Thin Love (Thin Love, #1)(126)

He’d always remembered the conversation they had when he was five. He loved hearing it over and over. “It’s you and me, kid.”

His nod tells her that the small emotional catharsis is over and he returns to the island, picks up the knife and returns his attention to the cucumbers. “So, what did he say?”

“You mean after he stopped giving me evil glares?”

Ransom shrugs. “It had to be a shock for him.” Her kid is Pollyanna. Leann’s positive projection finally stuck with someone and though his “can do, see the best in everyone” attitude can be annoying, Keira is proud of the way her son chooses to see the world.

“To say the least.” She distracts herself with finishing the meal, prepping the serving dishes as Ransom reaches for a tomato. “He wants to meet you.” Keira comes to his side, scoops up the peelings into the trash and she watches him, checks his expression to see if that positive attitude falters. “You okay with that? I mean he’s been your hero since you were a kid.”

He jerked his attention to her, a waver of his smile and Ransom shakes his head. “No he hasn’t. He’s a phenomenal ball player, Mom, but he isn’t my hero. You are.” When Keira’s chin wobbles and that burn returns to her eyes, Ransom calls her on it, dismisses her emotion with a roll of his eyes. “If you don’t stop looking at me like that I’m gonna start talking about my boners again.”

“Please. God no.” She kisses his cheek, has to lift up on the balls of her feet to reach his skin. “You sure you’re okay?”

“Yep. I’m good.” There is a moment when her son frowns, thinking of something he keeps to himself, but it passes as quickly as it comes and the teasing tone returns to his voice. “Now come on woman, feed me your guilt food.”





Kona’s mother had lied to him before. He’d caught her. At the time, he couldn’t stay mad at her. Tutu kane got cancer and it was terminal. Kona was playing in the AFC finals, happy, excited at the chance to be on a team that could land in the Super Bowl. It wasn’t until after they won when Kona was coming down off the high that his mother told him about the diagnosis.

“I didn’t want you to worry,” she’d said. “That game meant so much to you and Tutu kane didn’t want me mentioning anything to you. Not until the last moment.”

That last moment came two days before the Super Bowl. Kona hadn’t cared about the game. He only wanted to be with his tutu kane. But he’d made a promise. His grandfather wanted him to play. He wanted Kona to forget him, if only for a few hours. And so he did. He’d played. They’d won and shortly thereafter the last moment came as he held his Tutu kane’s hand, cried like a little boy as the old man took his final breaths. He forgave his mother.

But as he waits in the old Victorian, arm across the back of the sofa, posture easy, he thinks forgiveness will not come so easily now.

He hears her Mercedes pull into the drive and Kona fleetingly thinks that she needs a brake job, that the squeak when she stops is getting worse than it had been two days before when she picked him up from the airport.

Her long, thin skirt sways against her legs as Kona watches her through the window and he grips the back of the couch, somewhat nervous, still angry that she’d kept this secret so long.

Keys on the table in the foyer and his mother stops short as she enters the living room, eyebrows up high when she looks at him. “Keiki kane? What are you doing here?” She drops her bags, worry etched in her face so that the wrinkles around her eyes deepen. “What’s happened?”

He doesn’t answer. Kona moves his chin, motions for his mother to sit across from him. She is tiny now; grown so thin and he worries about her. The professor is nearing her mid-sixties and she doesn’t cook for herself, doesn’t do more than shop and putter around in her garden.

Her back is straight as she sits on the glass coffee table, gazing over his face, looking, Kona suspects, for any hint of what has him so sullen, so quiet. “Yesterday in the Market,” he says, eyes lowered, glaring at her, “I saw Keira.”

The worry disappears and his mother’s posture becomes less rigid. “And?”

Kona dismisses the curiosity. He wants to measure her reaction, to see if a confession will come. “I spoke to her.”

“Kona, no.” She’s already abandoned her worry. She’s always hated Keira, even before the wreck, before Luka. He’d never known why and this flippant attitude that has her standing, has her picking her purse up from the floor and lifting her wide hat from her head, only confirms that her opinion has not changed. “It’s best you stay away from her. After all she did…”

“What do think she did, Mom?” His mother snaps her attention to him, a snarl curling her top lip, but Kona ignores it. “You think she’s responsible? Still? After all these years?”

“If she’d minded her own business…”

“She wanted to protect me. So… so did Luka.” He leans up, rests his elbows on his knees. “It was my fault. You never understood that. I led them there.”

“Don’t say that, son. No.” His mother comes next to him, takes his hands and some of his irritation is replaced with gratitude. She never thought he’d done anything wrong. His sins, his crimes, she always excused away as though they were the stupid behavior of a misguided kid, not felonies he’d willingly jumped into.