CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
LIZ
Ilook out the window for what feels like the hundredth time now.
Ryan is on her way over. To discuss the custody situation.
Given she was the one who dealt with Lena and Trent directly regarding the matter, she seemed like the best lawyer to represent me in the case.
A hunch she confirmed when Jovi and I called her the week after I was served papers and she reacted as indignantly as Jovi did when he found out.
She’s been handling the situation ever since.
Our meeting today is meant to prepare me for what’s next.
Since the kids don't know what's going on, Jovi has taken them for lunch at one of his family's places. Much as I appreciate him making sure they're taken care of, part of me wishes he was here. To do this with me.
No sooner do I have the thought than my phone vibrates with a call from him.
"She there yet?" he asks as soon as I answer.
I peer out the window yet again. "No."
"Good. Then I have time to tell you three things."
Nerves knot my gut, but he still makes me smile. "Three things?"
"One. Trent and Lena chose you. Not Tammy.
You," he starts and that first statement is enough to both settle me and bring the sting of tears to my eyes.
"Two. The kids adore you. Despite everything they've been through this year, they're thriving.
As we speak, they're giggling so hard, Remmi has the hiccups. You did that. You got them here."
I'm almost afraid to ask. "And three?"
"You don't need me. But I've got you anyway. Whatever happens, I'm with you."
"I wish you were here now," I whisper, then press my lips together tightly trying to hold back the onslaught of emotions that simple statement brings forth.
"I was hoping you'd say that," and I can hear the sweet, lopsided grin in his voice when he says it. "Go drag your grumpy cat out from under the futon. Keep her with you for the meeting," he says, "and I'll be there too."
I hear the kids start talking to him, excitement in their voices as they compete for his attention. "I better go," he says after a second. "My mother just told them they could cook their own burgers on the grill in the kitchen."
"Oh." A small laugh bubbles out of me. "Yes, go supervise."
"You trust me?"
I don't have to think about it. "Yes."
"I trust you too." His answer is like the calm at the center of my storm. "Everything is going to be fine."
Then he hangs up, Gavin's delighted loud laugh the last thing I hear before the line goes quiet.
I take one more look out the window, then take a long resigning breath and track down Harriet.
Jovi called it. She is, as per usual, napping under the futon, and not at all impressed with me when I grab hold of her and tug her out.
Appeasing her with a snuggle to my chest, I rub under her chin, coaxing her to doze off again.
Her soft purr vibrating against me is like a balm to my frayed nerves, and I smile, wondering if that was Jovi's intention when he told me to go find her.
Until I notice she's wearing a collar. She's an outdoor cat. Never have I ever placed a collar on her. Certainly not one this fancy, with a dangling tag.
Curious, I flip it over to see what it says, only to find it's not a plate for engraving but a charm for pictures. Placed inside is a photo of Jovi. One I took the day he joined me for my photoshoot.
It's been cropped to cut out his half naked body, zoomed in to show only his face. Those deep, caring eyes. And that damn sexy, unendingly kind and forever taunting, smile.
And I can't help it, I laugh. This man has become the greatest surprise of my life.
And even when I don't really know where we stand, when we continue to hover on the precipice of something neither of us seems ready to leap into, I don't doubt that he's here to stay. That whatever it is we are, whatever we become, we are something unbreakable. We agreed to a year, but the truth is, I don’t think I can imagine a life without him anymore. I don't want to.
The realization sits like a comfy blanket over my mind, stilling all the reeling thoughts as I hold Harriet close and make my way back to the front of the house. I've reached the end of the hall, when there's a knock at the door.
Ryan is here.
And, thanks to Jovi, I'm ready.
JOVI
"I still can't believe you invited the kids into the kitchen to cook on an open flame grill," I grunt, watching the kids play in the small arcade room off the dining area while I sit at the bar with my mother. The Raleigh is the only one of our bars that’s open to all ages during the day.
With the lull between lunch and dinner, it makes for an easy environment to watch the kids while still catching up with my mother and making sure she feels secure with how everything is running.
There haven't been any major issues even through the changes I made in management to make sure everything was taken care of while I had to take a step back.
The minor hiccups along the way were easily handled, either by myself or everyone currently in charge, but my mother still lacks faith in the idea of handing over control to others. Mina included.
I don't blame her. I understand where this desire for control comes from all too well.
But it's my job to balance our growth and potential and my life against her need for control and risk averse thinking.
Well, risk averse when it comes to business.
Apparently not so much when it comes to teaching kids how to navigate their way around an open flame.
She shrugs off my concerns, smiling. "You and your siblings learned how to roast hot dogs in a bonfire as soon as you were tall enough to reach your roasting stick into the flame and stable enough to not topple over into it."
I remember that. We went camping a lot before my dad got sick. It was the only sort of vacation he would ever allow himself to take. A night away here, a day trip there. Never too far from the business, and never on a Friday or Saturday.
"It's only right I keep the tradition going with the next generation," she says, folding her napkin and setting it aside with her empty plate.
I frown at the sentiment. "They're not my kids, Mom," I remind her, but the second I say the words, they sound wrong.
"Aren't they?" She arches a brow at me, as if she's waiting for me to catch on to something I haven't figured out yet.
"Liz is their guardian," I say, sticking to the facts. Especially in light of Tammy's efforts, it's important everyone is clear on this one simple truth. "Their hers."
My mother rolls her eyes like I'm an idiot. "And she's yours. With the kids. It's a package deal, Jovi. I don't see how you're not understanding this."
I blink, caught off guard by my mother's blunt statement. "Liz and I aren't together." Another set of strung together words I hate the taste of on my tongue. But they're technically still the truth. For now.
My mother actually snorts a laugh at that. "Did you forget I was there the night you brought her in to see Dee Sparks?"
"That wasn't what you thought it was," I insist.
"Oh?" She turns in her stool to face me full on. "That wasn't you doing something special for the woman you love for no other reason than you knew it would bring her joy? Correct me if I'm wrong, but I as I recall it, those were your words."
I fidget, like a damn teenager, and when I open my mouth again, the words are a sputtering mess, "That's not... I don't...Mom, it's Liz...and things are...complicated."
My mother's bottom lip jumps. Something I've seen it do a million times over the years when she's trying not to laugh.
Something I've only recently started to understand on a whole new level since spending so much time with Gavin and Remmi.
That elder wisdom seeing the light and humor in a situation that seems dire and intense to the young and na?ve.
Fuck me. I did not think I could still wind up on the receiving end of that look, but apparently, when it comes to my love life, I'm still an inexperienced idiot.
"Life is complicated," she says and for a second, I'm almost pleased that she sounds like she agrees with me after all. "You and Liz are simple."
Oh. So not in agreement. "How can you say that? Liz and I have been the opposite of simple from the moment we met."
She chuckles and it's not lost on me that her amusement is at my expense.
"I could argue the opposite. You've been the constant in each other's lives from the moment your paths collided.
You fought it, sure, but at the heart of everything, you've always shown up for each other.
You've seen each other. Been honest with one another.
Been your truest selves in the presence of the other.
What do you think love is, Jovi, if not that? "
I turn my face toward where my fingers are wrung together in my lap. I know she's right. Have known for a while. But we still have some hurdles ahead of us. Things I'm afraid will continue to haunt us if I don't find a way to help her see them for the lies that they are and let them go.
Even if it's not to set her free to be with me, I want that contorted vision she holds of herself to be gone. For her to see herself the way I do. As the fierce, strong, fucking amazing, selfless and boundlessly loving woman she is.
"Fine," I admit. "I love her. I love the kids. And I love the fucking life I have with them. The glimpses of life I catch that we could have moving forward."
"But?"
"But I'm afraid it's so damn good that Liz won't let herself have it. She's so sure she doesn't deserve it, that if she's entrusted with it, she'll ruin it, hurt everyone the way her mother did."
My mother's brow crinkles at that, and it's the first I see her look stumped since this conversation started. "What happened with her mother was an accident. It was horrible, but I hardly see why Liz would be afraid of sharing that fate."