Between Hello and Goodbye(84)

I knelt beside him. “So I need to tell you something, buddy.”

He looked at me. “We can go home now?”

Christ.

He’d been asking me that nearly every day, and I’d ducked and weaved, but there was no more evading it now.

“That’s just it. I got final word from the surveyors, and they said it’s too dangerous because of the threat of mudslides. A few houses on the street can’t be lived in anymore.”

Including yours.

He frowned. “We can’t go back?”

He kept saying “we” because he correctly assumed I would come live with him in his old house. I’d have moved to a colony on Mars if that’s what he wanted, but I couldn’t give him the simplest of his wants—the only home he’d ever known.

“No, buddy. I’m sorry.”

“What’s going to happen to it?”

“Well, they’ll probably…tear it down.”

Kaleo sat still for a moment, then faced his papers. “I want to go home.”

My eyes fell shut at the pain that squeezed my chest. “I know you do, and I wish we could. I’d give anything for that, but…”

He looked at me with his big brown eyes, wide with fear because no one had told him that’s what grief could be either. “Can’t you fix it, Uncle Ash? Can’t you and your firemen friends fix it so it won’t slide?”

I can’t fix anything. Not a goddamn thing.

I shook my head. “I wish we could, buddy. But you’re going to live here, and we can decorate your room the same way. However you want.”

“I’m going to live with you forever?”

“Yeah. I’ll…”

I almost said I’ll take care of you, but anger gripped my throat in a chokehold. First Morgan, then Kal. The universe, or God, or whoever the fuck kept stealing parents from little kids and leaving it to me to step in. As if I could replace them.

“Okay,” Kaleo said dully and went back to his work.

I didn’t know what else to say, so I ruffled his hair again and joined Chloe in the kitchen. The scent of spaghetti sauce laced the air, along with the garlic bread baking in the oven.

“Hey,” she said with a smile. “How was the meeting with your manager?”

“Terrible,” I said in a low voice. “Have to sell the business and I just had to tell Kal the house is gone. Too dangerous.”

“Oh no.” Chloe took oven mitts from a drawer. She knew my kitchen like the back of her hand. “How did he take it?”

“I don’t know. I’m sure it’s fucking horrible, but I can’t read him.” I rubbed my eyes for the millionth time and glanced around. Chloe had cooked dinner and the table was set. Kal was doing his homework. Stability. Something I was struggling to give him.

“Chloe…I was thinking about your offer to move in here.”

“It still stands.”

“But you’d keep your own place,” I said. “And it wouldn’t be permanent. I couldn’t ask that. Just until I get my shit together.”

Her smile was wide and her eyes warm as they looked at me. “That’s what I want. To help you however I can.”

I nodded. “But…and I don’t want to sound like a presumptuous ass, but I can’t be anything to anyone right now.”

An understatement. My heart was completely shattered but every little piece still belonged to Faith and always would. Missing her was another brick on the pile I carried around. One of the heaviest.

“I know,” Chloe said. “And I’m not trying to pressure you. There are no conditions for me being here or expectations on my part. But maybe…” Her cheeks turned pink. “Maybe just keep an open mind?” She looked up at me through lowered lids with a glance that was entirely full of expectation. “And an open heart?”

Mental alarms went off, but they were lost in the cacophony that was already there. And because I had no fucking idea what I was doing anymore, I nodded absently.

“Sure.”

Chloe smiled, satisfied, and pulled the bread out of the oven. “Dinner’s ready .”





Chapter Twenty-Five



I barged into the penthouse condo Silas shared with Max without knocking. His concierge had told him I was coming but I couldn’t wait for more niceties. Silas had been out of town for weeks, testifying before Congress on the severity of the opioid epidemic, and his luggage was still by the door. Max must’ve been at work, because Silas was alone; I found him sitting at his baby grand piano, playing some insanely complicated piece of classical music.

He saw me out of his periphery and stopped, turned on the bench to face me.

“Faith, hey…”

“What is this?” I thrust him the velvet box I’d been clutching in my hand for almost twenty-four solid hours.

Silas stared. “You haven’t opened it?”

“Not so much as a peek. Because if it is what I think it is, this is not how I want to see it for the first time.” I swallowed hard. “Is it what I think it is?”

He nodded, his voice low. “Yeah, it is.”

“Oh God…” I moved to the couch and sank down, my knees giving out.