Page 51 of Harboring Secrets
“Because trust is earned.” I knew that better than ever because I wondered if I’d earned any of Brodie’s trust back. Something was clearly bothering him, but he obviously didn’t want to discuss it surrounded by his family. Not that I blamed him. I blamed myself for being such a mess of a man when we met that I’d let myself hurt him.
The conversation moved on around Clay and me. He was content to spout off all his ideas to me while Shane and Kieran held one conversation, and Brodie and Archer another. The chatter made me feel like I was part of something, like I belonged instead of being a casual observer.
Movement caught my eye and I saw Patricia pointing an iPhone at us. She shot me a smile. “I couldn’t resist getting a few pictures. All my boys and their boys under one roof for the first time. It deserved to be immortalized.”
“You should be in the picture too,” I told her.
“Yeah, Mom.” Shane got to his feet and took the phone from her. “Take my chair. I’ll get a tripod from the office and set a timer.”
Patricia took his seat and fussed with her hair, smoothing down a couple flyaways. Her apron had handprints made of flour on it, bright white against the red fabric. Her smile had etched joy into her face over the years. Surrounded by her people, she looked like the happiest person on the planet. The difference between her and my parents was night and day. I had few memories of my parents laughing. They weren’t cold, they were just … unhappy. Deeply so.
Shane got the camera set up and started the timer. He slid into the frame and stood behind his mom. One of his hands came to rest on her shoulder and she reached up, putting her hand over his. I moved closer to Brodie and put my arm around him.
“Everyone look at the camera and say cheese,” Patricia said.
The sound of all of us together, slightly out of sync, was horrendous, but yet still the best sound I’d heard in a long time. It sounded like belonging.
After the timer went off and we were all blinded with the flash, Shane checked the picture. He showed it to Patricia, who signed off on it with a happy smile, and we were all free to go back to what we were doing.
“Can you send me that?” Brodie asked Shane. It only took a few seconds before it arrived on Brodie’s phone. He forwarded it to me and I opened it to have a look. Brodie had been increasingly quiet as time dragged on. I wanted to get him alone and make him talk to me, but for the foreseeable future, we were going to be surrounded by his family.
A funny feeling tugged at my chest when I saw the picture. It had been years since I’d been part of a family portrait. Piper and I hadn’t gotten around to it, her not being one to love having her photo taken. I had a few candid shots of her and some wedding photos, of course. And before her, I’d been a little kid, still knee-high, in a suit and tie with my hair slicked back. I still thought I looked like a miserable little vampire child, all pale and scowling.
I’d almost expected to look like an outsider, this being my first time meeting Brodie’s mom. But with my arm around him, and the stress from earlier temporarily forgotten, I didn’t look out of place at all. In fact, I sort of looked like I belonged somewhere. I hadn’t expected to find that feeling again, but now that I had, I knew I’d do anything to hold on to it.
Chapter 25
Brodie
Wedidn’tmanagetoleave Mom’s until nearly dinner time. She tried to convince us all to stick around and I might have if Shane and Kieran hadn’t bowed out. I promised Mom to bring Liam around more often, and myself too, and then we were alone in Liam’s car.
“How long are you going to drive a rental? That’s got to be costing you a small fortune.”
“I should buy something when I get back. Will you help me look?”
There was that talk again of him going, but at least he was talking about coming back. It did little to settle my stomach. I’d picked at my lunch, unable to eat very much. The thought of Liam leaving me made me want to crawl into a hole. I wanted to ask him about it, but my throat closed every time I thought about putting myself out there like that.
Suddenly I was back in that hotel room, cutting my heart out of my chest and handing it to him, but he didn’t catch it. I’d left that room hollowed out. Empty except for despair. Having Liam back felt like a dream, but I was terrified if I asked about his plans that they wouldn’t include me.
Fear was never rational and it had my heart running like a scared rabbit ever since that stupid call to John back in Mom’s office. How long had he planned on going back home? The thought that he might have his travel plans arranged and I had no idea made bile rise in the back of my throat, hot and stinging like acid.
Liam pulled into the driveway at our house—was it our house?—and suddenly I couldn’t make myself move.
“Brodie?”
The concern in his voice was obvious and I hated that he couldn’t read my mind. That I was seriously going to have to open my mouth and make the words come out. Once again I was in the position of being the one begging and I hated it. I hated that I was going to and that I wanted it to work this time.
But I wasn’t going to do any of it in my fucking driveway.
“Let’s go inside.” I unbuckled and got out of the car. The autumn evening air was fresh and carried with it a familiar scent that had me stopping in my tracks to breathe it in again. “Smells like snow.”
“It’s not in the forecast.”
“Trust me.” I fished my keys out of my pocket and unlocked the front door. Home felt like a foreign planet all of the sudden, but it wasn’t the house that was different. It was me. It was the knowledge that if Liam walked away again, I’d let him. I had no desire to be John and Marsha, desperately clinging to the shreds of their former life.
I needed to be busy, but there was no mess to clean. No laundry to fuss with. Liam set my laptop bag down on the counter.
“You left it in the car.” He turned to me and tucked his hands into his pockets. He was uneasy and it made my fear spike. “Brodie, what’s wrong?”
