16.
R IN
“I’d like to talk if you’re not busy.”
“Shit!” I hissed as I stared at the phone, watching the three little dots appear and then disappear a few times. “That looks like the beginning of a break-up text.”
Suddenly, my phone rang, and, since I wasn’t expecting it, I jumped and fumbled the damn thing. It fell onto Grim, who howled in outrage and swiped my arm with his razor-sharp claws.
I managed to catch the phone just as I yelled, “You sorry little fucker!”
“Uh . . . hello?”
“That’s it! I’m getting a dog!” I yelled as I put the phone to my ear. “Sorry, Stan. I was in the middle of a domestic squabble.”
“Who started it?”
“I dropped the phone on Grim, so he tried to amputate my arm.”
“That sounds . . . dramatic.”
“This cat is so mean that he gets along with my sister, and that’s saying something because she doesn’t like anyone .”
“I need to see a picture of this horrid beast.”
“Hold on,” I said as I put her on speaker. I scrolled through my photos and sent her a few before I explained, “He’s not very photogenic.”
“Aww,” Stan said, in that way women did when they were about to rescue a wild animal. “The poor baby looks so sad.”
“That’s not sadness, Stan. That’s rage.”
“He’s just misunderstood. Pitiful little sweetie.”
I hit the button to turn our phone conversation into a video call and waited for Stan to accept the invitation so I could finally see her face. Once I did, I said, “You’ll think differently about him the first time he attacks you because his dinner is late or you moved his favorite pillow.”
“Am I going to get to meet him?” Stan asked uncertainly.
“I’d like for you to.”
“I wasn’t sure.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t realize how vaguely shitty that text sounded until I’d already sent it.”
“I was worried that this would be a goodbye conversation.”
“I don’t want it to be.”
“Neither do I, but we really should talk.”
“When are you coming home?”
“We’ve reserved the jet for tomorrow night. We’ll leave here late and fly through the night to Texas, drop off Aunt Frankie and Santa, and then fly home. Our car is at the airport, so my guess is that we’ll be there before you wake up.”
“And you’ll sleep on the plane?”
“That’s the plan.”
“Call me when you get to town, and I’ll meet you for breakfast. My first appointment is midmorning, and I have another scheduled for the afternoon, but I don’t want to wait all day to see you.”
“I’d like that. Where can we meet?”
“My cousins have a place called Wake-N-Bake. Let’s meet there. I’ll send you the address.”
“I can’t wait.”
“We can talk now if you’re up for it.”
“I take it you read my letter.”
“I did.”
“And the journal?”
“I did not. That’s your history, and it should be shared with Park and Sully, not me.”
“I just wanted to be completely transparent with you.”
“I appreciate that, but can you wake me up and kiss me goodbye before you leave me naked and alone in your big ass house the next time you have to leave suddenly?”
Stan laughed before she said, “I promise. I don’t think I’ll be flying off in the middle of the night all that often, but when I do, I will either drag you with me or at least give you a kiss goodbye.”
“Thank you. And I promise that before I leave on our family’s private jet, I’ll do the same.”
Stan blushed before she said, “It’s just easier to bum a ride than to try to deal with three grumpy guards on a commercial flight.”
“I’m not trying to give you shit. Use what you’ve got, sweetheart. I hate flying because there’s always someone in my space. I can’t imagine what it would be like to have an entire plane to myself.”
“Maybe when I’m getting along better with my dad, I can bring you to the city for a tour.”
“Why are you and your dad at odds?”
“He doesn’t understand what’s going on between me, Sully, and Park, and I think he resents the fact that I wouldn’t listen to him and left after he absolutely forbade me from doing so.”
“I’m not sure my parents have ever forbidden me from doing anything. Maybe when I was a kid, but not since that I can remember.”
“Dad just wants what’s best for me, and even though I hate it when we argue, I felt like leaving to be with them was the right thing, so I stuck to my guns.”
“I would bet there’s a small part of him that respects that.”
“I doubt it.”
“You’ll never know unless you ask.”
“We have barely talked since I got here. There’s this tension between us that I’m not sure how to get through.”
“I can’t imagine not being able to talk to my dad and Papa. They’re my sounding boards for damn near everything. When I’m really perplexed, I call in the big guns and bring my uncles into the mix.”
“How often does that happen?”
“It happened this afternoon.”
“Really?”
“I read your letter and went for a ride to give it some thought and clear my head, but I just kept thinking in circles, so I sent an SOS text and we met at the cabin to talk it out.”
“I bet they think I’m crazy.”
“They don’t.”
“What was their opinion on the subject then?”
“That you’re loyal and loving and stuck it out when most people would have run away. They agreed that your unwavering support of your exes says more about your character than you can imagine.”
“They said that?”
“ I said that. They agreed with me.”
“Oh.”
“I do have one question, though. Well, more than one, but we’ll start small.”
“What’s your question?”
“Is it normal for people who have only been on one date with each other to have such an intense connection?”
“I don’t think so.”
“So, you feel it too?”
“I do.”
“Good.Second question.”
“Go for it.”
“Is it normal for people who have only known each other for a few weeks to have such an in-depth conversation about exes and the future?”
“Absolutely not.”
“I didn’t think so, yet here we are.”
“I just wanted to be forthright from the start. When we were in bed together, I was suddenly overcome with guilt.”
I winced before I said, “That’s not good.”
“Actually, it was. I felt like I still had a thread of a connection to Park and Sully because I’ve never actually said that what we had is over.
Even though it ended because of things that were entirely beyond our control, I felt like I should make it official.
That’s why I wrote those letters - so that if they remember what we had someday, there would be an explanation of how things ended between us and why I moved on.
” Stan chuckled before she said, “I know it sounds crazy, but . . .”
“I don’t think it sounds crazy at all. You still respect them as the men you loved and love them now, even though it’s in a different way. In any other case, a decent person would break up with their partner before they moved on, and that’s what you needed to do.”
“It is. That’s what the letters did, at least in my heart.”
“I get it.”
“So, with all that out of the way, we’ve gotta figure out how we’re gonna top our first date and morning after. We’ve set a high bar here, you know.”
“In this case, I’d be content if we didn’t try to be overachievers.”
“Me too.”
“I think there’s one more thing you should do to make this official.”
“What’s that?”
“Go talk to your dad, Stan. He’s all you’ve got in the parent department, and no matter how old you are, you’ll always be his little girl in his eyes.”
“You’re right,” Stan agreed as her eyes welled up. “I’m just not sure how to approach him.”
“When you were a kid and wanted to talk to him, how did you go about it?”
“I used to sit in his office for hours, reading in the window seat while he worked. We’d talk now and then, but we were mostly just quiet together. I miss that.”
“I’d bet everything I own that he does too.”
“I think he’s in his office right now. Maybe I should go . . .”
“Yes, go,” I interrupted. “And if you run out of things to talk about, you can tell him about me just like I told my family about you.”
“Oh, that’s going to be quite a conversation, I’m sure.”
“I was surprised to find out that your father and I have a mutual acquaintance.”
“Of course you do.”
“Other than Bella.”
“Really?”
“The man you bought your property from has been a friend of my family since my dad was a kid. I’ve known him my entire life. He’s actually Uncle Wrath’s brother-in-law.”
“What a small world.”
“When it comes to Mayne, the world isn’t really as small as most people think.”
“What does that mean?”
I laughed before I said, “When you meet him, you’ll immediately understand what I’m talking about. He has a . . . presence about him. I think that’s the best way to say it.”
“I’m intrigued.”
“So, I guess if your dad knows him, he can call Mayne for a reference, which may come in handy if he ever goes on the trusty interweb to find out anything about me.”
“My dad has people that do that for him. When I was in the fourth grade, I had to switch classes because he found out my teacher had a gambling habit and was afraid I would get kidnapped for ransom.” I was speechless, but the look on my face must have been enough because Stan laughed before she said, “Yeah, he’s a careful man. ”
“I guess that’s one way to put it. That’s probably for the best in his business.”
“You know about my family, yet you haven’t asked me anything at all.”
“You’ll tell me what you want me to know. That’s good enough for me.”
“You’re one in a million, Rin Martin.”
“Not quite, babe, but I like that you think so.”
“I’m going to go talk to my dad.”
“Good. Call me later, okay?”
“I will. Thanks, Rin. And just in case you haven’t figured it out yet, I really like you a lot.”
“I like you, too, sweetheart. Now go do your thing.”
Stan blew a kiss at the screen before she ended the call, and I sighed as I let my phone drop into my lap. I’d never been in a relationship that moved quite so fast, but Stan and I were on a bullet train straight to something I didn’t think I’d ever experienced before.
I should be terrified, but instead, I was thrilled and couldn’t wait to see what was in our future.
After our talk today, I had a feeling she felt the same way.
◆◆◆
STAN
“Well, this is a sight I didn’t think I’d ever see again,” Dad said as he watched me walk across his office.
When he cleared his throat, I looked over and saw pain in his eyes before he admitted, “I can’t even tell you the number of times that I’ve wished you were sitting there so I could talk to you. ”
I smiled at him and made my way to the window seat where I’d spent hours and hours as a child, hanging out with a book or just watching the cars on the street below while he worked.
Occasionally, he’d lean back in his chair and ask me to tell him about what I was reading, which always led to other conversations.
I’d shared my hopes, dreams, and fears while curled up under a blanket in my favorite seat in the house. Until now, I hadn’t realized how important this time together had been for him too.
Once I found a comfortable position, I covered my legs with the soft blanket I’d pulled off the back of the couch, and smiled at Dad before I said, “I’ve missed you.”
“Sweet girl, I’ve missed you so much that I have no words to tell you how good it’s been to have you here.”
“The next time you’re missing me, you could do something crazy like give me a call or, better yet, hop on your plane and fly out to see me.”
Dad sighed before he said, “I’ve been trying to give you the space you need to make your own decisions.”
“I don’t need space to do that. I can make decisions with you around.”
“In this instance, you really don’t appreciate my opinions on the matter.”
“You’re right, but that doesn’t make me miss you any less. Besides, I’ve already made my decision about my future with Park and Sully.”
“Constance, I . . .”
“Luckily, I think the new guy I’m seeing understands,” I interrupted.
“New guy?” Dad asked. “Let’s talk about that .”
I chuckled before I said, “What’s there to talk about? The second I tell you his name, you’re going to fire off a text and have a dossier within an hour that has everything from his social security number to the diameter of his belly button.”
Dad threw his head back and howled with laughter before he said, “They’re not quite that detailed.”
“But you’ll have all the deets on him, his siblings, his parents . . . and I’m sure whoever your investigator is will take things a step further and look into his aunts and uncles too.”
“Why would they do that?” Dad asked, no hint of laughter left in his voice.
I leaned forward and whispered, “Because his family history is even more fucked up than ours.”
Dad’s eyes narrowed. “Who is his family?”
“You don’t need an investigator to find that out. Google has plenty of information.”
“Constance, don’t toy with me. What’s his name?”
“Rin Martin,” I said with a grin, knowing that wouldn’t give him any of the information I was talking about.
I chuckled as I watched my dad’s hands twitch as he tried to resist reaching for his phone to prove me right.
“The thing is, he’s got the less interesting dad’s last name.
It’s his other dad whose family has a colorful history. ”
“His mother remarried?”
“No. His mother had two husbands at the same time.”
“Is there a club somewhere I don’t know about?” Dad asked in exasperation. “I had no idea that this was really a thing until . . . you , and now you’re telling me that there are more couples . . . threesomes”
“They’re usually referred to as a throuple or a triad.”
“Thank you for the educational opportunity and how you’ve expanded my mind into alternate lifestyles, sweetheart , but now I’d like to know the man’s real name.”
“Rin Martin is his real name. His papa is Derek Martin, the fire chief in Colorado Springs, and his dad is a man named Loki Tempest. He’s a semi-retired tattoo artist who has several very lucrative businesses that are owned by the family trust and operated by different members of his family.
” Dad looked confused, so I offered, “When I talked to Rin this morning, he mentioned that his family has known the man I bought my property from since his dad was a kid. You could probably find out everything you want to know with a simple phone call.”
“I may just do that.”
“Oh, there’s one more thing.” Dad looked ready to explode, so I didn’t wait too long before I said, “Your mutual friend probably doesn’t know the diameter of his belly button.”
It was so hard not to laugh at the murderous expression on my dad’s face as he reached for his phone, but I managed to resist. I relaxed against the cushion behind me and picked up my e-reader before I said, “I love you, Dad.”
“You’ve got a weird way of showing it, smartass, but I love you too.”