“Told you it was flimsy.”
The morning after “the broken bed” incident, I still couldn’t believe the bed shattered around us. One of the feet cracked under all the weight (and banging), and when the mattress sloped, Levi continued pounding into me by grabbing the headboard. Well, that gave way too.
Talk about crazy.
We stood side by side, coffee in hand, surveying the carnage. A flimsy silk robe cloaked my body. He was in his boxer briefs.
I arched a brow his way. “Someone wanted to pile drive me into the bed.”
Levi barked a laugh. “As if you didn’t encourage me?”
I smiled into my coffee. I was quite the wanton, wasn’t I?
He wrapped an arm around me, pulled me close, and kissed the top of my head. “I think that’s symbolic, don’t you?”
“What? A broken bed?” I laughed.
“You replaced our marriage bed,” he accused.
“It was too big,” I said. “And there were too many reminders.”
“I’m in there, babe. You can’t get me out.”
So cocky.
“Remember the last time you challenged me with that?”
He glowered. “Let’s not bring that up again. It makes me overly possessive, and you need a break from fucking.”
After the broken bed, we simply migrated to the living room couch.
“Got that right,” I retorted. “Maybe we should stay over at Nana’s for a few nights.”
“That’s not a bad idea. We could get a new bed. I have a solid one over at my house. But what do we really want to do, Kelly? Stay here?”
I sighed. “It’s too early for this conversation. Let’s check on the kids before they trick Gramps into giving them pop tarts.”
“It’s six,” Levi said. “Think I have time for a run?”
“What? You still have energy after last night?”
He shot me a devilish grin. “Months of frustration, babe. I guess if we’re staying at your grandparents for a few days, I need to work more of it off.”
“Sex machine.”
He drew me into his arms so quickly, I nearly dropped my coffee. It did spill a bit, and I glared up at him. But before I could bitch, he swallowed my protest with a deep searing kiss. I couldn’t help but melt into him and was breathless when he let me go.
“Only for you.” He winked at me and left me standing there trying to remember what I said before the kiss.
An hour and a half later, I was in Nana’s kitchen supervising breakfast. I found out Gramps had fed them Oreo cookies with their milk last night, and I had to level up with scrambled eggs, ham, and sautéed peppers wrapped in a whole wheat tortilla. I also packed their lunch boxes with cut-up leftover steak that was trimmed of fat, peas, carrot sticks, and apples.
My grandparents were in the backyard with Bristow. He was trying to convince them to put in perimeter surveillance. Good luck with that. Levi had been trying to convince my grandparents of that for the past year. Hell, I only agreed recently.
“Can I stay home, Mama?” Ashley asked plaintively.
Whit speared her younger sister a look. “Why? So you can play all day?”
“No, because everyone will be here. It’ll be fun.” Ash unrolled the burrito I so painstakingly wrapped and started plucking at the filling.
“Ash, you need to eat the wrap so you’ll have more energy during the day.”
“Can I have cookies instead of the apple for my lunch box?” my youngest daughter scrunched her nose.
“That will make you tired,” I said. “The carrots and apple are healthier because it’s natural sugar.” It wasn’t the first time I had explained this concept to my youngest. Sometimes it needed to be repeated.
Levi appeared in the kitchen, freshly showered after his run. “Listen to your mom, girls.” He walked by me and brushed my lips with his before heading to the girls to plant a kiss on top of their heads. “You’ve got thirty minutes before we take you to school.”
“I want to stay home,” Ash continued to whine.
Levi sat beside our youngest and ruffled her hair. “You’ve got to go to school, baby girl. How about you get a cookie after dinner tonight, hmm?”
He glanced at me. I mouthed the word “sucker.” He and I needed to have a serious conversation about his compromising skills.
His eyes crinkled at the corners, but he changed the subject. “I see Bristow is trying to convince Cillian and Branna of additional security.”
“Is it working?”
“Looks promising. Cillian appears interested.”
I laid a plate with a giant egg white burrito in front of him. “Made to order.” I winked.
“Thank you, beautiful.”
Our eyes locked, and the heat in his eyes momentarily blocked out Ash’s laments until …
“Stop your freaking whining,” Whit yelled. “Maybe if you’d go to school, you wouldn’t act this dumb.”
Levi froze, and I gaped at my oldest.
Ash’s lips trembled, and she blinked back tears as if shocked her sister yelled at her before lowering her head to stare at her plate.
“Whitney James,” I said sternly. “That’s no way to talk to your sister.”
“Why? I’m telling the truth,” she continued to rant. “You all baby her. Everything is baby girl this and baby girl that. Dad reads her bedtime stories at night and what do I get? I get asked if I did my homework. She’s dumb. Maybe if—”
Ashley started bawling and I automatically moved to her and hugged her, still glaring at Whit.
“That’s enough,” Levi said sternly. “You don’t talk to your mother that way either.”
“Then how, Dad?” Angry tears rolled down Whit’s cheeks. “I’ve tried so hard to be good. I make good grades. I try to be the best older sister. I got in trouble for pushing a boy in my class when he made fun of Ash. I got sent to the principal’s office. All he talked about was following the rules and poor Ashley’s hurt feelings.”
Levi and I were speechless. A vise of I’m-the-worst-mom-ever squeezed my chest.
“I’m done with this family,” Whit declared. “Done with this.” She jumped off the bar stool, knocking it over, and ran upstairs.
The slam of the door on the second level reverberated around the house. Ash’s crying had slowed to hiccups.
I didn’t know what to say. How could I have been so oblivious to my older child’s feelings?
“I think …” Levi whispered. “I’m at fault here.”
“It’s both our faults,” I said. “But maybe you can explain better to Whit that we don’t love or care for her any less?”
He compressed his lips, gave a brief nod, and abandoned his breakfast to follow our daughter.
“Whit hates me,” Ashley said through her tear-streaked eyes.
“She doesn’t.” I kissed the top of her head. “Your dad and I misjudged what you both needed from us. This separation was difficult, and it caused a lot of confusion.” I turned her toward me and cupped her cheeks. “But we’re going to fix this, okay?”
“Okay, Mama.”
Nana, Gramps, and Bristow walked in and noted the vacant seats, abandoned breakfasts, and teary-eyed Ashley.
“What happened?”
Levi
I trudged up the steps to the second floor, trying to come up with what to say to my oldest child as a niggle of fear tugged at my heart. Had I fixed my relationship with Ash, only to ruin the one I had with Whit? Playing favorites was not my intent. I had missed so much of Ashley’s growing-up years, and I might’ve overcompensated giving her my attention to the detriment of Whit.
Being a parent was hard, and I admired Kelly for holding down the fort while I was gone on missions. I was surprised she put up with my shit as an absentee parent for two years.
One step forward, two steps back.
That shit stopped now.
I rapped lightly on Whit’s door. “Princess, can I talk to you?”
No answer.
I opened the door anyway. Whit was lying on the bed facing the wall. Her thin shoulders shook. Whit was tough. She wasn’t a loud crier. All I heard were sniffles and the occasional hitch in her breathing.
I sat on the edge of the bed. “Can you turn to face me, sweet pea? I want to see your pretty eyes.”
“They’re not pretty. They’re swollen,” she sniffed.
She still didn’t turn over, so I continued, “I’m sorry if I made you feel like Ashley was the favorite. I don’t love her more than you. I love you both equally.” I sighed. “I just made mistakes in the way I showed it. I wanted my family back. I just had to work harder with Ashley, because she wasn’t close to me like you were … because I wasn’t around much when she was born.”
Whit finally turned to face me. “Uncle Callum died, and you became sad.” She blinked and a tear fell to the pillow. “I don’t remember him, but I think I was sad too. So were Nana and Gramps. Everyone was sad. But Ashley was too small to be sad.” She looked at me earnestly. “She did not understand your sadness. You didn’t want to talk or go out, and that was okay. Ashley likes to chatter about fairytale princesses and going out for ice cream. All I wanted was for you to be home, Dad.”
Was it possible to have my heart excavated out of my ribcage? Emotion burned the back of my eyes. “Thanks, Whit.”
I tucked a dark curl behind her ear. “But you have to know … I love you as much as Ashley. As much as your Mom. The three of you are my world. It’s just that I was overcompensating … you know what that word means?”
She nodded. “Doing too much?”
“Yes, but in the wrong way … I see that now because I neglected you. I tried reading to both of you, but you and Ashley liked different things and you get bored with what she likes.”
“I don’t need you to read to me, Dad, but I understand now.” Her mouth twisted. “Ashley has just been so whiny lately.”
My brows shot to my hairline. “I think you were that way at her age. You just have to be patient with her, all right?” I poked at her chest. “That’s your responsibility as her older sister. Don’t call her names, but tell her when she’s doing things wrong or she’s being a pain in the butt. You have to know, sweet pea, hurtful things you say are like nails hammered into a fence. Do you know why?”
She shook her head.
“When you remove the nails from the fence, what do you see?”
“Holes.”
“The holes are the damage from those nails—your words. They’ll remain there forever. They’ll leave scarring. So, what am I trying to tell you?”
She sighed heavily. “Words I say can hurt really bad and it will stay with a person forever.”
“That’s right. That’s one of the reasons your mom and I separated. I had anger issues because of Uncle Callum’s death. If we didn’t separate, if I didn’t fix myself, I might’ve said hurtful words to your mom and to you girls that I could never take back. Come here.”
I patted the space beside me, but Whit crawled onto my lap instead, and my arms convulsed around her. It reminded me that I hadn’t hugged her this way in a long time. It was always her younger sister who got first dibs. I hadn’t tried to be an equal-opportunity dad. I shouldn’t let my guilt dictate how I treated my girls any longer. Christ, parenting shit wasn’t a one-and-done. As the girls grew older, different challenges would sprout out of nowhere. I was given a second chance both with Kelly and the kids.
I wasn’t wasting that chance.
Five minutes later, we returned to the breakfast room.
Ashley had finished her breakfast, and Kelly was drinking coffee.
Whitney approached her younger sister. “I’m sorry I said mean things to you. You’re not dumb, Ash.”
“I forgive you,” Ashley said in a serious tone. “But you better hurry up and finish your breakfast, or we’ll be late for school. Mama said if we’re good and help Gramps with Ruger this week we could look at puppies this weekend.”
Surprised, I crossed my arms and arched a brow at Kelly. “Really?”
“You said I had the final say.” She chewed her bottom lip. “That is … if your friend has a dog ready to go.”
A grin split my face. “I’ll check with Mike.”
