Page 61 of Opposites (Never) Attract
Mom shook her head, the tears coming for real. “Your father showed me what real love was. He was my angel. The way he saw all my flaws and loved me because of them, not instead of them. He knew every gruesome detail, because I told him, and still, it didn’t matter. He said he wanted my future, not my past. I hope all you girls find a man like your father.”
I was relieved that what I thought had been true when I was a kid was real. More than relieved, really. Comforted. It felt like a boulder had been pushed off my chest and I could breathe again.
“And Leroy McGraw really didn’t know about me.”
Her lips pressed into a thin line. “No. I never told him once I knew he wasn’t leaving Sasha.”
“So, if he didn’t know about me, howdid he find out?”
She sighed. “I think he always suspected something. I married Edward only weeks after we broke things off. I could only hide my belly for so long. Most folks understood that Edward and I jumped the gun before marriage. But Leroy knew me well enough to know I wasn’t stepping out with two men at the same time. When he was diagnosed with cancer, he asked me to come see him. Said he had to know the truth before he died. Edward was gone. Sasha was gone. Didn’t see the harm in telling him the truth then.”
I nodded.
“He was curious about you after that. Obsessive, really. Wanted to know everything about your job. I didn’t have a lot of answers, so he looked you up online. Studied your career, read everything anyone ever published about how smart you were. How outside the box your methods were. He said you reminded him of his mother. Apparently, she’d been very smart but had never had the chance to prove herself away from the ranch.”
That was nice and all, but I didn’t give a shit. Not really. I cared about my sisters, these new half-brothers of mine. I cared about doing what I could to help the ranch, which would help all of them.
I let out the breath I didn’t know I’d been holding. “That’s it then? All the secrets?”
“That’s it,” Mom said, with a smile. “All the secrets I have are out in the open.”
“My room still here?”
“I just put fresh sheets on the bed.”
And with that, Monica Calloway stepped back from the door, opened it wide for me, and I…came home.
“Where are Amity and Bliss?”I asked over dinner.
Mom had made chicken pot pie, my favorite when I was a kid. I didn’t have the heart to tell her I tried to avoid dairy, gluten and sugar as part of a healthy diet.
“They moved out. Amity lives above the café and Bliss lives over the bar. Thought they might come home for a visit, but they must be busy.”
“Is that safe. Living over a bar?”
My mother chuckled. “The girl from the big city is asking me if our town is safe.”
“Mom, New York isn’t what you think. I have a doorman to my apartment. They have rowdy cowboys getting drunk every night downstairs. I’m pretty sure I’m safest of all of us.”
“No one around here would touch those girls. They know it would be a death sentence for them. People want to drink, they need the Last Stand. People want to eat, they need the Last Meal. People want to eat or drink at home, they need-”
“The Last Chance,” I finished for her. “Got it.”
“They’re excited to have you home,” Mom said, with that raised eyebrow that immediately brought back a rush of guilt for being the shitty sister. “We’ll stop by Amity’s place tomorrow.”
“They’re only excited because they think I can save the Swinging D, which in turn will save the town and their businesses,” I said.
“No, they’re excited to haveyouhome,” she corrected me. “And because they plan to raid your suitcase for fancy, big city designer clothes.”
I chuckled. “They’ll be disappointed then. I didn’t bring much with me.”
Mom tipped her head. “You don’t plan to stay long?”
I pushed a pea covered in chicken gravy around the bowl in front of me. “I have an idea. It might work. It might be a disaster. But it’s something.”
“All anyone can ask of you is that you try.”
My phone vibrated in my back pocket. Leaving my phone behind this morning had put me behind the eight-ball at work. The texts and voicemails from my assistant had gotten increasingly desperate. But, I’d taken an hour before dinner and put out every fire.
