Breaking Even (36 page)

“I torture you until you say yes,” I say absently, smiling as she goes to grab the top drawer.

She grabs those sweet cotton panties, and I grin like a fool as she slides them on under her dress. Then she grabs a white strapless bra and pulls down the straps of her dress to put it on.

We’re never leaving this room.

“Stop,” she giggles when I try to wrap her up in my arms.

“Then stop teasing me with a reverse striptease and answer my question.”

She sighs playfully, feigning exasperation as she reaches a hand up and tugs on my neck.

“What happens if I say yes?”

I grin as I start pressing small kisses on her neck, and she arches to lean into me.

“Then I torture you daily, but it’ll be fun.”

She laughs, and the sound vibrates throughout me. I wonder how long it’ll feel this good, because I’m pretty sure it’s going to be impossible to ever get anything done if it’s always like this.

“Then yes,” she says at last, and I spin her in my arms to kiss her hard, pressing her up against the dresser and silently counting how many times I’ve had her right here.

It’s not enough. One more time is necessary.

“No,” she says through a laugh. “Guests. You have guests.”

“
We
have guests. You live here now, too,” I remind her, enjoying the way that sweet blush creeps across her cheeks.

“Well,
our
guests are waiting on us. Go on while I finish getting dressed.”

I pout, but she shoves me out, somehow managing to withstand the power of my puckered lips. But I’m grinning when I walk out.

Dad is talking with a woman when I reach the outside, and he nods in my direction while smiling. Looks like Ash is still trying to play matchmaker, but at least this woman is my dad’s age.

I smile back at him, and he takes a breath that appears to be easy. Everything is so much easier. I never thought it was possible. The relationship I have with my father is by no means a normal one. Not yet. Possibly not ever. But I can stand to be around him, and he’s coming out of the house more.

I guess he decided if I was going to start healing, then it was okay for him to start healing, too.

Wren walks up with a small girl at his side, and I grin at the kid who looks so much like Wren and his family.

“You must be Angel,” I say, kneeling in front of the little girl.

She nods and says, “You must be the guy with tattoos my momma stitched up.”

I thought she was six. She looks six.

She points to the small scar on my hand, and I nod.

“Yeah,” I say, confused as I look up at Wren.

“She’s really smart, really observant, and really blunt. Oh, and she eavesdrops on any conversation she can,” he explains dryly.

Angel walks toward Ash who is calling for her, and Angel thanks her when she offers her cake.

“She just turned six, right? Not eighteen?” I ask, looking at the back of the kid who very properly thanks Ash.

“Yeah. She’s used to living with her mother and Bella—Allie’s roommate and best friend. Like I said, she eavesdrops. I’ve learned the hard way to keep my mouth shut if I want to keep secrets, because she could be under your bed without your knowledge. And she’s quick to catch on. I think she’s aware that I was a dick to her mother. So... Yeah... It’s a struggle, but I’m working hard to build a relationship. Right now she’s not too thrilled with me.”

I sigh long and loud. This is fucked up no matter how you slice it. No one is a winner in this. Allie was a single mom who didn’t know the name of her child’s father; Wren is the guy who missed six years of his daughter’s life because he messed up once and acted like a jerk; and the kid is stuck in the middle.

“Does Allie talk bad about you around her? I know you said she hates you.”

I feel bad for not being there for him as much as I should have been this past month. I got too involved with my own drama, and I let him down.

“No. She doesn’t talk about me at all, according to Angel. This sucks. Allie is actually trying to help us have a relationship, but she resents me—possibly hates me. Angel is smart enough and observant enough to realize that without Allie vocalizing it. She’s loyal to her mom, and I don’t stand a chance until I get on Allie’s good side. And that’s not working out so well.”

Sighing, I take a sip of my beer. I suck in this department. I don’t know the first thing about kids.

“Tag got any insight?”

“He has tons of advice. But his kid is much, much younger and loves him. His new one will love him, too, when it’s born. But he can’t help me build a relationship with an estranged daughter. No one can. It’s on me, and I’ll figure out a way to fix this, because I want to make this right. And I really, really want to get to know her. She looks at her mother with such pride and adoration. But she looks at me with disappointment and the same resentment Allie has. I paved the road, now I have to try and drive down it despite the damn crater-like potholes that are on it.”

I smile weakly in an attempt to seem encouraging. Angel sits down next to Ash, eating her cake, and we both watch.

“I should get her out of here. Her mom only gives me so long to keep her without supervision. It’s sad that she trusts me that little. But she doesn’t know me. I guess that’s on me to change.”

I frown as he ruffles his hair and sighs.

“She can’t stop you from seeing your daughter. You have rights. You should talk to your lawyers.”

He shakes his head. “I don’t want to do anything like that unless I have to. The more amicable this thing is, the better. She’s raised Angel on her own because I never gave her my name. The least I can do is take it at her pace. If she insists on continuing this limited time thing after I’ve proven myself, then I’ll involve the lawyers.”

I’ve seen guilt—struggled with it for most of my life. Still struggle with it.

His guilt is different than mine, but I see it.

“I’ll come back after I drop her off,” he says, clapping my back on his way over to his daughter.

“Are Wren and Angel leaving?” Brin asks, suddenly beside me, and I wrap my arm around her shoulders to bring her closer.

I wish Wren had someone to help him through this right now. I wish it was me, but I don’t know what to say. But I’ll be there as much as I can, just like he’s always been for me.

“Yeah,” is all I tell her. I’m not sure how much Wren wants divulged to everyone. He just announced he had a kid to our entire group a few days ago, and then he brought Angel over to introduce her to all of us at the last barbeque.

Until then, it was only a few of us who knew. No one is asking him a lot of questions right now, out of respect.

“You want a beer?” I ask Brin, smiling down at her wearing the white sundress I bought her.

“I do, but I’ll get my own,” she says, eyeing me like she still doesn’t trust me.

I don’t blame her. I have three bottles of green food coloring in my pocket.

She walks away to grab us both a beer, and I watch her with the same amount of suspicion as she watches me. I really love this girl.

Kode and Tria are hugged up, lost in each other—as usual. Tag and Ash are playing with Trip, and Tag reaches over to rub his wife’s small, barely pudgy stomach. Dane and Rain are trying to convince Carrie, their daughter, to eat the vegetables on her plate. And Kade and Raya are walking through the gate, their eyes locked as though they don’t need to see the world around them.

Brin comes up and tugs at my shirt, prompting me to bend so she can kiss me, and I smile while taking my beer from her hand. Before I drink it, I push it to her lips.

“You first,” I order, eliciting a soft chuckle from her.

“No trust,” she mocks, sipping the beer and then handing it back.

I inspect her mouth, and then sip the beer as we walk toward a table. I really don’t like dark beer, but I needed it today to hide the food coloring. It’s only natural that I would want to celebrate our one-week anniversary with a recycled prank.

Maggie and Carmen are eating the burgers I made as I sit down, and she points to the two plates in front of the two vacant chairs.

“I made your plates. Eat before it’s too cold.”

I smile at her, and she grins while rolling her eyes. “Yeah, yeah. I know. I’m too damn sweet,” she says dryly.

I laugh while sitting down, and Brin snickers softly while joining me. Ash calls her name, and she turns to answer her. I capitalize on my opportunity, and empty all three small bottles of the food coloring into her beer.

Maggie chokes on her bite, and I glare at her in warning as I discreetly toss the bottles far, far away. I manage to finish just as Brin turns back around.

“You okay?” she asks Maggie, who nods while sipping her own drink.

Brin shrugs as she takes a sip of her beer, and I turn just as Tag comes up beside me.

“Poker next week?” he asks.

I really don’t feel like hanging out with the guys all night. Not now. But I gave them immortal hell for the same thing for so long that I don’t have a choice.

“Sure,” I say noncommittally, not naming a day or time.

“Good. No Raya,” he says, glaring at her just as she opens her mouth to speak.

“Why not?” she asks, affronted.

“Guys only.”

Her glower grows, and she shakes her head. “Hell no. My girls’ night was invaded by all of you men, so I’m coming to poker if I damn well choose.”

“My wallet will lose some weight,” Dane grumbles from behind us, and I smirk while turning back and sipping my beer.

“I think Raya should only play a few hands because we’ll all be broke otherwise,” I say, laughing, but everyone is wide-eyed and staring at me with horror seconds before their cackles break free.

What the hell?

Then I hear
her
laughing, and I turn to glare at her. But her green mouth is too funny for me not to start laughing at.

“You two are incorrigible,” Maggie says, coughing on her own laughter.

Brin frowns when she sees everyone is laughing at her instead of me. She grabs Maggie’s purse from the table, and searches for a mirror. The second she has it, she turns it on her face, and I’m rewarded by the shocked intake of air.

“You bastard!” she says in a whisper.

I just laugh that much harder, and Tag says, “Don’t know what you’re laughing at, Dracula.”

My laughter ceases immediately as Brin’s lips curl up in a green-stained smile. I grab the mirror, and groan when I see the red coating my lips and teeth. My tongue looks like it caught on fire or something.

“Fuck,” I grumble, and everyone only laughs that much harder, including the two of us.

“Twisted minds think alike,” Brin says mockingly.

“Are you two even yet?” Rain asks, amused.

Brin looks at me with a challenging glint in her eyes, and at the same time, we both say, “Never.”

As the laughter continues, I pull her to my lap and kiss her, letting our mouths turn to Christmas colors as the red and green mingle together. She smiles against the kiss even as her devilish tongue provokes scandalous images of things I want to do to her.

I’m going to love spending the rest of my life trying to break even.

The End

A Redo is the next book of the Sterling Shore Series, and it will be followed by Triple Dare—Corbin Sterling’s book.

Get a glimpse of A Redo right now, set to release in 2015.

A REDO

Chapter One

WREN

When the hell did my mother start locking her front door on a Sunday afternoon? I’m already running late, and she promised me she’d have all the groceries bought that I would need to feed a child. I apparently suck at being a father, because I can’t even manage to buy food the kid likes.

“Mom?” I prompt when I walk in, but there’s no answer. The massive house doesn’t exactly carry sound very well, and I don’t have time to track her down.

If I’m late, Allie might damn well cut my balls off before cutting me off from Angel. But if I bring Angel over here to get the groceries, my mother will never let us leave. I need to figure out a way to bond with my estranged daughter if I’m ever going to be in her life. And my mother hogging her attention isn’t the way to do it.

Jogging toward the kitchen, I make a mental note to get a new phone. Mine has been freezing up all the time, and I didn’t even realize it had gotten so late until I was rushing around. My phone was still stuck on one even after it was past two. Stupid piece of shit.

Large canvas bags are still resting on the counter in the kitchen, and I sigh in relief. I grab the first two and... drop them both back to the ground as my jaw falls unhinged.

“What the fuck are you doing?” I ask the man who is walking into the kitchen with my mother’s robe on—her pink, far-too-short, satin robe.

“Oh, Wren. Sorry. Didn’t know you were here,” Ray Fucking Drivel—or Capperton or whatever in the hell he’s calling himself these days—says on his way to the fridge, acting as though I shouldn’t be shocked out of my damn mind right now.

I watch, unable to form anymore words that can possibly relay how confused I am in this moment. After he opens the door on the fridge, he bends over way too far, revealing much more of his body than I’ve
ever
wanted to see, and I whirl around to fight back a gag.

“Why are you
naked
under my mother’s robe?”

“Because my clothes are in the wash,” he says as though it should be common knowledge.

“And your clothes are in the wash because?”

“I got them dirty when I was crawling under the house.”

The more questions he answers, the more confused I become. But before I can truly interrogate him, my mother walks in, her eyes widening as she tightens the strings on her long, black satin robe.

Oh hell no.

“Wren,” Mom says in surprise. Her hair is ruffled, her face is flushed, and her lips are swollen. I’m going to be sick. “I would have thought you’d be here sooner.”

I gag silently when I think of what I might have heard if I had gotten here earlier. Mom reads my horrified expression and shakes her head vigorously. “I meant much earlier. I thought you’d go shopping with me so you could do it on your own next time.”