Page 71 of Shortcake
He faded, but I didn’t push him to finish the thought. Just waited. Circling the now damp towel over the wine glasses. I opened the cabinet and stacked them one by one.
“I know this makes me sound like a shitty dad,” he prefaced.
I slid a glance in his direction and popped an eyebrow. “I doubt that. But try me.”
“Okay… after my mom got sick, I suddenly had to doeverythingin the house. Cook, clean, laundry, stay on top of her schoolwork, parent-teacher meetings, grocery shopping. I know lots of people do it. And lots of single parents did so with full-time jobs and no support system. I was damn lucky to have my mother’s help for as long as I did. I guess I’d been spoiled with having her help. But the sicker she got, the more everything rested on my shoulders. Not to mention, taking care of a sick parent is fucking hard.”
Oh, I knew. I knew better than anyone in his life, probably. But I had help. Four siblings to share the load of taking Mom to chemo appointments, surgeries, caring for her in the aftermath, cooking, cleaning her house. I couldn’t imagine having to do all that aloneplusraise a teenager and keep up with a full-time job. Especially a job like being a cop in New York City. Talk about stress.
“I was just… exhausted,” Conrad added with a shrug. “So on my rare days off of work, it was kind of a nice break to have Harper go hang out with friends so I could rest and have some time to myself. But that’s when everything started going to hell.”
“Because of her friends? The graffiti ones?”
“Because of hercousin. You know the one…” He gave me a look, but I was as confused as ever until he said, “Stephanie.”
Oh. Right. Stephanie Harris… the girl in the ID.
“Stephanie offered to help me out by taking Harper on the weekends when I was staying in the hospital with my mom. I thought she’d be safe with family. But Steph was in college at the time. And what was supposed to be a small movie night with Stephanie’s friends turned into a low-key party. I’m pretty sure that was the night Harper got a taste for rebellion. That was the night she transformed from my sweet little girl into the angsty hellion who got drunk the other night.”
Angsty hellion.
Once upon a time,Iwas that hellion. I was the kid in our family who always got caught rebelling. A blazing spark of irritation jetted through me. “There’s nothing wrong with a little rebellion. And it doesn’t mean she won’t turn out great.”
I’d always been ‘spunky’ as my mom put it. I was never the little girl who put on the frilly dress and sat quietly when they needed me to. I was the girl who had to wear bike shorts beneath my dress and then would inevitably end up sitting in the mud, trying to catch worms.
“I’m not saying she won’t grow up to be a smart, motivated individual,” Conrad said, eyeing me carefully. It was like he knew how raw I was tonight and even though my comments were somewhat irrational, he didn’t get mad or fight me. His deep, assessing eyes merely took me in until he gave a slow nod. “It’s her job to push back as a teen. But it’s my job to enforce the boundaries.”
I needed to chill out. Conrad wasn’t attacking me by saying he didn’t want his daughter rebelling. No parent wants that. Especially when ‘rebelling’ involved an ID that wasn’t yours and getting black out drunk.
I didn’t realize how quiet I was as I stacked the remainder of the plates in the cabinet next to the oven, until Conrad broke the silence. “So… you have a sister, huh?”
It was the sort of non sequitur question that would normally have me changing the subject with a self-deprecating joke. But something in how vulnerably and easily Conrad spoke with me cinched my heart like too-tight laces. Hot tears pricked the back of my eyes, but I quickly blinked them back.
I wanted to try. I wanted to be like him. I wanted to be able to talk things through calmly and rationally.
“I have… a biological female sibling I’ve never met.”
His right eyebrow tipped into an elegant arch. “Somepeople might call that a sister.”
“Some people might. But not me.” When I didn’t go on, his eyes drilled into me. “A sister is someone you can count on. Someone who’s been there for you your whole life. Someone who will always have your back and be the maid or matron of honor at your wedding. Enzo, Haylee, Elaina, and Chloe are my sisters. Hope? She’s just the daughter of some girl my father knocked up. The child of the affair my dad had before I was even born.”
“Pretty harsh,” Conrad whispered.
Other than my unfiltered conversations with Enzo, I hadn’t spoken this candidly about my dad and Hope to anyone.
Not even Haylee.
I spun to face him, inhaling a sharp breath.
“Harsh is my dad leaving us when we were little. Barely even calling on our birthdays for a few years. Harsh is those phone calls becoming less and less frequent until they stopped altogether. Which was fine while I thought he was just off, running around, being an asshole elsewhere. I had my amazing mom and three awesome brothers. But learning that he was out there being a father to someone else while we didn’t even get a sliver of his love?That’sharsh.” I shook my head and tossed the towel back on the counter, not bothering to hang it up.
I felt Conrad’s eyes still on me and when I glanced at him, his expression was sober, mouth pressed small, brows low over midnight blue eyes. “He was a shitty dad.”
“Damn right he was.”
“Was he shitty even before he left? When you were little?”
The question speared into me as a cool, evening breeze twisted through the open window above the sink, cooling my heated, flushed face. “He was…”
