Page 54 of Forever Your Touch

“Jo,” Mason corrected him. “She doesn’t like to be called Josephine.”

“Isn’t that what you call her, though?” Viktor arched a brow.

“Hells yeah.” His first hint of a smile slipped out. “I only do it because it irritates her.”

“The little things are what you’ll remember the most, son.”

They all jumped when Ronin Kincaid spoke. Bastard could skulk better than even Conner.

“Where’s Mama?” Conner asked, pushing Mateo out from behind his legs and giving the boy a look.

“Downstairs with your brother and his wife. The girl’s spooked.”

“They’re here already?” Shit. How was he going to be there for both Jo and his family?

“Yes, I came up here to check on you.” Ronin slapped him on the back, his father’s way of hugging his grown-ass son. “How is she?”

“In surgery. We won’t know anything until they come out and talk to us.”

“Then we’ll take turns waiting with you and Becca.” Ronin walked over and sat down, a cough slipping out. “Girl’s as nervous as a cat. Dimitri’s with her, but the minute more than two or three people come in the room, she gets antsy.”

“She’s got severe anxiety of crowds, Papa.” Mason took a seat beside him, needing to be near his father. Ronin exuded the kind of strength all his sons could only wish for. “She had a rough life. It left a mark on her. Don’t judge her. You don’t know her story.”

Mason did. She’d told him all about growing up with a father who was more interested in his motorcycle club than how her crack whore mother treated his kids. She’d confessed how she and Jackson, her brother, sometimes stole food from the grocery store so they wouldn’t starve. Becca had been through enough without her father-in-law adding to it.

The softest smile graced his father’s face. “You’re growing into a fine man, Mason. I’m proud of you, son.”

His father was never one to hand out compliments, but he’d been doing it a lot this last year. And now they knew why. He might be dying, and he wanted his boys to know what they meant to him.

“Now, tell me about this girl you’re sweet on.”

Mason laughed. He was more than sweet on her. He loved her. He’d suspected but fought those feelings. It wasn’t until he saw her lying bloody and screaming that he admitted it to himself.

“She’s not sweet on me, Papa.” He sighed and settled into the hard chair while he told his papa all about Josephine Maxwell. “And then, knowing the bastard caused this, she wanted to call him. I don’t know how to fight that kind of blind love. How do you convince the most stubborn person on the planet they deserve better?”

“Through your own stubbornness.” Ronin nodded like this was gospel or something. “You keep being there for her, wear her down, boy. Don’t give up the fight. If she’s really worth it, then put in the time.”

“You gotta tell her, though.” Vik finally put in his two cents. “Won’t mean as much if she doesn’t know you’re fighting for her.”

“But what if she doesn’t want that? Want me? What if she tells me to get the hell out and not come back?”

This was his biggest fear. He’d decided to be her friend for this very reason.

“Give her your most charming smile and tell her that shit’s not happening. She’s stuck with you until she comes to her senses.” Viktor smirked, proud of himself for thinking that up.

“Shithead, it’s the twenty-first century. Going all caveman on a woman doesn’t work so much anymore. They are allowed to have an opinion now.”

Ronin shook his head. “Son, here I thought you’d learned a thing or two from your brothers. Not so much if you don’t understand the man-woman relationship hasn’t really changed all that much since creation. Men and women fight, then they make up and fight some more. It’s what you do in between that counts. Man up, buttercup. Be the Kincaid man I taught you to be.”

Mason wasn’t about to argue the point. Kincaid men were hardheaded and learned it from Ronin. He wasn’t his father or his brothers. He wasn’t going to go in there and tell her she was his, and that was that. That might have worked with their women, but he had a feeling that shit wouldn’t fly with Josephine.

Nik, Viktor, and Dimitri all used that mentality with their women, and maybe Lily, Sara, and Becca needed that. They’d suffered so much in their lives. It must have been a relief on some level to have someone to take care of everything. With Angel, well, her initial relationship with Kade was built on a lie. They’d had a lot of shit to work through. He could understand the caveman mentality with all of them. Hell, he even approved of it.

But Jo? She wasn’t anything like them. Sure, she might think it was okay for Ray to put himself first, but he wasn’t abusive. Just apathetic. Jo had been raised in a loving home and treated the way a normal kid should be.

That was the crux of it. She was normal. There were no demons to overcome, no lie to get past.

Just him baring his soul to her and hoping she didn’t kick him out of her life for good.

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