“They were slow songs we were dancing to. How else were we supposed to dance to those?”
The conviction she’d conjured up in her previous argument had waned. Drew plopped down on the sofa just as Chelsea walked out of the kitchen, wearing a chocolate milk mustache.
“Baby, go wash your face, but let Tank out first. He just woke up. Probably has to potty.”
“I . . .” Phoenix paused and Drew could only imagine what he was watching because she could hear the ballad playing in the background. “Dani, I can’t . . .”
Instantly, thoughts of her evening with Nine came flooding back. Last night Nine called her on her I can’t comment. The guy was just too perceptive. She’d meant I can’t even imagine being that in love. Because God knew she wasn’t.
At least not with Brad.
“You know this guy walked out of the wedding with two girls last night?” Phoenix’s words stabbed her heart. “I sincerely hope this isn’t one of your douche infatuations because it’s what he has written all over him, and from the looks of it, this guy has you wrapped already. What did Brad have to say about this? You two even still engaged?”
“Of course we are.” Drew left out that she wasn’t sure for how long as she got up and off the sofa. “He wasn’t that mad. We even stayed and hung out for a while after he asked me about it. Until Chelsea knocked out and we had to leave.”
“So you two are good? Even after all this?”
“Yes,” she said as she started to her bedroom. “Even after all this.”
Drew knew that was far from the truth. Brad didn’t bother to text or call her before getting on his plane that morning as he normally would’ve. It was already close to eleven, and she still hadn’t heard from him. But she was done discussing this.
“Listen. I gotta go. I’m getting Chelsea in the bath now. My mom’s flying in today, and we’re meeting her for an early lunch.”
“That’s right. I forgot about that. She staying with you?”
“No. Paul’s flying in later today, and they board their cruise ship this evening. So I’ll only hang with her for a few hours.”
Finally off the phone with Phoenix, Drew considered responding to Nine’s text until she remembered Phoenix’s comment about his leaving with two girls. “God, I’m an idiot,” she muttered as she walked off to fetch her daughter.
It wasn’t until almost noon that she finally heard from Brad. But he didn’t call her. Just sent a text to say he’d be getting back earlier than expected. He was supposed to have stayed out there for a couple of days. Instead, he’d cancelled his appointments for one of the days and would be flying back in late tonight. Drew sat on a bench at the airport where she and Chelsea waited for her mom to exit her plane.
Chelsea stood by the big window, watching the planes land. Though her mother’s plane already had, she just wasn’t out yet. Drew glanced down and stared at the last part of Brad’s text.
Any way you can take the day off tomorrow so we can spend it together?
All Drew had promised so far was that she’d try. A part of her was relieved he didn’t seem mad anymore. But after getting off the phone with Phoenix that morning, Phoenix had sent three of the most damning stills he’d cut from the footage of the wedding yesterday. In them, she looked absolutely enamored. More than anything, the more she thought about it, the more she was convinced. Continuing to lie to Brad—and herself—just wasn’t going to work anymore.
Despite knowing anything serious between her and Nine would be out of the question, crushing on him as she had to admit she was doing was just further proof that she was dating Brad for all the wrong reasons. Sure, getting involved with someone like Nine wasn’t the answer to her problems, but staying with Brad just didn’t feel fair anymore.
Sliding Brad’s text off her screen, she scrolled to the pictures Phoenix sent again. The first was one where Nine was standing next to her, watching the photographer take pictures outside just after the ceremony. Drew was laughing at whatever it was Nine was saying, and he wore that big amazing smile that just looking at it now had her heart pounding. Of course, she’d look so damn enamored when he was right in front of her. “Gads,” she said under her breath. “Does he have to be so damn good-looking?”
Only after all the talking they’d done lately, Drew knew there was so much more to what she was feeling for him than just his looks.
“Grandma!”
Looking up from her phone, she watched as Chelsea ran toward her mom as she walked through the airport. Drew stood up and greeted her mom before they headed to the baggage claim. After lugging all the baggage to Drew’s car, they drove to the park near the catering trucks Drew loved so much. Chelsea got antsy at restaurants. But the park with the catering trucks had a huge play area Chelsea loved playing in. That would give Drew and her mom some time to chat for a while.
They sat at the park, even after they’d finished eating. Her mother caught her up with everything going on back in Maryland, and Drew told her about the wedding—minus the drama about Nine. In fact, she didn’t plan on mentioning him at all.
Her mom told her about the newest all-year travel team her husband Paul had picked up. “With both of us semi-retired now, it keeps us busy.” Her mom smiled big. “And we enjoy it so much we figured we may as well do it all year long.”
Drew listened, remembering how hard and how long it’d taken her to accept Paul as her stepdad. After years, she’d finally had no choice but to just accept it. Both her parents were remarried and happy now, so she supposed that was all that mattered. But deep inside, she’d never truly forgiven her mother for hurting her father the way she had.
“Something wrong, honey?”
It was only then that Drew realized she’d zoned out. She started to shake her head but then thought better of it. All these years she’d wanted to ask her mom why she chose to cheat on her dad. Her mom had apologized for what she’d put the family through, but they’d never actually discussed why she did it.
“Actually, I always meant to ask you, and I promise I’m not mad about it anymore. I’m just curious. How and why did you decide to cheat on Daddy? Why didn’t you just divorce him first?”
Chapter 15
As expected, her mom looked stunned by the question. Drew knew it had come out of nowhere. She wasn’t looking to ruin their limited time together, but suddenly she really wanted to know.
“I could try making excuses, honey, but the truth is I was a coward.” Her mom glanced off in Chelsea’s direction where she was running up the ladder to the slide, giggling with another little girl. “I know this will sound like a cop-out to you, and for many years it felt like one, but it just happened.” She turned back to Drew with a small smile. “It was inevitable. Your father and I had been drifting apart for years, but I wouldn’t even consider leaving him because staying with him was the right thing to do. He was a good man, a good provider, treated me well, and I wouldn’t dream of breaking up my family. I couldn’t justify leaving him, but we were too different. Always had been. So I cowardly chose to do the easier, shittier thing. I cheated.”
Drew felt her insides warm in anger. “So cheating felt like the better way to deal with it?”
Nodding, her mother didn’t deny it. “For years, I told myself that it just couldn’t be helped.”
Her mom explained how her dad worked so much overtime because he liked the big checks it made them. But it meant he was gone a lot more. “I just wanted my husband home as much as possible to help raise and enjoy our children. And he was gone most the time.”
Her mom said Drew didn’t remember that she did her best to celebrate their holidays on off days because her dad chose to work most of the holidays for the double pay. “Your father was a good man, Drew. He just enjoyed the finer things in life, so he worked so much. While all I wanted was to have my husband home more.”
Drew thought of the irony. She’d never minded Brad being gone so much. In fact, it was probably why they’d lasted this long. N
ine was right. She had said he was gone a lot that very first night he asked her about Brad because he was.
“I volunteered to manage Daniel’s teams because I was lonely and bored. Paul’s wife was hardly ever there because she worked retail and almost always worked the weekends. It wasn’t until later that he admitted she just wasn’t interested in her stepson’s baseball. It bored her. So we bonded, and before you knew it, we were filling the voids and fell in love. I fought it, honey. I really did. But it still doesn’t take from the fact that it was a completely cowardly way to handle it.”
Drew continued to listen as her mom went on about how easy and natural it felt being around and talking to Paul. How even with her dad her mother had never felt so inherently connected.
“And then one night it just happened.”
Drew turned to her mother as she went on, looking out at nothing in particular. “It’d been building for months. My feelings for Paul were through the roof by then, and he kissed me.” Her mom took a deep breath as if she remembered it like it was just yesterday. She turned and looked at Drew very seriously. “I’d been married for almost nineteen years, Drew, and I loved your father for most of them, but I’d never felt anything like this. It was unreal. I should’ve walked away from the marriage long before that happened because, after that moment, I was incapable of stopping it from happening again. Even as I tried and tried to convince myself that I could. That I had to.”
As Drew’s mouth dropped slightly open, the ache in her throat was almost unbearable. She felt like such a hypocrite for judging her mom so harshly all those years. If Nine had tried to kiss her last night, despite Brad being there to witness it, she wasn’t at all sure if she would’ve had the will to stop it. She’d been so completely lost in the moment. The more she thought of it, the more she was certain she would’ve allowed it. Not just allowed it but she would’ve thoroughly basked and gotten lost in the pleasure of it—to hell with right or wrong.
“Drew, honey, it’s been so many years. I don’t understand why you’re still so upset about this.”
Blinking, Drew felt the tears spill out of her eyes, and she shook her head. “I’m not.” She wiped tears away, realizing how confusing this must be for her mom. “Not about that. Well, it’s upsetting, but not how you’re thinking.”
Shaking her head in frustration, she glanced over to Chelsea, who was happily swinging on the swings and chatting with the two little girls on either side of her. Turning back to her mom, she exhaled loudly, still wiping at tears. “I probably would’ve never understood before, but I think I do now.” Her mom peered at her, brows pinched tightly, understandably confused. “I’m not in love with Brad. I keep waiting just to fall in love with him because he’s an otherwise great guy, but I haven’t been honest with him or myself.”
She too had been doing the cowardly thing.
Drew was able to get through the whole explanation about why she decided to date Brad in the first place without sniveling. But she bit her tongue when it came to Nine because she wasn’t willing to talk about her feelings for him. Phoenix was right. It was just one of her stupid infatuations with a guy she knew would only hurt her. And not even purposely because he’d been completely upfront with her about not being into commitments.
Chelsea’s wailing had Drew on her feet and her heart at her throat instantly. She sprinted toward her daughter, who was on the ground by the monkey bars, holding her hand as the other kids around her watched her wide-eyed.
The moment Drew was close enough Chelsea pulled her hand closer to herself, shielding it with her other hand. “Don’t touch it!” she sobbed.
Drew’s heart dropped, dreading that Chelsea’s wrist might be broken. “I fell on it and it huts!” she wailed.
“Okay, okay,” Drew said calmly. “Let Mommy see it. I won’t touch it. I just wanna see it.”
She braced herself to see a bone protruding or something. Chelsea moved her other hand away as she continued to sob. It just looked red and a bit swollen, but Drew knew she wouldn’t know for sure until she took her in to get it X-rayed.
The day at the park ended with Drew whisking her daughter off to the ER. Her mother stayed with her, and for once, the wait wasn’t as long as some of the other times they’d been there. But they were still there a while. Fortunately, it was just a sprain, only they still put Chelsea’s hand in a soft splint to keep her from further injuring it if she moved it too much.
Any talk of her issues with Brad were axed since Drew didn’t want Chelsea to hear her talk about it. After the trip to the ER, all they had time for was to get her mom to the port where she’d be meeting Paul before boarding their cruise ship.
By the time they got home, they were so exhausted both physically and emotionally. Knowing what she was in for tomorrow, after getting off the phone with Phoenix and putting her daughter to bed, Drew passed out, refusing to give anymore thoughts to Brad, the conversation she’d had with her mom, and least of all, her infatuation with Nine.
Nine
Hopping off his motorcycle, Nine shook his head, shaking off the nagging thoughts. Nope, that had nothing to do with it. He visited his moms all the time. Maybe not as often as he should lately, since the shop kept him so busy. But ever since his dumb ass straightened out, he was a mother’s dream, if he did say so himself. Even if his mothers might disagree—adamantly.
Tay opened the screen door before he reached the top of the porch steps of his moms’ house. As usual, she smiled big. “Well, well, to what do we attribute this miracle?”
“What are you talking about?” He hugged his mom hard, loving the way just being here made him feel better already. “I was just here.”
“Two months ago,” she said, pulling away.
Nine thought about it for a second. “Oh shit. Was it that long ago?”
Tay lifted a playfully scolding brow. “Yes, it was.”
“It’s the shop, Mom.” They started into the house, and he could already smell the heavenly aromas coming from the kitchen. “I’ve been real busy. But I called you.”
“Over a week ago.”
Nine stopped to ponder that, but turned to Dulce when she walked out of the kitchen. “Ay que guapo, mijo.”
Her arms were already stretched open, and Nine walked into them, hugging her just as hard as he’d hugged Tay. “Hey, Mom.” As soon as he was done hugging her, he turned to Tay. “I sent you a group text just the other day.”
“GIF’s don’t count,” Tay countered.
Laughing when he remembered the GIF of two dancing squirrels wearing wigs and his caption made me think of you two, he put an arm around each of his shorty moms. “But that was some funny shit.”
Tay elbowed him, and he feigned more pain than she’d actually caused, but laughed. “So what’s that I’m smelling?”
“I made chicken taquitos with all the works,” Dulce said as they started to the kitchen. “Tay made her yummy paifala.”
“Yes!” he said as they walked into his moms’ ample kitchen.
No matter how long ago he moved out, it still felt like home. He walked by the stove, checking out everything on it. “Looks damn good and I’m starving. I always make sure I don’t eat when I tell you guys I’m coming over.”
“Well, you’re lucky Dulce loves cooking for you because all I can make is paifala.”
“Yeah, but it’s killer.” Nine opened the fridge and pulled out one of Tay’s mini bottles of root beer. Leaning against the counter, he took a swig. “So what have you guys been up to?”
Tay eyed him, and Dulce turned one of the burners off then glanced up at him. “Same as always: cooking, gardening, trying not to fall off the daily gym wagon.”
Picking up the taquito platter, Tay chimed in. “I think the question is what’s going on with you? Grab that.”
She pointed at the salsa caddy with the salsa, guacamole, and sour cream on the counter as she placed the platter on the kitchen island counter where they always ate.
Dulce
placed other side dishes on the counter as Tay cocked a brow when her eyes met Nine’s. She tapped his hand when he reached for a paifala. “Dinner first. Now sit.”
Nine and Dulce sat next to each other on one side of the island. Tay, who always ate standing up because she sat all day for work, stood across from them.
“So . . .” Tay seemed to be observing him as he reached for the taquito tray and put a few onto his plate. “Only time you ever call ahead to let us know you’ll be visiting is when you want us to prepare something because you have something to share. Then we can discuss it—good or bad—while we eat. What’s up?”
“That’s not true.” Nine grinned as he reached for the beans and rice bowls but felt caught. “I just call to make sure you’re gonna be here.”
“Rudy, you’re nothing if not obvious.” Tay laughed softly. “We’re your mothers. We know you better than you know yourself. So let’s have it. Business still doing okay? Is Leo getting better about giving you the creative freedom you deserve?”
“Everything’s cool.”
Nine continued to grin as he brought a loaded taquito to his mouth and bit it. He let out a groan because damn it was that good. Tay eyed him like she knew better even as Dulce seemed oblivious to what Tay might be implying. Refusing to bat an eye about this, Nine continued to happily devour his food.
“This have anything to do with that little show you and your wedding partner put on at Leo’s wedding?”
Like an idiot, Nine stopped mid-bite of his taquito and was caught in Tay’s knowing eyes for a moment. Trying desperately to recover, he finished biting and thanked God for his full mouth. He needed a moment to decide how to respond. Of course, Tay would be the one to notice. Dulce, bless her heart, was still glancing back and forth between them, looking completely lost.
Truth was Nine hadn’t gone there to vent or ask for their advice. He just needed to be around them, eat some of their comfort food, and feel the warmth of their love. He needed his mommies, damn it. He was willing to admit that much. But he hadn’t anticipated Tay catching on to him, much less having noticed what happened at the wedding and calling him on it.