Vulnerable [Suncoast Society] (Suncoast Society #29)(66)

He hated lying to her, but it was for the best.

He went to grab his shower.

When he finished, Eva wasn’t in the kitchen. He went to check on her, opening her bedroom door without knocking first. She wore a bra and panties and a towel wrapped like a turban around her hair. She was getting something out of the dresser and was slow to turn when he entered. Without speaking, he walked over to the bathroom. She’d cleaned up the mess, and looked like she’d gotten a shower.

He headed for the door. “Good girl,” he said on the way. “Hurry up and meet me in the kitchen.

He would make her do it, dump the liquor. Punishment, even though he could tell she felt like shit.

“Yes, Sir.”

She joined him there less than five minutes later. He stood there, now working on his second cup of coffee, watching as she emptied every bottle of liquor in the cabinet into the sink, including a half a bottle of Moscato wine from the fridge.

When she finished, she turned to him but didn’t meet his gaze.

Setting his cup aside, he walked over and pulled her in for a hug. “Good girl,” he whispered. “We’ll get through this. I promise. Together.”

She crumpled against him, softly crying. “Yes, Sir. Thank you.”





Chapter Twenty-Four


After Eva got Laurel’s mess cleaned up, Jesse sat Eva at the kitchen counter and made her some toast. Laurel’s focus was on the TV show she watched, so he kept his voice down as he stood on the other side of the counter and slid the plate over to Eva.

“Thank you,” she said, sounding lost.

“So tell me this. Why did your parents act like that last night? What piece of the puzzle am I missing that you guys haven’t told me?”

“Did Leo tell you I’m adopted?”

He faltered. “No. Believe it or not, Leo doesn’t tell me every last factoid about you.”

“All three of us are. We’re half sisters. My mom’s younger sister is our biological mother.”

“What happened?”

“She’d met a guy and got pregnant with my older sister, Ann. Then she dropped out of college and he left her while she was pregnant. She had Ann, then met another guy and got pregnant with me. She liked to party and stuff, I guess. He left her, too. Gayle was a third guy. She’d already lost custody of Ann and me when she got pregnant with Gayle.”

“But I get the impression your parents don’t treat your sisters like they treated you.”

There was a weighty pause he suspected contained far more than she let on. “No, because I look just like our birth mother. We always knew we were adopted and nothing I’ve ever done in my life was good enough. Only my grandmother never treated me like that.”

She looked even more lost than before. At least it explained the strong bond she had with her grandmother. “My mother and father always threw it in my face that if I didn’t straighten up, I’d end up worthless, just like my birth mother.”

“Where is she now?”

“Somewhere in Hudson, I think. We haven’t seen her in years. My mom and dad and the rest of the family don’t have any contact with her. She’s got a husband and son and they don’t know about us, apparently. We don’t even know our birth fathers.”

Wow.

Okay, so there was someone out there who had it worse, family-wise, than he did. He’d always known there was, he just never knew anyone personally who had it worse off than he did. Hearing the old pain in her voice allowed him to completely release his anger.

He reached across the counter and took her hand in his. “You aren’t defined by them or anyone else. You are able to live your life the way you want to.”

“That’s what Leo’s always told me,” she softly said.

“Then it’s time to do it, don’t you think?”

She nodded.

He let go of her hand. “Eat your toast. You need something in your stomach. Make sure you drink plenty of water today.” He walked over to the bag of Leo’s belongings and looked through it, finally finding his work cell phone. It had been damaged in the wreck and wouldn’t power up.

Item number one—Leo’s work. That would have to be kept going, no matter what. He could juggle his job and school around that, if he had to.

He rejoined Eva at the counter. “How much do you know about Leo’s shop and running his business?”

“Not much. He’s got a bookkeeper. He does stuff through one of those online accounting programs and he does direct deposit payments to his guys.”

Item number two—find out what software and buy a book on how to use it.

Sleep was beginning to look like a distant luxury. “Do you have the bookkeeper’s info?”

“No, but it’s probably at the shop.”

Leo’s keys had also been in the bag, his house keys and the shop and work truck keys.

He heard a phone ringing in the guest bedroom and realized it was his. He bolted for it, relieved and disappointed to see it was Ed.

“Hey,” the lawyer said without preamble. “Got everything filed this morning and will have official copies in my hands when Pat signs off on them this afternoon. How is he?”

“Same. I’m at Eva’s.”

“You’re…what? You’re where?”