It hadn’t been hard to track down my mother. Like Thea had written in her text, Mom’s green sedan was in the lot of the motel.
The car was a hell of a lot nicer than the one I remembered from my childhood. But I guess when you got rid of your kid, your expenses dropped and you could afford a newer vehicle.
I didn’t want to explain to the motel owners why I needed Melissa Page’s room number, so with Willa at my side, I parked my truck in the lot and walked up to the door directly in front of her car. The motel was fairly empty this time of year and even if I knocked on a few wrong doors, it was worth the hassle so people in town wouldn’t know who Mom was.
With a deep breath and a glance over my shoulder at Willa, I pounded on the door. Behind it, someone shuffled and mumbled before it swung open.
“Jackson.” Mom looked me up and down before doing the same with Willa. “Finally decided to talk to me?”
I took a step back and crossed my arms over my chest. From the corner of my eye, I saw Willa do the same. Her protective streak was a mile wide right now and I fucking loved it. It felt almost as good as it had when her parents had called me family this morning.
I wouldn’t ever be an official member of the Doon family, but like I’d done with my foster families, I’d get to claim them for a time. That was good enough for me. They were a hell of a lot better than the woman standing in front of me.
“What’s it going to take to get you to leave and stay away for good?”
“Just assume I want somethin’?” She frowned. “What if I was here to stay?”
“You wouldn’t be welcome.”
Her face turned down, like she was hurt that I didn’t give her a hug, a kiss and a Hey, Mom, I missed ya!
As she stood there, looking like the victim, my temper roared. Feelings I’d kept buried deep for years were boiling to the surface. I clamped my arms across my chest, keeping my arms and fists pinned. I didn’t trust myself with this much anger rolling through my bloodstream. The only thing keeping me composed was Willa and my desire to get some answers.
“Seems like a waste of time to track me down,” I told her. “You could have found me a long time ago. Instead, you dumped me with a damn stranger and never looked back.”
“Oh, please.” She waved me off. “My sister, your own aunt, is hardly a stranger. Don’t act like I abandoned you. You were with your family while I had to take care of a few things.”
I scoffed. “Yeah. I was with family. For. A. Week. Then this family dumped me too. When you drove off to take care of these things of yours, did you at least look back once or twice in your rearview? I can’t remember. I do remember your sister—my own aunt—didn’t look back. Not once. Aunt Marie didn’t even get out of the car when she dropped me off at social services. Nope. Just pulled up to the curb and told me not to forget my backpack.”
I waited, hoping for a flash of surprise or remorse to cross Mom’s face, but it never came. “I didn’t know she would do that.”
“No,” I said through gritted teeth. “You were long gone by then. So back to my original question. What the fuck is it going to take for you to leave Lark Cove and my life for good?”
Because then I could block it all out.
I’d forget about that scared little boy who stood outside the social services building all day until finally, a social worker came outside to ask if he was lost.
I hadn’t been lost, just left behind.
Lost came later as I moved from foster house to foster house, never once finding a home. All because this woman had things to take care of.
“Forget it,” I clipped. She wasn’t sorry. She didn’t care. There would be no answer for me today.
As of now, she was dead to me.
“Let’s go, Willa.” I turned to leave but stopped at the sound of a new voice.
“Mom?”
I froze as Willa gasped. There was no question which motel room that voice had come from or who it was addressing.
I turned around slowly, facing my mother just as a boy emerged from the motel room. But he wasn’t just a boy. He was her kid.
What the actual fuck? She had another kid? She’d left me to fend for myself at nine years old, then she’d had another son.
The boy stood by Mom’s side, staring right at me before he whispered, “Is that him?”
Mom threw her arm around his shoulders. “Yep. This is your big brother, Jackson.”
“Hey.” The kid smiled like he’d been waiting his entire life to meet me.
I stared at him with a slack jaw. Was this why she’d come here? To introduce me to my younger brother?
I had no idea how old he was, maybe eleven or twelve, like some of the kids at Willa’s camp. What I did know was that his jeans were four inches too long and his sweatshirt would have fit me better than it did him. Why was he wearing such baggy clothes? Couldn’t Mom afford ones in his size?
He didn’t look a thing like her—or me for that matter. The only similarity I had with her was light hair and the color of our blue eyes. He didn’t even have that. His skin was darker, like his dad had been African-American. His eyes were a rich brown and his curly black hair was cropped short.
My half-brother.
The kid stepped forward, away from Mom, and held out a hand. “I’m Ryder.”
Ryder? This just kept getting better.
“Ryder?” I huffed, ignoring the kid and glaring at Mom. “Are you fucking joking? You named him Ryder? Did you forget that you already used that for my middle name?”
The kid flinched, but I kept my glare on Mom.
She shrugged it off, staring at me with complete indifference.
I hated her. Jesus, fuck, but I hated her. The tension on the sidewalk was stifling, making the cool fall air heavy and hot.
The kid shifted his weight back and forth as his extended hand dropped slowly along with his eyes. But before he could shrink away, Willa stepped up and caught his hand, returning the handshake that had been meant for me.
“Um . . . hi, Ryder. I’m Willa.”
He gave her a shaky smile as they shook but then looked right back to me with big, brown, hopeful eyes.
I recognized that hope—I’d had that same look once.
After Mom and my aunt dumped me, I’d longed for someone to welcome me with open arms. I’d needed someone to accept me. But the people in the first foster home hardly paid me any attention. They only kept me for a month. The next home was the same, though they kept me for two months. The third let me stay a week.
And each time I packed up my backpack, hope faded.
I wouldn’t be the guy to take that from this kid, so I held out my hand. “Hey, Ryder. I’m Jackson. Nice to meet you.”
“You too.” He shook my hand with a bright smile, then let it go. “Mom told me about you.”
About what? She didn’t even know me. I looked over his head to see Mom looking bored.
“Is this why you came?” I asked her. “For a family reunion?”
“Ryder, give me a minute with Jackson.” Mom stepped farther out onto the sidewalk, nodding for Ryder to go back into the room. “And shut the door.”
“Okay,” he mumbled. He gave me another smile before going inside and closing the door.
“How old is he?” I asked Mom before she could talk.
“Twelve.”
“Twelve,” I repeated, shaking my head. After I’d spent my entire childhood needing a mother, she’d found it in herself to become one to someone else.
“So is he why you came to find me?”
She nodded. “Need you to take him for a while.”
The disgust tasted worse in my mouth than my hangover breath. My mother was disgusting. Simply disgusting.
She’d tracked me down after all these years to pawn off another one of her kids.
“You want me to take him?” I asked. “Are you serious?”
“You’re his only family and he’s a good kid. He won’t give you any trouble.”
A memory came rushing back of the day she’d left me at Aunt Marie’s. Mom had said those exact same words about me.
“So you came to pawn him off on me. Does he know?” Was that why he’d looked at me like I was his salvation?
Mom shook her head. “Thought it would be best to tell him together.”
“Of course, you did,” Willa said dryly. “You always put the needs of your children first.”
“This ain’t your business,” Mom snapped at her.
“Why?” I asked before Willa could respond. “I want a reason why you’re leaving him here.”
“That ain’t your business either. But you either take him or he’s on his own.”
What choice did I have? She’d backed me into a corner, piling all of this on my conscience so that if Ryder went into the system, I’d feel guilty.
“You’re a fucking bitch.” The words were cathartic.
Mom rolled her eyes. “Now you sound like your granddaddy.”
“Too bad I didn’t get to meet him. I think we would have had a lot in common.”
“You gonna take Ryder or not?” She was getting flustered, the color in her cheeks rising.
“How did you even find me?”
She shrugged. “Wasn’t that hard. Hired a guy to track you down online with your social security number.”
Because she’d needed a place for my brother. I bet she had a backpack all loaded up for Ryder, just like she’d done with me.
“Get the kid. Get his shit. And get the fuck out of Montana.”
She grinned, knowing she’d won. Without a word, Mom went back inside the motel room, closing the door at her back.
“Oh, Jackson.” Willa came to my side. “I cannot believe this is happening.”
My arm went around her shoulders, holding on to her. “Me neither.”
I’d come down to the motel for closure and hadn’t gotten any. Instead, I’d gotten a twelve-year-old kid brother who would be living with me indefinitely.
“I don’t know what else to do,” I whispered. “If I don’t take him, then—”
“You have to take him.” Willa’s entire frame shook with fury. “You need to get him away from her. She’s toxic.”
“What am I going to do?”
I didn’t know anything about raising a kid. I worked at a bar. Who was going to watch him when I was working until three in the morning? Who was going to help him with his math homework? Who was going to make sure he was eating the right shit from the food pyramid?
For fuck’s sake, I’d slept on a pool table last night. I wasn’t equipped to be responsible for another person. It was one of the reasons I didn’t want kids of my own. I wasn’t that guy.
“We’ll figure it out,” Willa reassured me.
“Yeah,” I muttered. I didn’t have a choice. I wouldn’t let a kid, let alone my brother, go through the same childhood hell I’d gone through.
The motel door opened again and I let Willa go.
Ryder’s face had paled and his eyes were wide as he walked out the door with a backpack slung over one shoulder.
Mom was right behind him, rolling out a cheap black suitcase.
Ryder’s eyes were full of despair as he stood on the sidewalk. The poor kid. There was no doubt that Mom had just dropped the bomb on him.
“Sounds like you’ll be staying with me for a while.” I clapped him on the shoulder. “That cool with you?”
He shrugged and looked at his tennis shoes. He had big feet and was probably going to be tall after he grew into them.
“Willa? Would you help Ryder get his things loaded into the truck?”
“Sure.” She practically yanked the suitcase handle out of my mother’s hand. Then with a parting glare, she walked to the truck.
Ryder waited a beat, then followed her. He didn’t even turn to say good-bye to Mom. He didn’t give her a word or a look. And he didn’t seem surprised, just . . . disappointed.
How many times had she left him before? I remembered my years with her being full of babysitters and neighbors. Maybe our time with her wasn’t all that much different. I bet she’d promised him a fun trip to meet his brother, just like she’d promised me a fun trip to meet my aunt.
Mom didn’t say anything as Ryder walked away, certainly not a promise to return. Instead of watching her kid leave, her eyes were glued to my truck and a greedy smirk spread across her mouth.
She was going to ask me for money. Guaranteed.
“Get out of town.” I shuffled closer, growling down at her. “Now.”
“I need money.”
This bitch was so predictable.
I hated the idea of giving her a damn cent, but if it got her out of Lark Cove and away from me and Ryder, I didn’t care.
I ripped my wallet out of my back pocket and pulled out the stack of cash I’d shoved in there. It was ten days’ worth of tips—about five hundred bucks. I’d planned on running it up to the bank in Kalispell this week.
Instead I shoved it into her chest. “I never want to see your face again.”
She took the money and stuffed it in her jeans pocket. “I need more money if you don’t want me coming back.”
I stepped even closer, sending her back on her heels. “That’s all you’re ever going to get. You don’t see me again. You don’t see him again. You’re dead to us. Got it? If I see your face again, you won’t like what happens next. I got no love for you, lady. But I got a lot of rage.”
The threat erased some of her arrogance. She stepped back farther, looking at me once more before turning into the motel room and slamming the door.
My shoulders collapsed as I breathed. I gave myself until the count of five, then went to the truck and climbed into the driver’s seat. Willa was sitting shotgun, her face etched with worry.
I reached over the console and took her hand as I glanced in the back. Ryder was looking out his window, away from the motel and Mom’s car.
“You got everything?” I asked him.
He shrugged. “I guess.”
Was this really happening? Two hours ago, it was just Willa and me curled together in her bed. Two hours ago, I was just a bartender lucky to have a girlfriend who’d forgiven him after he’d acted like a dick.
Now I was some sort of pseudo-parent to a kid I’d met less than fifteen minutes ago.
“Are you hungry?” I asked Ryder.
He shrugged again.
“I’m hungry,” Willa said.
“You’re always hungry. Ryder, do you want to see Willa stuff an entire pizza in her mouth? She can inhale one in about three minutes.”
She smiled, going along with my attempt to lighten the mood. “More like ten.”
Ryder didn’t laugh or respond. He just hung his head, turning even further into the window. One of his hands slid up to wipe his nose.
I opened my mouth to say something else but closed it instead. There was nothing to say. So I looked ahead, glancing one last time at my mother’s motel room door. Then I fired up the truck and reversed out of the lot.
Before I even hit the highway, Willa was texting on her phone. She was calling in reinforcements. Thea was already at the bar. Hazel would likely be there soon. So I focused on the road, driving us the few blocks down to the bar where I’d find help.
Where my real family would be waiting.
