Truth & Tenderness (13 page)

He got three kisses after that—one slobbery, one stuffed, and one from Griffin that included a brightly desperate smile.

“Don’t kill me?”

T
HEY
ATE
pizza in the living room, Jim remarkably calm about a child, red sauce, and crumbs coming in contact with a rug and the upholstery.

“We’ve had sex on this rug—she can drop a crumb,” Griffin muttered.

“I’m fine. I didn’t even say anything.”

Sadie ignored them both. She sat primly with her back against the recliner, a dish towel tied around her neck and a large plastic plate in her lap. The monkey sat next to her, similarly decked out. Griffin cut her slice into smaller pieces, and she ate each one carefully.

The monkey was not hungry.

“You know, I actually think she’s cleaner than you,” Jim observed, reaching for another slice from the box on the coffee table. “Think I can make a trade?”

“Haaaa. You’re a laugh riot.” Griffin offered her a juice box. She leaned over and took a sip, then went back to her pizza.

When he looked up, Jim was staring at them. Him.

“What?”

Jim smiled then, one of those smiles that had a terrible effect on Griffin’s knees. Lucky he was sitting on the floor. “Nothing.”

B
ATH
TIME
started well, but that ended abruptly when Sadie tried to take the stuffed animal into the tub. Griffin couldn’t get her to stop crying, so Jim plucked the monkey from her hands, then proceeded to give it a “special bath” in the sink with a washcloth and Griffin’s toothbrush for behind his ears.

Sadie sniffled a few times, then consented to getting washed, but only if Uncle Jim brushed the monkey’s fur.

Jim was glad Griffin didn’t have a camera.

Sitting on a closed toilet, brushing a monkey with one of Griffin’s seven hundred hair accessories. Watching Griffin handle Sadie like a pro—from hair to ears to crevices where pizza crumbs had gotten into, he kept her laughing and content the entire time.

He’s going to be such a good father
, Jim thought. His hands tightened around the monkey as Griffin wrapped Sadie in a giant towel. Her shrieks of laughter as Griffin pretended to lose her in the folds made Jim smile.

“Pajamas and stories!” Griffin yelled as he scooped Sadie into his arms.

Jim followed as if pulled by an invisible string.

G
RIFFIN
FELL
into bed, utterly spent and deeply happy.

Jim was home, Sadie had gone to sleep, and no news from Daisy felt like a good thing. Clearly she and Bennett were taking advantage of baby-free time. Everything was good and right in his world.

“So, you’re good at that,” Jim said, lying down next to Griffin. They hadn’t even washed up or changed into sleep clothes.

Griffin turned his head to Jim and smiled. “I told you. Several hundred nieces and nephews. Not my first rodeo.”

“Now see, I know that in theory, but this is the first time I saw you….” Jim rolled closer, pressed a kiss against Griffin’s cheek.

“I love taking care of her, Jim,” Griffin whispered. He tucked his forehead against Jim’s neck, letting the contact bolster him. “And I feel like—my career is settled, we have a home now, a real home, we’re getting married.”

Jim twined their hands together.

“Have you thought more about it?”

“Yeah,” Jim said quietly. “I have.”

The silence that followed was killing Griffin, literally sucking his life away. But before he could open his mouth, Jim made everything perfect.

“Let’s have a baby.”

M
UCH
LIKE
when he had proposed, all of Jim’s carefully planned and thought-out life decisions went out the window. Spending the evening with Griffin playing godfather and caregiver tugged at Jim’s emotions. Maybe it would be all right—Griffin would clearly be the hands-on parent. And Jim would be there, strong and steady, supporting his Griffin.

No. God. No, wait.

Jim put his arms around Griffin, who was babbling in utter delight at Jim’s words.

He wasn’t going to be his father. He’d figure this out, how to be a good dad. How to be like Ed Kelly, who loved his girls so much he had suffered just for the privilege of having them in his life.

He could….

The doorbell rang, shattering the moment.

I
T
DIDN
’
T
ring once. It kept ringing.

Griffin ran down the stairs, calling for Jim to check on Sadie to make sure she hadn’t woken up. He slid across the foyer, then pulled open the door, not even looking to see who was on the other side.

Daisy, hysterical and sobbing, fell into his arms.

M
ATT
WAS
halfway through his morning cup of coffee when his cell went off. The kitchen bustled with activity—Evan getting his breakfast, the twins in and out of the refrigerator.

“Yeah, hey, Jim,” Matt said, taking his coffee and his phone into the living room. “You on your way? You have to be at the offices by nine.”

“Sorry, Matt—you’re going to have to take this one.” Jim sounded exhausted, and Matt’s first thoughts were: more of the Tripp Ingersoll case. He ducked out of the kitchen and walked into the farthest corner of the living room for some privacy.

“We had an agreement about this fucking—”

Jim cut him off. “Daisy showed up here at about midnight,” Jim said coolly. “She left Bennett.”

Matt stopped short. “What?”

“Apparently he fucked an old boyfriend a few weeks ago. Claims it was a one-time thing, but Daisy wasn’t having any of his bullshit.” Jim was whispering now, and Matt heard a door open and close. “She drove up here and fuck—I haven’t slept, Griffin hasn’t slept. It’s a mess.”

On the one hand it made sense, given Bennett’s behavior, but Matt couldn’t reconcile this man, so protective and loving and devoted to his wife and daughter, cheating. Anger started to boil up inside him. “Fuck,” he swore.

Footsteps behind him made him turn; Evan stood there, looking confused.

Matt held up a finger, then went back to Jim. “So you can’t come down here today?”

“I’m a hazard on the road, and frankly someone has to be around to mind the kid because Griffin’s got his hands full with Daisy.”

Matt blew out a breath. “Okay, I’ll figure something out.”

“I’m sorry.”

“No, it’s nothing you can help. Give Daisy my love, okay?”

“Yeah. I’ll call you later.”

Matt switched off the call and threw his phone across the room onto the couch.

“What’s wrong?”

Sighing, Matt turned back around to Evan. “Daisy left Bennett. Apparently there was someone else.”

Evan looked about the same way Matt felt—shocked and a little sick. “Jesus. I’d never expect him to be the type….”

Matt shrugged. “No one expected this. And now Jim can’t make it to the inspection today or the afternoon meeting. Shit.” He was supposed to work from home today and Jim was handling the appointments in the city. The kids both had things after school. “I need to go into the city.”

“You can’t.”

The words stopped Matt cold. “What?”

“Danny has a game and Elizabeth’s got dance at five.” Evan looked at his watch. “I’m late.”

“You’re late? For a community meeting on parking meters or something?” Matt snapped.

Evan narrowed his eyes. “You need to take care of this. I can’t.”

They didn’t fight. It wasn’t their thing. There was grousing and maybe some passive-aggressive door slamming, but they didn’t do this.

But Matt was standing in the middle of the living room watching Evan put on his suit jacket, and he thought his head might explode. “You’re the fucking captain—you can leave a few hours early once in a while,” Matt said sharply. “And please don’t act like I’m making this shit up. You and I both know—”

“We both know that I’m being scrutinized more than most, and we both know that your job is flexible. Mine is not.” Evan grabbed his keys off the table near the door, and Matt felt the vein in his head throbbing.

“You’re just going to leave—”

“I’m sorry, but I’m late.”

Incredulous, Matt watched as Evan opened the door and left.

Left
.

“What the almighty fuck.” Matt exhaled. When he turned around, Danny and Elizabeth were watching wide-eyed from the kitchen.

M
ATT
CALLED
the phone tree, parents who came through in emergencies when Matt was out of town.

No one was free—apologies all around—and Matt got angrier and angrier with each call. Why was this his problem?

Oh right, because you made it your problem
, Matt thought. He sat in the parking lot of the high school, angrily pressing buttons.

He tried keeping up a smile for the kids, but no one believed him, so he wiped the fakery off his face, gave them each ten bucks, and waited for them to laugh at the old joke.

Nothing.

The last person he called was the one person he feared might say no just to spite him. “Miranda?”

“S
O
JUST
pick them up, get them where they need to be, and feed ’em?” Miranda asked.

Matt rubbed his forehead. “Yeah, I’m sorry—will you be okay leaving work early?”

“I can take the afternoon off. Don’t worry about it.” Miranda called to someone in her office; then Matt heard a door close. “What time will you be home?”

“Six or seven.”

“Dad still rolling in around nine?” It was a joke except for the part where it wasn’t.

Matt didn’t laugh. “Yeah. Or ten. He usually calls.”

“Right. Food, or am I doing the No Dad, Let’s Have Takeout Thing?”

“There’s food in the house. Make two vegetables.”

“Cool. Do you mind if Kent comes over?”

“No, that’s fine. No making out on the couch, though,” he teased, letting himself unhitch from the anger for the time being. He owed the girl big, particularly considering their truce was still written in wet ink.

Miranda snickered. “No promises.”

A nice moment. Matt would press this into his scrapbook right after “Fought with Evan.”

“Just—thanks, okay? I appreciate this.”

Miranda’s response was so blasé, he knew it wasn’t a shot or a pointed remark. “You forget, Matt, I used to have to do this for Mom all the time.” Noise started up again on her end, and she told someone to hang on. “I gotta go. See you tonight.”

Matt didn’t say good-bye, he just sat in the parking lot for a while, stewing over her words.

M
ATT
SHOWED
up at Bennett’s office after nearly a month away.

His mood registered somewhere between “fuck you” and “fuck you twice”—and the fight with Evan and what Miranda said sat in his stomach like a festering wound.

Goddammit.

On Bennett’s floor, everyone was walking around with white faces and zipped lips, hands tightly clutched around files and tablets and coffee cups. Matt got a few nods and a plaintive look from Amy.

He knocked on Bennett’s office door loudly, then stood back to wait.

The man who answered the door bore very little resemblance to the put-together millionaire Matt had known for the past few years. Red-rimmed eyes, unshaven, his clothes dirty and askew.

Matt felt a twinge of sympathy, but that dissolved into anger at what Bennett had done to Daisy. “We have the final walk-through today for your security system, Mr. Ames,” Matt said coldly. “Let’s get started.”

Bennett leaned against the doorjamb and started to cry.

T
HEY
SAT
on the couch in his office, Bennett with a bottle of water he wasn’t drinking and Matt with a coffee. No one said anything for a while until Bennett wiped his eyes with one shaking hand.

“Are they all right?” he croaked.

“They’re fine,” Matt said shortly.

“With Griffin and Jim?”

“I don’t think it’s appropriate for me to say.”

Bennett seemed to sink a little bit lower. “Please make sure—I’ll give you whatever you want, just make sure they’re safe.”

“Don’t worry about Daisy—she’s my friend. I don’t need any money to make sure she’s okay.”

“I’m sorry for how I behaved toward you—” Bennett began, but Matt put up a hand to stop him.

“I have a contract to finish and then I’m done.”

Bennett sighed, leaning back into the leather sofa. “I thought we were friends.”