Total pages in book: 68
Estimated words: 68735 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 344(@200wpm)___ 275(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68735 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 344(@200wpm)___ 275(@250wpm)___ 229(@300wpm)
—Audric to a manufacturer
AUDRIC
“But not all?” she asked.
“They know enough, because we had to give them that much to make sure that they respected your boundaries when we were in Hawaii for Webber and Silver’s wedding,” I explained as I merged onto 635. “I didn’t want you to feel uncomfortable once I knew.”
She started to circle her hair around one finger, and I longed to reach out and do the action myself.
God, I loved her hair.
“Okay.” She nodded, then told me about her experience at Cakes’s place last week.
“That tracks,” I agreed. “He may not necessarily have been there, been there. But he has the pulse of everything that goes on there.”
She looked at me. “Do you know how you’re going to tell him?”
I gritted my teeth. “I don’t.”
“How about you let me start?” she suggested. “I can tell him what I know. Then we can tell him how you just found out.”
I closed my eyes for a brief second, then said, “I don’t want him to hate me for keeping her away from him.”
“But did you?” she asked. “It’s been what, two weeks since we’ve been home and you’ve known for sure?”
“Not for sure, sure,” I admitted. “I was trying to get a DNA test done, but without going through Apollo to get it, it’s been slow going. It said it could take up to four months.”
“You didn’t want to talk to Apollo?” she asked.
Her confusion was adorable.
“I didn’t want anyone to know,” I admitted. “I literally have no fucking clue. We know what Laney told you. Who I suspect. But we don’t actually know who.”
“And we don’t know that Laney was telling the truth that day,” she agreed. “I mean, she had been drunk off her ass and was on her way to sobering up when you left. How do we know that what she knew was the actual truth?”
“Exactly.” I scrubbed my left eyeball. “I wanted to wait because this is huge. How do I tell someone they might be a father? I have no clue how to do this.”
“Maybe you should wait?” she said. “Maybe your instincts are spot on. Maybe you need to know for sure?”
I grumbled under my breath. “That’s great, but she needs surgery now. I can’t make these kinds of decisions. I’m not actually her father.”
“You’re her father for now,” she pointed out. “You need to talk to Webber. And this Apollo dude. You need to stop shouldering this alone.”
She was right.
I knew she was right.
“Fuck,” I groaned.
“Where is Webber?”
I pulled off the highway, then turned around, crossed the highway, then started back the other way.
“His office is near where we just were,” I admitted grumpily.
“Of course it is.” She snickered. “Let’s go there first.”
So that was what we did.
When we arrived in the parking lot, I pulled right up into the bay to keep the sun off the truck, then left it running as I got out and closed the door as quietly as I could so not to wake Lottie.
Creole did the same from the other side, wincing when it made a louder click than she’d intended.
I grinned and said over the hood of the car, “She’s not quite that bad.”
“God.” She laughed nervously. “I’m just so used to Damon and how he…” She trailed off, her face falling. “One wrong step on a floorboard, and that boy’s eyes snapped open like a horror movie villain. Swear to God, I think I tiptoed around for two straight years.”
I smiled. “But I bet he was a really good kid once he grew out of that stage.”
What little I knew of Damon, I knew that to be true.
Damon had always been such a cute kid, and always so damn happy.
Even in the throes of the leukemia trenches, he’d been smiling.
“Hey, what’s up?” I heard Silver call. “Oh, hey! What are you doing here, Creole?”
Creole offered Silver a small, reserved smile before saying, “We need to talk to Webber.”
“Webber’s…” Silver trailed off when Webber rounded the back corner of the shop, carrying a transmission casing in one hand, and a pan full of nuts and bolts for said transmission in the other. “There he is. He was getting some parts from the steamer.”
Webber set everything down, then walked over to me and offered me his hand. “What’s up?”
I looked around the shop and said, “Have some time? This might take a bit.”
Webber studied me for a long moment before he said, “Sure. Lottie asleep?”
“In the car.” I jerked my head toward the truck. “She’ll be out for a while, though. We drugged her up and gave her some medication to help with the pain.”
“I’ll sit in your truck for a bit while y’all talk,” Silver said, reading the room. “Y’all can talk in the office.”
I blew out a breath and said, “Thanks.”
Creole patted Silver’s shoulder, whispering, “Thank you,” as she passed.