Page 50 of Served Hot
“Must be where you get your creativity.”
She shrugged against him and rubbed his chest. “I guess. My mother didn’t want to settle anywhere. Winona once wrote that she was a passing shadow, always drifting. My father loved that about her at first, that wandering soul. She was a writer, you know. A pretty popular poet.”
He let her continue, knowing she needed to let it out.
“But when she got pregnant with me, she figured it was time to settle down. She got back in touch with her family. Tried to put down roots. She married Dad after he spent months talking her into it. He can talk anyone into anything.”
He smiled against the top of her head. “I like that about him.”
“He likes you too. Always has.”
His heart thumped beneath her hand.
“But when my mom took my dad back to her family to introduce them, her father wouldn’t accept him. Dad’s white. Not family, no matter how hard he tried. My grandfather didn’t want me either.”
“They couldn’t all have been that bad.”
“No, not all. Her mom—my grandmother—liked Dad, and so did my mom’s sisters. But her father was your typical tyrant dad. What he said went. That’s pretty much why she left home to begin with.” She snuggled into his arms. “To hear Dad tell it, my grandfather would have forgiven her if she hadn’t gotten knocked up by a white man. I didn’t make things any better when I arrived. One of them, yet not. I’d always be white to them. Which is ironic, because to a lot of folks in Bend, I’m nothing but an ‘Indian’.”
“I’m confused. Your mom was pregnant with you, and she loved your dad. Why didn’t she stay with him?”
“She tried to be with Dad, but she missed her father. And truthfully, she missed her drugs and her writing. Dad made her stop when they learned she was pregnant with me, and I guess her muse needed pot and pills to work. When I arrived, Winona had had enough. She turned against Dad. Against everything, really. Dad was so in love with her, and she shut him out. She left a few months after I was born, then came back, then left again. It went on like that for a few years. She never tried to get custody or anything to take me with her. She just left us.”
“Jesus. That sucks.”
“Yeah.” She sounded so sad. “Dad raised me, but he never forgot her. Unfortunately, I look just like her.”
“Then I know why your dad could never forget her. You’re gorgeous.”
She didn’t seem to be hearing him. “He’d tell me stories about her, hell, evenaftershe died. Tried to act like she was just confused, that she loved me but the drugs made her crazy. But I read her letters. I knew.”
She sniffed, and he hurt for her. “What did they say?” he asked.
“How much she hated how she’d left everything good for him. How I was too needy, too much a burden. She hated coming back to visit. She hatedme—she wrote that.”
“Maya…”
“So all those years, Dad kept himself apart from others. Because of me.”
“No. He loves you.” Dex knew that to his bones. “He said he was seeing a therapist. He had his own issues.”
“Because—”
“Because he fell in love with a woman who didn’t love him back. Period. You had nothing to do with it. You know that deep down. Your mom would have left him anyway because your grandfather didn’t like your dad.”
“Prejudiced old bastard.”
He hugged her tight. “Those two missed out on you. Their loss.”
She snorted. “Yeah, sure.”
“How did she die? A crash, right?”
“Car accident. My grandmother called to let Dad know. According to him, the old woman was beside herself. He tried to visit her once, but they’d already moved. He never heard from any of them again.”
Like being rejected all over again, he thought. “So because your dad was hurt, you were too. Is that why you haven’t been in a long-term relationship?”
She pulled out of his arms. “I’m with you, aren’t I?”
