Page 115 of Clean Slade
“Daddy!” she said and wrapped her arms around me. “What are we doing here?”
As she let go, I turned to the table and guided her toward it.
Mac instantly recognized Nino, and he waved at her.
“No dog today?” she asked, looking around everyone’s feet.
“Sorry, pumpkin, he had to stay behind today,” he told her.
“Mac, you remember Uncle Nino, right?”
She looked up at me and rolled her eyes.
“Of course, Daddy.”
“How are you, pumpkin?”
I glared at my brother. Where the hell had pumpkin come from?
“I’m good, thank you. Who are you?” Mac wasted no time, turning to Grams and waiting for a response.
“Mac, honey, that’s why we’re here. I wanted you to meet…” I dropped to my knees and grabbed either side of her so I could look into my daughter’s eyes. I took a deep breath. There were so many ways this could go. I just hoped it wasn’t terrible. I couldn’t deal with that. “I wanted you to meet a person who means a lot to me. This is my…your great-grandmother, sweetie.”
A knot formed in my throat, but somehow, I managed to finish my sentence without completely breaking down.
I wanted to tell her the truth. I wanted to tell her she wasmygrandmother and Nino wasmybrother, but I couldn’t. Not without telling her about Tony. About what he was and what he’d done. What he’d made me—made us—do.
So until she could handle the truth, that was what she’d have to be.Notmy Grams.JustGrams.
Mac looked from Grams to me multiple times, and my stomach sank.
That was it. One revelation too many for my poor little angel. She remembered I’d lied to her. I’d told her we had no family, and now I had sprung not only an uncle and a grandpa but also a great-grandmother.
Mac turned to Grams and cocked her head to the side. “You live here? It’s sooo dirty!”
Grams laughed out loud, the espresso cup in her hands almost slipping her fingers, and she rocked back and forth, trying to compose herself.
“See? I told you she’d notice. She’s my great-granddaughter, after all. Come here, little one. Let me get a good look at you.”
I let go of Mac and watched them, biting my bottom lip a tad too hard.
Grams stroked Mac’s hair and took her all in from head to toe. I didn’t miss her eyes going red or the quiver in her lips. But she kept it together somehow. For Mac.
I didn’t know if I’d be able to, however. I may not be inside Grams’ head, but I could perfectly imagine what was going through it.
I could imagine it because it was going through mine too.
All the years lost. All the sacrifices made. All the things she hadn’t witnessed. All the things she hadn’t been there to teach her.
Grams had been a mother to me. A mother to both Nino and me. She’d raised us. She’d made us into the men we were today. She’d taught us things my father had apparently never learned. She was the one who held us—smothered us—when we were sick. The one that held our hand when things got rough. The one that wiped the tears from our eyes and cleaned the blood off our skin.
Whatever we’d gone through, no matter how hard, no matter how awful, she’d been there to prop us up. To make sure we shared our weaknesses with her so we could present our strengths to everyone else.
A woman made of steel and gold. That was what she was.
Fuck. I don’t know how I’ve lived without her for so long.
The realization hit me like a truck at full speed. How much I’d missed her. How much I’d missed out on, let alone Mac. How my little girl wouldn’t have the same memories of Grams from her childhood that I had.
