Page 38 of Sweet Southern Heat

His presence was a double-edged sword. If he came around, we risked him stealing from Dad again, but it would make pinning him down for a long, overdue conversation a lot easier. As it was, I would have to track him down after I left here, but I’d gotten a tip about where he might be this evening. Before I could do that, though, I owed my father a conversation.

“There’s something I wanted to talk to you about,” I began, trying to act casual despite the thundering of my pulse against my ribs. Lyle had given him the same story about the accident that he’d given me. It painted Olivia as the bad guy, the selfish,irresponsible princess I once believed her to be. My father was understandably angry, just as I was, but he never held the level of contempt for her as I did. He believed the cops when they said she wasn’t intoxicated and chalked it up to being a tragic accident. Maybe he realized Lyle had been lying this whole time. Or maybe he was just too focused on helping Lyle recover to put as much energy into hating Olivia as I had. Either way, I wasn’t sure how he would handle me dating her, but after Lyle, he was the person who most deserved an explanation.

My dad studied me for a moment, worry creasing his brow as he set his fork down. He sat forward and leaned his forearms on the table.

“Is everything alright?” he asked. I swallowed, steeling myself against his reaction. I opened my mouth to speak, but my throat suddenly felt dry. I was about to admit to him that Olivia and I were together. I was dating the person we’d always blamed for ruining Lyle’s life. I picked up my glass and took a long sip of sweet tea and placed it on the table before clearing my throat.

“Remember how I worked on the bakery renovations?” I asked.

“Of course. It’s only been a few weeks since you wrapped up that project. I know my health isn’t great, but I haven’t gone senile yet,” he claimed with a chuckle. I released a relieved breath, and my shoulders relaxed. My father was always easy to talk to. I didn’t know why I was so nervous to tell him the truth.

His expression turned serious, his eyes filling with trepidation.

“Whatever it is, son, you can tell me. I’m a tough old guy. I can handle it.” A long moment passed before I gathered enough courage to speak.

“I’ve been seeing Olivia Duprey in secret.” His eyes grew round as saucers, and he choked out a cough. It took him a solidminute and several sips of sugar-free lemonade before he could speak again.

“You-you’re dating Olivia?” I nodded my confirmation, and his mouth fell open.

“Well, this is unexpected,” he said finally. “I shouldn't be surprised, though.” It was my turn to look shocked.

“Why’s that?” I asked, curious how he came to that conclusion.

“You went from complaining about her every time we spoke to acting like she didn’t exist. Not one mention of her name or complaint about what she wanted for the remodel. It happened around the time her bakery got vandalized.” I winced at the mention of the night of the vandalism.

“Yeah, about that…” I began, but my voice trailed off. Dad waited patiently as I searched for the right words to tell him what I’d suspected. “That’s when things changed between Olivia and me. I was already fighting these feelings for her I didn’t understand, and when that happened, I learned the truth about the accident.” He cocked his head to the side, waiting for me to elaborate.

“Lyle’s account of that night wasn’t exactly accurate.” He nodded as though he suspected as much, and my stomach twisted with guilt. Even our father had doubted Lyle’s version of events, yet I was fully committed to believing Olivia was the villain. I didn’t want to dig too deep into why that was. I was sure a psychiatrist would chalk it up to mommy issues or something equally as concerning, and they’d probably be right.

Shaking away those thoughts, I recounted the conversation I’d had with Olivia that morning as we stood among the rubble of her broken front window. He listened intently as I relayed Olivia’s account of the night of the wreck. He shook his head and buried his face in his hands as the ugly truth spilled from mylips. His eyes were misty, and his features twisted with grief by the time I finished.

“Once I learned the truth, it was that much harder to fight my feelings for her,” I admitted, my shoulders slumping in defeat. “The night we stayed at the lake house…” I began, but my voice trailed off. I didn’t want to talk to my dad about anything intimate that had happened between Olivia and me, but that was the moment everything had changed. “I couldn’t pretend anymore. She wasn’t who I thought. I no longer looked at her with the lens of Lyle’s lies tainting my perception. And what I saw was…” I shook my head, a soft smile curving my lips. “I think I’m falling for her, Dad. And I don’t know what to do. Lyle will never forgive me.”

I stood from the table abruptly, and the legs of my chair scraped loudly against the linoleum. Scrubbing a hand over my face, I paced back and forth across my father’s tiny kitchen.

“I’ve been trying to reach him. He won’t answer my calls, but Ineedto talk to him. I want him to hear it from me that I’m dating Olivia. If someone else finds out and tells him, he’ll think I betrayed him.” My stomach knotted with worry and guilt. My father watched silently as I continued to wear a path on his floor. “He’s already vandalized Olivia’s bakery and car. I’m afraid what he’ll do next when he learns I’ve been seeing her in secret. I’m worried he won’t be able to handle it, and he’ll OD again.”

I turned to face my father, hoping for his words of wisdom, but his face had turned ashen, and he blinked up at me wide-eyed. His throat bobbed with a heavy swallow before he opened his mouth to speak.

“Lyle did all that?” he asked, his voice shaking. I nodded.

“The police don’t have enough evidence to prove it, but Iknowit was him.” Who else would go through all that trouble to hurt Olivia?

Dad stood from his chair, wobbling as he gained his balance. It was tough with his prosthesis, but he’d managed to acclimate to the foreign limb. He came around the table and stood in front of me.

“If this is what you truly want, then you’re right. You need to find him. He won’t handle it well if he hears it from someone else. Don’t waste another minute,” he pleaded, grabbing me by the shoulders. His worried expression said it all. He also feared what Lyle would do if he found out before I could tell him. My brother could go off the rails and try to numb his pain in the most self-destructive way.

And this time, my father could lose his baby boy for good.

My foot tappedagainst the floorboard impatiently as I waited for my brother to emerge from the ramshackle building. I had to ask around, but eventually found out this was one of his usual haunts. The house sat on an overgrown lot with several dog kennels in the backyard. The dogs barked any time someone came near or a car drove by. The snarling beasts were covered in cuts and scrapes, and one was missing half his ear. Disgust curled my lip, and my stomach soured. I loathed anyone who harmed animals. It took everything in me not to ram through the rundown house with my four-by-four. It was already falling apart. It wouldn’t take much to topple it completely.

The front door flew open, and Lyle finally emerged. He glanced from side to side nervously as he stuffed something into his pocket and yanked his too large shirt over his waistband. Opening the passenger door of a vaguely familiar sedan, he hopped inside, and the driver pulled onto the street. I followed at a distance until the car stopped at a small cottage that looked tobe in a little better shape than the one my brother had just come from. The paint on the siding was peeling, and the roof over the porch dipped slightly on one side, but the yard had been mown and was picked up. There were children’s toys peppered across the yard and a rusty swing set that had clearly seen better days between the house and the woods bordering the property.

I expected my brother to go directly inside, but instead, he skirted around the side of the house and disappeared into the back yard as the car pulled away from the curb and drove off. I parked a few houses down, hoping he wouldn’t notice my truck, and jogged down the sidewalk. There was no one outside, but I still felt eyes on me as I stopped in front of the house. It was stupid to go onto someone’s property I didn’t know, but I needed to talk to my brother, and this was the only way I could do it.

I followed the path he took leading behind the house. It was cool and shaded against the late evening sun. It was almost dark, and already the cicadas created their symphony of summer.

Lyle stood at the back of the property, smoke curling into the air from his lit cigarette. He took a long drag from it and blew it out before speaking.

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