“Where’s your truck?”
I climb into the passenger seat and glance over at my dad. “Dylan has it.”
“Dylan? Why would you let that musician-creep drive it?”
I laugh harder than I should as he pulls away from the station. “Dylan is the girl staying with me. Remember Damon McCoy from that sleep-away football camp you sent me to when I was in high school? She’s his sister.”
“Oh.”
“The musician-creep is Jett.”
“Jett? As in like an airplane type of jet?”
“Exactly.”
“It’s easy to confuse your old man,” he says with a laugh but then falls silent as he slides a look my way.
Christ. Not again.
“Who talked to you?” I sigh. First the guys at the start of shift yesterday and now him.
“No one.” But his lack of explanation as to what I’m referring to is an answer in and of itself. “I heard you got in a fight the other night with the Winters kid.”
The Winters kid. I feel like I’m back in grade school again the way he says it.
“The fucker deserved it.”
“Grady—”
“He disrespected Dylan, so don’t give me a lecture on how fists don’t solve problems. I get it. I know better. I’m not twelve anymore, and I didn’t pledge my life to upholding the law. But this time around, he deserved it. You don’t brag about sleeping with a woman when you didn’t and then say rude shit to disrespect her.” There’s more anger in my tone than there should be, but I’m so sick and tired of being pushed right now.
I look over to my dad to see his lips pursed. It’s his tell when he has a shitload to say but is holding back.
“And this Dylan woman,” he finally says, “what did she think of you protecting her honor?”
“She doesn’t know.”
“Hmm.” He nods but gives nothing more on the subject. “You’ve missed the last couple of Sunday dinners. You know what that does to your mom. Maybe you should bring this Dylan around the house sometime since it seems you don’t want to leave her.”
“It’s not that I don’t want to leave her. It’s that I’ve been on shift. And bringing Dylan to the house would only encourage Mom’s matchmaking you-should-marry-this-girl-and-give-me-grandbabies frenzy. No thanks.”
“She means well.” After forty years, there is still affection in his voice every time he speaks of her.
“I know she does.”
“So are you?”
I’m pretty sure I choke on the air I’m breathing. “Am I what?”
“Are you going to marry this girl and give us grandbabies?”
If whiplash were possible, I’d have it from the breakneck speed I turn to look at my dad. “We aren’t even . . .”
Aren’t what? We aren’t dating but we’re fucking?
Classy, especially after I was just talking about respect and women.
“Grandbabies aren’t in the future.”
“But you like her.” It isn’t a question. Just a statement.
I chew the answer on my tongue before nodding. “Yeah, she’s pretty cool.”
“You got in a fight for her, Grady. That means she’s more than pretty cool in your eyes. In fact, it says you more than like her.”
“Seriously?” I laugh, feeling like I’m on the playground bickering with a classmate.
“A songwriter, you say?” he asks, switching gears like the seasoned interrogator he used to be.
“I didn’t say what she did.” He has definitely been talking to my brothers. “But yes, she’s a songwriter.”
“Does she sing too?”
I think of her voice. How it’s throaty and sexy with that hint of rasp to it when she sings. “Yeah. She has a great voice.”
“So is she going to transition to singing for herself instead of hiding behind the scenes?”
Let the cross-examination begin.
I know my dad, and right now he’s angling at something. “No,” I respond as we turn down my street. “I keep telling her she has a hell of a talent, and it’s too bad she isn’t putting it to use.”
My dad pulls up to the curb in front of my house and looks at me for a beat. “Kind of like you.”
“What?” My fingers tense on the door handle.
“You have a hell of a firefighting talent.” He shrugs. “Too bad you aren’t putting it to use.”
Trigger pulled. Point made.
I stare at him, wanting to lash out but knowing it will do no good. Being the ex-chief of police, his ties run deep in this community. Someone at the fire department talked to him. Someone voiced his concern. Without me saying a word, he knows I haven’t been back into a fire since the accident.
“I know. It’s a rough time of year for me.” I slide from the car, wanting this conversation to be over and done with.
“Hey, Grady?”
I lean down and meet his eyes. “Yeah, Dad?”
“It’s okay to forget what hurt you, but just remember to never forget what it taught you.”
“What did it teach me, other than to fear the one thing I love?”
“Fear has two meanings, son. Forget everything and run. Or face everything and rise.” He gives me a soft smile as I try to process what he just said. “You’ve been doing the first for a while. That’s understandable. It’s been a long road, and a part of me wants to tell you to run forever and not look back, because I almost lost you once. That’s the safe bet. But that isn’t you. That isn’t the son I know. You’d die without being able to do your first love, fighting fires. So now? Now you take it day by day, call by call, nightmare by nightmare . . . but you face everything about it and rise.”
I nod as he starts the car and drives off without another word. I watch his car until I can’t see the taillights and then stare after it a bit more.
Face everything and rise.
My dad’s words ring in my head as I walk in the house, their poignancy hitting closer to home than I want to admit. It’s too much for me to think about.
So I don’t.
Instead, I grab a beer from the refrigerator and flip through the mail sitting on the counter as Dylan’s voice comes strong and focused through her closed bedroom door.
She’s working. Figures.
Jett’s gone. That’s a bonus.
I move to the hallway, Petunia beside me, and listen to her sing. Every part of me wants to open the door and sit on her bed to listen to her while she works. Watch that little crease she gets in her forehead when she’s concentrating. Study the way her fingers work with skill over the strings of the guitar. Listen to how she varies the same line over and over with one word changed, an inflection altered, to try to see what sounds better.
But I don’t do any of those things because I’ve been thinking about her way too much and thinking about a woman when it isn’t only how I’m going to get her back in bed is not something I can rationally afford. I mean, hell yes, I’ve thought about how I want her back in my bed, but I’ve also thought about so many other things. Things that make me think of Shelby and Brody and the fact that they’ll live the rest of their lives without Drew. Things that tell me I need to stop playing house with her and go back to being roommates.
I run a hand through my hair and force myself to retreat from her door and the comfort her voice brings. It’s when I walk into my bedroom and find the T-shirt and boxers I lent her washed and folded and set on the corner of my bed that it hits me.
In order to be roommates, we’ll no longer sleep in the same bed.
And without her in the same bed, my dreams will return. My nightmares.
With her beside me, they didn’t haunt me. It may have been only three nights, but they were the most peaceful three nights I’ve had in a long time. Not to mention one night of incredible sex.
I stare at the bed for a few moments before shaking my head.
Quit being such a pussy, Malone. Suck it up.
But instead of taking a shower like I planned to, I drop my bag right inside the door, shuck my shirt, and head out back to work on the playroom.
I need something to do with my hands that doesn’t involve them being on her skin.
So I begin to work. Nail after nail. Board after board. But it’s my dad’s words that keep ringing in my ears.
“It’s okay to forget what hurt you, but just remember to never forget what it taught you.” It taught me I’m not infallible. It’s taught me I can’t let someone close to me, because one day, I may be the one who doesn’t come home.