Page 76 of Winter's End

“Does Mom know?”

If he was still keeping this secret, I was going to blow it wide open. Ignorance wasnotbliss, and I would not let my parents live a lie. If Mom worked through it, that was her prerogative, but I wouldn’t be my father’s secret keeper.

Dad pursed his lips and dipped his head. “Yes. I confessed everything after she was hurt. I was wracked with guilt and couldn’t live with the shame. She took the time needed to recover, and I did everything in my power to show her it would never happen again. She stayed.”

A part of me was relieved Mom was indeed here of her own free will, knowing all the facts. Did Mom know about WAQ, too? My heart sat in my throat at that thought. I had always assumed she was completely in the dark about Dad’s activities, but what if she had known everything all along?

I stood from the armchair and shot him a hard stare.

“Mom may have forgiven you, but I don’t. You’re not the man I thought you were.”

I marched to the door and turned back before I lost my nerve. “I won’t be coming to work this week. Fire me if you want, I don’t care. But this”—I motioned between him and me—“will never be the same.”

I gave Mom a kiss on the cheek on the way out, knowing she could read me like a flashing neon sign, but I couldn’t breathe a word without falling apart. I climbed into my trusty truck and made it all the way to my apartment before the dam burst.

Salty tears fell onto the steering wheel as I leaned my head against it. My chest was an agonizing dumpster fire, and the gasoline Dad had just poured on it burned worse than the risk of Georgio coming for all of us like fish in a barrel.

There was something about your parents letting you down that drove a screwdriver into your heart. I was fortunate enough to grow up in a world believing my parents were my protectors, my spirit guides, and my brightest inspirations.

That illusion now lay shattered, leaving me with nothing but shards.

I needed a joint, I needed my best friend, and I needed a fuck.

I shot off a text to Winter and made my way inside, trudging up to my apartment like my world was ablaze.

Nope, just my rosy family reality.

The joint I rolled at my coffee table was the biggest I’d ever made. I inhaled the sweet smoke and sat back on the couch, shifting all the garbage that had accumulated there this week. I wasn’t usually Winter’s caliber of a slob, but I couldn’t bring myself to care.

Winter hadn’t responded to my texts yet, and Drew was spending the afternoon with his siblings; I didn’t have it in me to interrupt his family time. I took another toke of the joint and let the warm haze of being high wash over me.

Everything was fucked, and now, as I felt the languid laziness of the weed take over my body, so was I.

I woke with a start; groggy and with a serious case of the pasties as I rolled my fuzzy tongue over in my mouth.

Yuck.

The dank taste of ash and the scent of my body finally overpowered me. I rolled off the couch with a groan and walked to the bathroom; the hot shower and toothpaste felt as good as an orgasm.

I checked my phone after I pulled on some clean clothes. I was at the limits of my wardrobe; I’d needed to do laundry weeks ago, and now I only had two white t-shirts and a pair of gray sweatpants without sweat or stains on them.

Winter had sent me a bunch of texts, threatening to come get me if I didn’t respond in the next fifteen minutes. That had been an hour ago. I sent her a quick message I’d be there in twenty minutes. She responded within seconds, telling me she’d throw a pizza in the oven.

Perfect. Now that I had my wits about me, I was starving. I told her to put in two and tucked my phone in my pocket.

Winter had a washer and dryer in her apartment—I’d pack up a bag and do my laundry there.

Things hadn’t been strained between us since she’d let me kiss her. A fucking phenomenal kiss that had forced its way between the gray matter creases in my mind. I couldn’tstopthinking about it. Instead, life had continued on as normal—whatever the hellthatwas for us right now, with our daily messages and moving forward with Operation Guantanamo Georgio.

If I didn’t still feel the ghosts of her kisses on my lips, I’d swear nothing had happened between us.

But it had—first the threesome and then the life-changing kiss. I couldn’t undo it. I didn’t want to—I needed Winter Wallace to be my everything. Myactualeverything. Mind, spirit,andbody.

But where did we go from here? Did we talk about it? Did we just let our bodies lead the way? All I fucking did these days wastalkabout things—I was sick of talking. But Winter, as free-spirited as she was, would make me talk about it. If not now, then eventually.

I was sweating bullets when I arrived at her apartment. Not just because of the unusual June evening heat, but because I didn’t know how this encounter was going to go down. We could just eat pizza and watch a movie—or we could talk about our feelings and then fall asleep watching reruns of Seinfeld—or we could give in to what I was positive was brewing between us, and have the most blissful fuck of our lives.

I was desperate for the third option.

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