Somebody's Ex (13 page)

“Don’t you even give a damn about
that? He’s dead. He’s not coming back. Somebody’s gotta keep this family
together without him.” His chest ached. Even his breath in his throat felt as
if he were dragging in shards of glass.

“Lou didn’t keep us together. We
tolerated his high-handedness because we loved him.”

“You asshole.” David slammed his
mug down, beer sloshing over the side, then he slapped a bill on the table.
Rising, he shoved his chair back, toppling it to the floor.

He needed to get out. He needed
air. He needed to stop hearing his brother’s voice in his head. Lou’s voice.

Slamming through the tavern’s swing
door, his angry strides ate up the dirt as he headed to his truck.

Why don’t you listen to what I
say, David?

Why didn’t you do what I told
you to do, David?

Lou was the one who made them all
strive to be better. Lou was the one who’d kept them on the straight and
narrow. Lou was the one person in all the world David wanted to emulate.

And Lou, God rest his soul, would
roll over in his grave if he knew about Taylor and Jace.

You don’t fuck your brother’s
widow, even if your brother’s been dead three years.

Roles reversed, Lou wouldn’t have
let it happen. Lou would have crushed them. Lou wouldn’t have wanted Taylor to
move on.

His head about to burst, David
leaned over, breathing hard, his hands on his knees.

Lou could be an arrogant ass, but
David had idolized him to the point of trying to fill the gaping hole he left
behind. Doing what he thought Lou would do. Trying to
be
Lou. He saw his
dad aging before his eyes, withdrawing. His mom struggling to pretend they were
all fine. And Jace. Striving to atone for a death he hadn’t caused.

“He was my big brother, David, and
I loved him.”

His ears roaring, he hadn’t heard
Mitch’s boots in the dirt.

“We’re never going to be the same
without him.”

David’s eyes burned, but he
couldn’t say a word.

“But he wasn’t perfect. You don’t
need to be either.”

Lou
hadn’t
been perfect. His
way
wasn’t
always the best way. Ultimately, he hadn’t taken his own
advice or followed his own rules. He’d paid with his life and plunged the rest
of the family into turmoil with his passing.

David had only wanted to smooth the
scars left behind. He’d wanted to fix it all. Instead he’d alienated his
brothers and stolen a piece of the happiness Jace and Taylor deserved.

He’d also lost a good woman by
telling her she wasn’t good enough just the way she was.

How could he have missed all the
answers?

Because he hadn’t listened. Just as
Randi’s father never listened.

David rolled his head, eased the
ache, then turned to his brother. “Little brother, how did you get to be so
smart?”

Mitch shrugged. “Guess I take after
you.”

Maybe. When he wasn’t walking
around with his head where the sun didn’t shine. David knew what lay ahead of
him would be hard. He had abused relationships to repair, acceptance to give,
and forgiveness to ask. Mitch. Jace and Taylor. And Randi. Most especially
Randi.

“I know I invited you out for a
beer, but I’ve suddenly got a pressing need to be somewhere else. Rain check?”

“Sure. Connie was pissed I went out
anyway.”

She hadn’t been, having practically
shoved Mitch out the door. But right now, David had his own mistakes to fix,
just as any man had to find his own answers. The sooner, the better.

* * * * *

The soft tones of the TV filtered
through the door of her parents’ apartment over the store. Gathering her
courage around her like a warm coat in a cold winter, or the comfort of David’s
strong arms, Randi counted to ten before knocking.

Her mother answered, her face grim,
her jowls sagging lower than usual. Her mother had never been quick to laughter
or a smile. Tonight, her lips drooped and the lines at her mouth were so deep
it seemed her frown might be permanent.

Caught in the middle, her mother
had always hated the silences as much as Randi.

“I want to talk to Pops.”

Her mother glanced over her
shoulder, quickly, stealthily. “That is not a good idea, Randi. Give him time.”

Time. Her father always took his
time. A day, a month, a year.

“No. He and I need to talk now.”

Her mom had never known how to
handle Randi or Pops, and acquiescence to any demand was the easier road. She
stepped back and opened the door wider, allowing Randi inside the steaming
apartment. The heat rose from the shop and warehouse below, turning the cramped
set of rooms into a sauna.

Her father’s white cap of hair
peaked above the back of his recliner. A TV tray topped with an empty dinner
plate sat beside him. He didn’t greet her, and the TV volume rose.

Their silences had been punctuated
by a louder than normal TV, and if he absolutely needed to tell her something,
he spoke through her mother. Just as he did now.

“Tell that girl I am not at home.”

“Your father is not at home.” Her
mother repeated whatever he said, even when Randi was right there in the room
to hear it.

This isn’t normal.
The
punishing silences had been so much a part of her life that long ago she’d begun
to think of them as ordinary. As if every father treated his children this way.

It
wasn’t
normal. It was
dysfunctional. While rationally, she knew that, in her heart and her belly, she
believed his conduct was no more than she deserved.

She rounded his chair and stood in
front of him. He looked beyond her as if he could see the TV through a hole he
sliced in her body. Under that non-gaze, her legs wobbled like Jell-O and
butterflies dashed about in her belly, but she couldn’t back down now.

“We’re going to talk, Pops. And not
through Mom. You’re going to listen.”

This time the TV’s volume didn’t
change when he pointed the remote. This time, Randi was in the way.

This time, she would make him hear
her. “I’m not going to apologize. I did that this afternoon.”

He rose on stiff legs, placing the
remote very carefully in the cloth holder hanging over the chair arm. Moving
the TV tray out of his way, he headed to the hallway leading to the bedroom.

Randi followed, pushing past him in
the narrow hallway to stand between him and the bedroom.

“You either need to accept my
apology or tell me not to come back. But whatever you do, you need to
say
it, Pops.”

He went into the bathroom and
closed the door in her face. Her mother watched her from the same spot near the
front door. She hadn’t moved.

The doors were thin. Her father
could hear her breathe out in the hallway. She raised her voice only slightly.

“Come out of there, and we’ll talk
about it like rational adults.”

He turned on the water.

She didn’t shout, merely raising
her voice to be heard over his childish antics. “I can’t work for a boss who
won’t speak to me. Come out and talk, Pops, or you’ll have my resignation by
the cash register in the morning.”

The water went off, and the door
suddenly slammed open, crashing against the toilet on the other side. Her
father’s face beat a deep red, and his eyes flashed an angry midnight blue.

“Tell this person she cannot
threaten me.”

“Randi—”

She held her hand up to shush her
mother. “I’m not threatening you. I am telling you that in a normal business
relationship two people talk. If you can’t give me even that much courtesy,
then I can’t stay.” Her stomach crimped. She was quitting her job. She was
quitting her family. But she wouldn’t let him smash her down. Not again.

“In a normal place of business, the
owner does not walk in on his employee doing the terrible things you were
doing.”

He’d actually spoken to her. She
grabbed the triumph. “The door was closed, Pops. You didn’t have to open it.”

Even his scalp pulsed with anger,
gleaming red through his thin, white hair. “I knew what you would be doing.
With that man. I saw it in his eyes. I have always seen it in you.”

He’d hoped to catch her. He’d
wanted to humiliate her. He wanted to find fault. He always had.

“You have not changed. You were
only thirteen and yet I saw the seeds. You do not listen. You forget everything
I try to teach you. You do not learn. You marry trash, and now you are divorced
and still you have learned nothing. You still allow men liberties.”

She tipped her head as if that
would somehow allow her to see her father clearly. “Are you trying to protect
me, Pops? Is that what this is all about?”

“You do not know a good man from a
bad man. You allow them to disrespect you. I will not have it.” He slammed a fist
against the bathroom door, sending it crashing once more into the toilet. “I
will not have a man disrespect you in my store,” he shouted.

She backed up until her shoulder
blades hit the wall.

“He wasn’t disrespecting me. He was
loving me. And he is a good man. I know the difference.” She smiled softly. “He
thinks I’m special.”

“You speak nonsense.” This time her
father didn’t shout. His face was still red, and his hair looked like he pulled
a rake through it, but he was looking at her and talking to her, without
shouting.

“It’s not nonsense,” she told him.
“People show how they feel in different ways. With David, I
am
special.”
He’d touched her with reverence. Those heated, frantic moments in the locker
carried a special brand of homage. Even his desire for her to confront her
father was steeped in his belief that she was special.

People showed how they felt in a
myriad of ways, each utterly unique. She stared at her father as if seeing him
for the very first time. He used silence to teach what he thought was the right
path to follow. Punishment was love in order to guide. She’d just never seen
things the way he wanted her to. That didn’t mean he didn’t think she was
special.

“Pops,” she whispered, “you have to
talk to me. We can’t go on if you don’t talk to me. It just won’t work that way
between us anymore.”

“I am talking to you.” He rubbed a
hand over his head, looked at the tiled floor of the bathroom, then finally
back at her. “I do not like some of the things that you do.”

“I know. I was wrong. That wasn’t
the time or the place. But he does think I’m special, Pops. He does.”

After long seconds of silence, he
said, “You did not finish filling the orders for the morning’s shipping.
Perhaps you will come in early tomorrow. And later we will talk about this man
who thinks you are so special.”

She smiled. He couldn’t change her
with silence, and she couldn’t expect to change him. He would never be a
talker, but what he had said was his own form of compromise. It was enough.

“Yeah, Pops, tomorrow. I won’t forget
to be there.” She didn’t touch him. They weren’t a touchy-feely family.

When she turned in the hallway, she
found her mom. The permanent frown etched along her mouth was gone.

She left her parents with a lighter
step than when she’d arrived. Life wasn’t perfect, neither was her relationship
with her dad, but things were...on the upside.

She took the stairs with a spring
in her step, reaching the halfway point, and then she saw him leaning against
her truck. David, legs crossed, his hands stuck in his pockets, the parking lot
light shining down on his head.

“I’m special,” she whispered,
taking the last two steps. “He
does
think I’m special.”

Warm night air fluttered through
Randi’s hair as she crossed the lot to David’s side.

“Hi,” was all he said.

“Hi,” she answered, equally
innocuous, a tentative note in her voice and a slight wariness in her gaze.

“I went by your house first,” David
admitted.

“Then you came here to see if I did
what you told me to?”

He couldn’t blame her for her
suspicion. Earlier, he’d come off like a know-it-all ass.

“Actually, I didn’t have any idea
where else you might be.” He shoved his hands deeper into his pockets so he
wouldn’t reach out to stroke an errant lock of hair that had blown across her
cheek. Talk first, touch later, if she let him.

“Well, you found me.” She tucked
the strands he wanted to touch behind her ear.

He uncrossed his legs and
straightened away from the truck. “I owe you an apology.”

“For what?” She shuttered her eyes,
her gaze falling to his shoulder. Her posture gave nothing away.

“I didn’t like what your dad said
to you. If it had been anyone else, I would have popped him one right in the
kisser.”

Her glance flashed to his eyes,
then dropped to his lips as if she had to read the words as well as hear them.

“But I couldn’t belt the father of
the woman I’m in love with. And I felt...helpless.”

“The woman you’re in love with?”

“Yeah.”

“But you’ve only known me two
days.”

He took a chance, running a finger
down her cheek. “Three days,” he corrected. “And that’s long enough with a
woman who’s as open and honest as you are.”

She toed the dirt lot. “You were
right, you know. I’ve got a whole lot of crap going on with my dad and how he
treats me, and I needed to do something about it.”

He cupped her cheek, drawing her
closer with a slight touch. “Your dad’s your own business. You didn’t have to
do anything just because I told you I thought you should.”

She took the final step to bring
her body flush with his. “I didn’t come over here for you, David. I came for
me. And for him. But you were still right, it needed to be done. I shouldn’t
have thrown you out just because you told me what you thought.”

He stroked her face. “What I said
to you was for my benefit, Randi, not yours.” He leaned his forehead against
hers. “My oldest brother died three years ago, and I’ve spent the time since
trying to fix everything for everyone because that’s what he always did. I
thought I could fill his shoes. I am only just beginning to realize that I
don’t have to do that.” He pulled back to look at her. “I was trying to fix
things for you, too. Tell you how you should run your life. I was wrong.”