes at their PDA since he’s doing me a solid and getting Wren out of here.
They leave with Wren rambling to Brooks about the end-of-year school field trip next week and how she wants to see the giraffes eat standing up.
The door shuts, and I turn around to see Lottie standing with her arms crossed. “What’s up?”
I bypass her and go to the kitchen where Romy is sitting on a stool with the street corn dip in front of her and a bag of corn chips.
“Way to wait for the rest of us.” I steal a chip.
“Bennett has something to tell us,” Lottie announces to the room.
“You’re marrying Delaney?” Dad holds out his hand toward my mom. “I won.”
“I owe you nothing. You said it would happen a month from now.” Mom wipes her hand on a dish towel and turns away from the stove. “What is it?”
“Thanks for that.” I glare at Lottie.
“You’re welcome,” she sing-songs. She steals a chip and dips it in the street corn dip. Romy practically growls.
All eyes are on me, and it makes me wonder if I should’ve given this more thought and gone about it another way. But here we are, so I might as well just put it out there.
“Okay well… Leia… Delaney’s daughter?”
“Oh my god, spit it out,” Romy says. She’s still gobbling the chips.
Lottie covers her mouth and says loudly, “She’s cranky.”
Off my train of thought, I ask Romy, “Where have you been?”
Her head rears back, and her arms fly in the air. “Will people stop asking me that? I have other friends besides people who live on this ranch.”
“Like who?” Lottie asks with a laugh.
Romy shakes her head. “What did you have to say, B?”
I take in my youngest sister. Something is definitely going on with her. She’s wearing her pajamas, and her hair is thrown into a messy bun, but it looks like it wasn’t even brushed first. No makeup.
“Hello?” Lottie waves her hand in front of my face.
“She’s my daughter.” I spit it out because I have limited time with Wren outside.
“Leia, she’s mine.” I glance around for a second.
“Delaney was in California when I was there. Kristie and I weren’t seeing eye to eye…
” I push a hand through my hair and cringe.
“Actually, she slept with Jon, so I moved out. We separated and had started divorce proceedings. Delaney started at the same company as me, and we kind of…”
“Well, we know what you did, son,” my dad says, eyebrows raised.
My mom swats the dish towel at his arm. “Let him continue.”
“We started to date, but then Kristie came back and said she was pregnant with Wren. So, I ended it with Delaney, and we moved back here to try to give it another go.”
My mom shifts her attention back to the pan of chicken.
Lottie’s mouth is wide open.
Romy shoves another chip in her mouth and shrugs. “Nice, big bro, you knocked up two women at the same time. Is he still your favorite, Mom?” she mumbles, pieces of chips falling onto her chest.
“Wait.” Lottie puts up her hand. “You just now found this out, or you knew all these years about Leia?”
My lips thin, and I glare at her. “Seriously? You think I’d just tell Delaney to screw herself and our baby?”
At least she looks sheepish. “Well, you left out the part that she hid the kid from you.” Lottie leans over the counter and pulls out another chip, not even fighting Romy for the dip, but eating it plain.
“I just found out.”
“So, she’s not the drug lord’s?” Dad asks.
“Apparently not.”
Romy snaps her fingers and points to Lottie. “That explains it.”
“Yup,” Lottie says with a nod.
“What?” I look between them.
“The other day, I had to go over and pick up the centerpieces for that retirement party, and Lottie was with me. Poppy was driving Delaney’s car, and Delaney was crying. They didn’t want anything to do with us. So…”
“Poppy knew before us.” Lottie narrows her eyes. “Who else knows?”
“Emmett,” I admit, knowing it will piss them off, but he’s my best friend. There’s a reason Nash called him to come check on me. “She was crying?”
“Of course she was crying,” my mom says.
“Darla…” my dad says, going to her side and wrapping his arm around her back.
“What?” I ask my mom.
She drops the spoon on the rest and turns to face me.
“Of course she was crying, Bennett. Her entire world, everything that made her feel safe and secure, has blown up. She doesn’t know who to trust, who to lean on.
Just imagine, the person you choose to marry, the one you’re supposed to be the most vulnerable with has been lying to you the entire time.
Isn’t at all the person you thought they were. ”
“And here I thought you’d be on my side. I had a daughter, and she didn’t tell me about her for years.”
My mom says nothing but gives my dad a look.
I throw my arms up at my sides. “Unbelievable. You’re taking her side.”
Lottie and Romy glance at one another.
“I’m just saying I’m sure she had her reasons,” my mom says.
“Fucking hell. Dad?” This isn’t the mom I know.
“I think your mother is saying that we know Delaney well, and this is out of character for her. Did you ask what her reasons were?”
“So, Kristie slept with Jon, your roommate from college?” Romy’s eyes narrow as Lottie shakes her head.
“He was always so full of himself.” Lottie sticks out her tongue in disgust.
“And you took her back?” Romy frowns.
“Broke up with Delaney for her?” Lottie chimes in.
“I did it for Wren… you know, the little girl throwing a ball to your dog outside.” I stuff my hands in my pockets.
“Okay, girls.” Dad holds out his hand. “Let’s all remember that Bennett just told us that we have a new granddaughter and niece.” He tips his head toward my mom then my sisters.
“So what’s the plan?” Romy asks around a chip.
“Seriously, how are you going to eat dinner?” Lottie nods at the bag of chips.
Romy rolls her eyes. “Don’t worry about me. When do we get to meet her?”
“I already did,” Lottie says. “Mom picked her and Wren up from school, and they came by the store. Good thing Delaney’s genes are strong.”
“She has Bennett’s eyes,” Mom says, spooning rice into a bowl.
“You knew?” I ask her.
She shrugs. “Suspected. I mean, I saw that Sean guy’s pictures, and she sure doesn’t look like him. But what reason did I have to think she was yours? You never told us about you and Kristie separating or that Delaney and you were an item in California.” She hasn’t looked at me once.
“There didn’t seem like any point in telling you once I knew Kristie was pregnant, and we were coming back to Willowbrook together.”
“So these past seven years have been what exactly? You unable to move on with your life? Why haven’t you if you were able to move on after you separated from Kristie?” She hands my dad the bowl of rice, and he takes it to the table.
“I wasn’t trying to raise a daughter by myself back then.”
“Oh, okay,” Mom says, putting the chicken in a separate bowl and holding it out for Lottie.
“Just say it,” I snap.
My dad comes back in from the dining table and gives me his stern fatherly look. “Watch it.”
“You’re clearly Team Delaney, so I want to hear your excuse as to why it’s okay that she kept from me the fact she was pregnant with my daughter. To have that monster of a man raise her instead of me.”
My mom walks by me and goes into the dining room.
“Mom?”
She turns around and locks her gaze on me. “That’s for you to figure out, not me.”
I throw my arms in the air and look at my sisters who aren’t agreeing that it’s absurd that Mom’s being like this. “Aren’t you upset that you lost out on time with your granddaughter? Don’t you care?”
She slams the spoon on the table. “Of course I’m upset and saddened, but how will that help right now? Is me being mad or questioning Delaney going to change what happened? No, it’s not. The only control I have is what happens now.”
The door opens, and Mack runs in, tongue hanging out, stopping at Lottie. She bends and pets him. “Oh, Mack, you missed it. Sorry, buddy, but good news, you have another playmate coming soon.” She eyes me with a smirk.
Fucking hell.
“I’m hungry,” Wren says, coming in a minute later with Brooks behind her, assessing the room.
“Let’s eat.” Dad picks her up and swings her around. Her squeal of laughter loosens the tension in the room.
Dinner is quiet since no one says much, but everyone’s gaze roams across the table every time Wren brings up her friend Leia.