Come to Me Softly (Closer to You #2)(32)
Author: A.L. Jackson

But it was her.

I knew it.

It thrummed a steady beat within me. This girl had brought me home.

The one who had breathed life into a blackened spirit and a deadened heart.

Right behind us, Karen clapped her hands once. “Okay, we need to get busy in here. Dinner will be ready in about an hour, so things are about to get hectic.”

Karen was wearing this granny apron that covered her whole front, and these tight little black ankle slacks and heels almost as high as the ones Aly had been wearing last night.

She’d always been a knockout, not that I’d ever thought of her that way, but damn, I wasn’t blind.

All of mine and Christopher’s friends were always calling, wanting to hang out at our houses because they wanted to get a look at our moms. Funny, ’cause it was kind of gross but kind of made us proud at the same time.

Aly released my hand and stepped toward the stove. “Just tell me what to do, Mom. That’s what I’m here for.”

Karen lifted a lid and poked at the boiling potatoes inside with a fork. “The green beans need to go into this pot here,” she said, pitching her head to the side to gesture to it. “We can probably mash these potatoes in about twenty minutes, then we need to get the gravy going and the turkey out, and then we need to get the rolls in the oven.” Her mom rattled this all off like she had the whole thing mapped out in her head, this organized chaos fueling her energy as she moved so easily about the kitchen.

“I’m on it,” Aly said as she washed her hands in the sink and went to work.

“Anything I can do to help?” I offered, standing there with my jutted hip resting up against the counter. Awkward didn’t quite describe what I was feeling. My emotions were in such conflict, I couldn’t begin to describe them, this unrelenting distress that nagged at all my senses and this comfort I wanted to sink into.

“I think we have it under control for now, but all you boys are on standby,” Karen commanded with a wave of her hand, drawing a line in the air with her pointed finger indicating the end of the island, like we weren’t allowed to step foot out of the kitchen’s boundaries.

Aly tossed me a knowing glance, one that just said we should go with it, and everything would be fine.

Aug pulled out a barstool and sat down, and I figured I’d best to do the same.

Christopher clapped me on the back as he headed toward the refrigerator. “Hey, man, you want a beer?”

“Uh . . . sure.”

If I wasn’t feeling so damned uncomfortable, I might have laughed at being here this way, because the last time I’d had a beer at this house Christopher had snuck us a couple when we were fifteen.

It seemed crazy that so many years had passed. That so much had changed and still these people were completely the same.

Good.

Christopher opened the large, stainless steel door of the fridge. Disappearing behind it for a couple of seconds, he came out bearing two beers. He slid one my way.

“How about you, Dad? You want one?” he asked, twisting the cap free from his and tossing it across the room and into the garbage, completely nonchalant.

Appearing to be feeling just about as uneasy as me, Dave hesitated.

Couldn’t blame him all that much. I kept thinking Aly should have warned him, given him some kind of indication of what to anticipate. Poor guy didn’t deserve this double blow.

If our roles were reversed?

I couldn’t help but imagine the baby, what it would be like, if it’d be a little girl or a boy. If it were a girl, this kind of bullshit would definitely not fly.

I wouldn’t stand for it.

Not my little girl.

Not a chance.

I twisted the cap from my beer and drained half of it, f**king overcome by the thought, because I hadn’t truly allowed my mind to go there. Those thoughts had always been an impression of what seemed an impossibility.

I looked up to meet Dave Moore’s face. Blatant distrust saturated every inch of his expression. He was graying now, just a hint around his ears and at the back of his neck. But he was a whole lot like Karen, looking so much younger than he actually was.

“Yeah, sure, son,” he said, keeping his attention trained on me, this slow simmer of anger burning somewhere in the depths of his eyes.

Christopher passed his dad a beer before he plopped down in the stool next to me and ran a hand through his unruly hair. Would have thought he’d have attempted to tame it for today. Dude was such a slob, but he was just acting like himself, and I realized that’s just the way he was. There wasn’t a whole lot of pretense obscuring what was happening inside of him.

Had to respect him for that.

Christopher tipped his beer to his mouth and took a long pull, smacked his lips, a clash of glass and granite as he set the bottle down too hard on the bar. “Damn, Mom, I have to admit, that turkey smells delicious.”

Karen smiled a little. “You think so? I hope it turns out well. . . . That thing has been sitting in brine all night. I researched about ten different recipes.”

“Oh yeah, for sure. So much better than the turkey we had when we were ten,” he pressed on, slanting a knowing eye in my direction.

I sputtered over my beer and swiped the back of my hand over my mouth, trying not to bust up laughing, but that had to have been about the worst damned dinner I’d ever eaten.

Should have known from the tone of Christopher’s voice he was getting ready to razz his mom. That’d always been one of his favorite pastimes, messing with her, because she was just so unsuspecting.

Offense stopped Karen midstride. Her eyes narrowed when she set them on her oldest son. But the frown carved on her face fluttered with amusement, like she was about three seconds from busting up at the memory, too.

“I have absolutely no recollection of that,” she finally answered in defiance, lifting her chin as she finished her pass from the oven to the island. Metal clattered as she picked up her whisk and began whipping something in a large silver bowl.

“No . . . no . . . I’m sure you don’t remember that Thanksgiving at all,” he prodded, ribbing her more. “I’d have wiped that from my memory, too, if I’d tried to cook a completely frozen turkey.”

Aly flicked a bean at Christopher’s head. “You’re such a jerk. You leave my mom alone.” She punctuated her words by widening those expressive, green eyes.

Christopher exhaled an offended breath. “Are you kidding me, Aly Cat? First you’re taking sides with this ass over here . . .” He hooked his thumb in my direction. “. . . and now you’re gonna turn against me when we’re talking about Mom’s cooking when we both know how terrible it is?” He placed his hand over his heart. “You wound me.”