Total pages in book: 93
Estimated words: 86364 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 432(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 288(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 86364 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 432(@200wpm)___ 345(@250wpm)___ 288(@300wpm)
“I know. I just—I was getting my life settled here. To pick up and begin from scratch in Phoenix…” My head dropped so that my chin nearly touched my chest. Of course, everything was up in the air now with Joy. My big plans were put on pause, and I was going to need to scrap everything anyway, but I at least had a foothold on things here in Cincinnati. I had some friends, though no one as close as Molly was.
Molly and I had grown up in Phoenix, but we’d moved the hell out of there for college and never returned. We’d attended college at the University of Cincinnati and decided to stay. We liked the town, and after four years of school, it had become home for us. Nearly ten years later, the idea of moving back to Arizona felt so weird and foreign to me.
My entire life had changed in a heartbeat, but I felt confident that I could work Joy into all my routines here in Cincy. Going to Arizona would be too much change for both of us.
“Let me try it for six months,” I blurted out. “Let me at least try it. Joy and I have been together for less than a week. During that time, it’s been getting all her things here and settled. Then arranging the funeral and locating all the information that Molly had for Joy’s doctor. Not to mention working out the health insurance. We have had nothing that might resemble a normal day yet.”
Mom sighed heavily, but before she could speak, my dad cut in.
“He’s right, Lenny. He hasn’t been given a chance to find his footing. It’s only fair to him.”
“What about what’s fair for Joy?” My mother huffed.
“If life were fair, she wouldn’t have lost her mom.” I narrowed my gaze at her. “Did you do this with Jack at Olivia’s birth?” I asked, mentioning my oldest niece and Jack’s first child. “Were you worried about what’s fair for Olivia when it came to how Jack was raising her?”
“Well, no, but Jack has…”
“Jack has Heather,” I finished for her.
My mom huffed again and looked as if she were trying hard not to make an annoyed face at me. “I love your brother, you know that, but Jack has no common sense. He would have been lost without his wife. Still would be.”
I turned my hand in hers so that I could squeeze it. “Mom, no new parent knows what the hell they’re doing. You figure it out. You ask doctors and read books. Do you think I don’t have enough common sense to figure this out?”
“No, of course not. I just don’t want you to have all this on your shoulders alone.”
“I know, and I won’t. You and Dad will be there to answer my questions and cheer us on from Phoenix. And if things get too hard or more than I can handle, I will seriously consider moving back.”
“I think that’s a smart way to approach it,” Dad chimed in.
My eyes shot to my mom’s face. Her smile was tight and worry dug deep lines in the corners of her eyes, but after a second, she nodded as well. “Okay. As long as you know that we’re always there for you and Joy.”
A pent-up breath I hadn’t realized I was holding in rushed out of me. Their support meant the world to me, but not nearly as much as their belief that I could handle this. I mean, I didn’t know what I was doing, but I had to believe I could figure this out. That I could at least try for Molly and Joy.
4
DECLAN FOSTER
Monday morning arrived with a shock.
I’d been in the office for less than an hour when a knock on my door drew my eyes away from the computer screen. Anyone visiting me felt like a surprise. The only person who usually stopped by was Sebastian, and he rarely knocked. He just started talking the second he walked through the door as a way of announcing his arrival. Everyone else in the company called or emailed.
No. There was one exception—Parker Cain.
But the Parker Cain currently standing in my office wasn’t the man I’d last seen in my office a week ago. My stomach knotted at the sight of him. Last week, I’d found him sitting on the floor outside my office, sobbing as he shook his phone in his fist. He’d said something about the death of a friend before staggering to his feet and leaving. Something in my gut had told me I shouldn’t have let him leave the office alone that day, but we knew so little about each other. It had felt wrong to interject myself into such a painful, private moment.
It was reassuring to hear that he’d called in sick for the following week because of the loss of his friend. At least then I knew he was still alive.