Page 72 of Unbreakable Love

Yeah. Can I call you in five?

Not quite the response I was hoping for.

I can wait. Sounds good.

Less than five minutes later, my phone rang. I answered it right after it started buzzing.

“Hey.”

“Sorry,” Penny rasped. She sounded breathless, tired, but also happy. “Faye and Dolly and Lydia came over tonight. They were just leaving when you texted.”

“They were there?”

“Yeah. Faye texted and needed to escape Max, I guess. She brought friends with her.”

“That’s good. Good for all of them.” Definitely for Lydia. “Why did Faye need to get away from Max?”

Last I heard, they were divorced. He didn’t want it, but it’d been his screw-up in the first place. The guy was an idiot. He regretted what he’d done one hundred percent.

“Oh, because he showed up the night everything happened last week and he’s refusing to leave. Says it’s not safe for Faye to be alone. She’s apparently kicked him in the shins and told him if he didn’t want her to be alone, he shouldn’t have made it happen.”

I laughed. “Sounds like Max and Faye. So he’s moved back home and is refusing to move out. Does she want him to?”

“I think so? She told us these stories tonight of their fights and she sounded mad, but she also looked kind of like she was enjoying, so it didn’t make sense.”

“They’ve always been fiery. Can’t say I blame her for kicking him out or leaving, but we’ve shared a drink or two since. He regrets it. Would work his ass off to get his family back, so I can’t lie and say I’m not rooting for him.”

“Yeah…” Her voice softened. “We probably shouldn’t be talking about them, though. That’s their business.”

Oh, she had so much to learn about life in New Haven.

“And this is life in a small town. We either enjoy someone else’s drama, or we’re probably involved in our own that everyone is talking about.”

“Speaking of, Maize told the girls tonight about us kissing on my porch. Just so you know.”

She sounded worried. Someday, I’d make certain she never had to wonder about how I felt, never have to be worried around me again. It might take a hot minute considering my behavior the last few weeks, but Bryce was right. I was a determined man.

“If you think that’s going to scare me, Penny, it won’t. You don’t think I didn’t take town gossip into consideration when I showed up at your place?”

“Well, no.” There was a soft laugh. “It didn’t seem like you’d considered much, actually.”

“Fair point.” I laughed. “But I think it turned out all right for me. How was the rest of your day?”

There was a sigh, and then, “Maize told me she talked to you this morning.”

“It wasn’t bad, Penny. Frankly, I’m glad you have her in your life in that way.”

“Yeah, but?—”

“No buts. I admire her for what she did, and you, for all you’ve done for her. She said you give too much to people and wanted to make sure I wasn’t just taking from you. That I was giving, too.”

She went quiet, so quiet I checked my phone to make sure the call was still live, and then finally said, “That idiot. That explains so much.”

I waited for her to explain. Her business with her sister wasn’t mine, not yet. But then she followed it up with, “She gave me a check today. A large check, paying me back for helping her with school.”

“Well, damn, that was nice of her.”

“Yeah, but she prefaced it with saying she’d taken from me long enough and wasn’t going to do it anymore. But it never felt like that to me.”

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