Pieces of Us (Confessions of the Heart, #3)(13)

My chest tightened. The bullshit the two of us had endured should have been insurmountable. I’d gone one direction. Ian had gone the other.

He’d paid for his crimes, and he’d come out better on the other side. The guy I’d always believed he could be. The one I wouldn’t second guess to call on for anything.

“Pretty sure she trusts you because she knows you can be trusted, Ian. You’re not gonna fuck it up,” I told him, sincerity bleeding free. “Not when you’re doing it with the right heart. Mistakes don’t mean we’re ruining something. It just means we’re learning. Getting better every day.”

He gazed down at his son. “Just want to do it right.”

We both looked up when his oldest son, Thomas, came shuffling into the kitchen.

Ian had adopted all three of Grace’s kids.

Thomas.

Mallory.

Sophie.

He was right.

He’d been given the greatest gift of all, not to mention that little bonus point of Collin who he cradled tenderly in his arms.

Thomas’s socked feet slid across the wood floor, all of his attention wrapped up in his iPad. He barely glanced up, totally absorbed in whatever was on the screen. “Hey, Dad,” he muttered.

When the kid said it, Ian lit up like a lightbulb.

Kind of had one light up in the middle of me, too.

“Did you see that interest rates are expected to go up? Wall Street Journal is reporting it. I think you and Uncle Jace should go for it if you’re thinking about getting something new and you plan on financing. It’s a good time to buy.”

Ian and I shared a glance. The kid was too much. As brainy as they came, always reading all these advanced articles and journals that I wouldn’t have dreamed of reading at that age. Hell, I still didn’t get half the shit he was talking about.

“Oh, hey, Uncle Mack,” he said offhandedly, just then noticing that I was there.

I refrained from using the hay joke on him.

“What’s up, Thomas, my man? I see you’re keeping your dad in line.”

Way cooler, right?

Yeah. I was with Ian. Totally out of my element.

Because I was pretty sure the one I knew about two hookers and a fisherman would be way out of line.

Thomas shrugged a shoulder. “Trying.”

“Come here,” Ian coaxed him softly, and he looked over the kid’s shoulder, reading whatever report it was that Thomas had pulled up. “Whoa, good job finding that. I didn’t hear. Uncle Jace and I need you looking out for us like this.”

Ian dropped a tender kiss to the top of Thomas’ head, lingering a bit, like he didn’t want to let go.

Thomas tipped his head up backward, beaming at him, before he fumbled right back out.

Easy, but the interaction seemed wholly profound.

I met Ian’s eye. “Pretty sure you’re doing it right.” Was doing my best to try to keep my voice from going rough.

That unsettled, sticky feeling hitting me in waves.

“Looks to me like you and Jace might have yourselves a new partner.”

Ian watched as the door stopped its slow swing and fell completely still. “Kid blows my mind. Did we think about stuff like that when we were his age?” he asked as he angled his attention back to me.

A snort blew through my nose. “Hell, no. Pretty sure the only thing either of us were thinking about at that age was the next thing we might be able to swipe without someone noticing or what girl would be game to let us touch their tits.”

“If I was my kid, I’d kick my own ass.” He laughed out a subdued sound, wonder filling his tone. “It was different back then, yeah?”

I shrugged, hating the heaviness that came rushing in, the weight of the reality of this world that could never be outrun. “It’s different for them, Ian. Different because you and Grace work hard to give them a good life. Because you love them more than anything else. Put them first. Not everyone gets that. These kids are damned lucky to have you. To have both of you.”

Pain leached into my chest.

Ian, Jace, and I had been bred into that kind of life. Their mom an addict. My dad a low-life thief. At least Megan Jacobs had good inside of her. The willingness to sacrifice.

If only my father would have possessed a sliver of those qualities.

Shouldn’t even have let that asshole get into my head because the second I did, all I could see was the heartbreak written all over Izzy the last time I’d seen her before she’d left town.

That striking, unforgettable face flashed through my mind, moving through me like a reel of time.

Progressing.

Now and then.

The girl so pretty I felt her like a punch to the gut. Her face and that smile and that body.

There was no forgetting her belief in me that I could be something better than my circumstances. She’d never given up on me no matter how hard I’d tried to keep her at a distance. Arm’s length.

It was when I’d started taking her into my arms that everything had gone to shit.

A pang of agony rattled my ribs, this choked sensation that was suddenly constricting the flow of air. Because all of it suddenly felt like too much.

The grief and the worry and the pain.

The regret.

The fear that I would never outrun myself. That I’d get sucked into that black, vapid hole, become the man I’d been bred to be.