Walk Through Fire (Chaos #4)(155)

“Of course it does,” she replied.

“He has his two girls. He dotes on them. I cannot express how happy I am that he has them but that doesn’t mean I don’t think. Even though he isn’t holding any anger about what I did, he still told me that what I did meant he couldn’t be around to help us build a new dream. He’s a biker and there was a good deal of shady going on in the Club back then but maybe we could have adopted. Maybe—”

“Girl, stop it.”

I shut my mouth.

She went on.

“Sister, you came this far. You went through hell. You gave it all up and then you got it back. Your story is impossible. Shit like that doesn’t happen. Seeing your guy at Chipotle and ending up with him back in your life, just as into you as he ever was, committed to building a future. Now there are so many ways to f*ck that up, it boggles the mind.”

She leaned into me again and, as was sometimes her way, got bossy.

“Beat that back, Mill. You get stuck in your head about all that you lost. All that’s passed that you can never get back. All you couldn’t give to him. All he couldn’t give to you. Mistakes that may or may not be just that. You get stuck in that, you’re gonna lose hold of the one thing in your life you ever truly wanted, Millie. And you can’t do that.”

She held my gaze, reached out, put her hand on my desk, and gave me the rest.

“I know you wanted kids. I know you wanted a family. What you gotta get is that maybe you didn’t. Maybe you wanted that because you wanted it all from Logan and with Logan and you wanted to give it all to Logan. Because, babe, seriously, you have family. Lots of it. You have love around you. Lots of it. From the moment I met you, anything you wanted, you got because you worked at getting it. But the only thing I ever saw you really, really want, the only time you were really, really happy, was when you had him. Now you have him. Do not get mired in what could have been. Rejoice in what is now.”

She was soooooo right.

“For a crazy bitch, you’re also super smart,” I blurted in order not to get emotional and burst into tears.

“Van Gogh was crazy. The guy was also a master,” she returned, taking her hand from my desk and sitting back in her seat, grinning.

“I think I read somewhere he might have had a neurological condition,” I told her.

“Yeah. His neurological condition being that he was crazy and crazy talented,” she replied.

“Are you taking up painting?” I asked.

“Nope. And not gonna win the Nobel Prize like that dude from A Beautiful Mind. But that guy was a genius and he was bonkers too.”

“He wasn’t bonkers, Kell. He was ill. He had schizophrenia,” I informed her.

She smiled. “We genius folk who are bonkers can call each other bonkers. It’s in the handbook.”

I started giggling.

She joined me.

I stopped giggling abruptly and said, “Thanks for understanding about...” I paused before finishing lamely, “everything.”

She shook her head again, no longer giggling but her lips were curled up.

“Sister, I got a ton a’ friends but only four real ones. That’s because the others like having fun with me but they don’t get me. You don’t have to thank me for shit. You give that understanding back and that’s just the way it is.”

“I think I feel the need to hug you now,” I told her.

“Beat that back too,” she returned. “The only time I feel physically affectionate is while riding the rush after crowd surfing and there’s no concert on my imminent schedule, which is bumming me out.”

I raised my brows. “That’s it? There’s no one you feel physically affectionate for at the present moment?”

“If you’re asking if I’m getting it regular, no. Which is also bumming me out.”

“Time to go on the prowl,” I remarked.

“There was a time when I’d try to drag you with me but I’m thinking Low would frown on that.”

I was thinking she was correct because he always had. He hadn’t said much when Justine, Kellie, and I hit the town or a party without him. But back then we were all young, fun-loving, and attractive, so he also didn’t hide he didn’t like it much either.

We might not be able to claim the adjective young anymore, but we were still fun-loving and attractive, and at this early juncture, I didn’t think it would be good to test Logan on that unless he was at my side.

Hard for Kellie to be on the prowl with a hot biker hanging around.

“Perhaps you should take Justine with you,” I suggested.

Veronica didn’t mind that Justine went, mostly because both of them had been through the romantic wringer before finding each other. Neither would stray and both knew it.

Logan knew I’d never stray either but he was a badass biker. They got aggressive about that kind of thing.

“Gonna set that shit up,” Kellie declared.

“And Claire. She’s probably due to get dumped by one of her six boyfriends soon. She’ll need to fill that slot.”

Kellie grinned.

I grinned back.

And I did it thinking again life was as weird as it was wonderful.

Because we’d discussed something that lay buried between us for years. Something she and Justine had guessed, but I’d never dug it up for them.