I cocked my head to the side thinking about how Miss Sonya was gonna get on him for talking shit about his name. She and I spoke often normally about Ami but she was more than happy to converse with me about me. Which made me feel weird but in a good way. “Your mama know you think your name is old?”
“She sure does, who you think started calling me Richie?” He crossed his arms over the white t-shirt he was wearing with the confidence of a man who knew he was telling the truth.
I took my eyes off him because he was distracting and went back to folding the rest of Ami’s clothes. “I don’t believe you.”
“She’ll be here soon so you’ll get to ask her yourself.”
I whipped my head around to face him because this was news to me. “What do you mean?”
“School about to be out for my siblings so she’s gone pull up to see her grand.” He nodded toward Ami and I had to swallowdown the nervousness that I felt thinking there would be people here to judge the fairly unusual situation we had going on.
“Oh, yeah, that makes sense.” I vaguely remembered him saying something about her visit but I’d forgotten about it.
“Your people must not be close.” Aldrich made the statement but I could hear the underlying question in his tone. The desire to prod but the knowledge that we weren’t there yet. Or were we? I’d only been here for a month but we’d been in close proximity the entire time. At least when he wasn’t hiding out. His asking to go somewhere was technically an improvement from how he’d been.
“That’s putting it really lightly but also really wrong at once.”
“Complicated?” Aldrich’s face was filled with sympathy but I didn’t feel like explaining the foolishness that was the extent of my family drama. That would lead into more family history that I didn’t want him to be privy to. I didn’t know why, but I was worried that he would feel some type of way about my money. Probably because most people did. The few families that I’d worked for before that found out, had started rumors ours was going broke simply because I worked. That, of course, led to embarrassment that everyone blamed on me and Dalton. It took forever for them to stop fussing about it. If my mother found out about my being here, I was sure it would stir up old wounds on their part.
“That would be far more accurate.” I hated to even think about them within the confines of this house so I switched the subject. “Back to what we were discussing.”
“We need to get you a car.”
My eyes narrowed as his smile widened and I wondered if this was some slick way he was going about apologizing with a gift he felt like I couldn’t refuse. I’d seen the jewelry bag and had flashbacks to how my parents and the rest of my family usedgifts instead of words to express themselves. It sucked not to have a genuine connection. “A car? Why would I need a car?”
“Because I only have the one everyday car and I’m not going to be here day in and day out like normal. She might be small now but I can recognize that she’s going to be more mobile soon and so will you.”
“Okay, well, they have a bunch of delivery services so if I need something on short notice I can just contact aU-Shopperand have them get whatever is needed.” I shrugged it off because I didn’t want him to go out of his way to buy something. There was no way I was going to be out and about with a baby this little. And he was making plans like I would be here years down the line…
“Just gotta make sure it’s a woman, right?” He was making light of the situation but he needed to get schooled real quick.
“Do you know how terrible y’all are at picking items from the store even with a legitimate picture in your face?”
“Yeah, that’s an upbringing problem. I don’t think that it’s just men. My mama could send me to the store and just tell me what she wanted to make and my ass knew exactly what to come back with. Even if I thought we had it at the house I grabbed extra anyway because I wanted my dinner right and I didn’t want her fussing me out.”
I slow-blinked at him, trying to understand what it was he was saying. When he kept looking at me like I was wrong I just chuckled and stood up.
“Grab her and come with me real quick.” I pointed toward Ami in her swing and then turned headed to the kitchen. I knew he was going to follow me but halfway down the hall I felt like he was watching my ass. I refused to turn around and check because that would then put us in a weirder space than we were already in. When I got to the kitchen I opened the spice cabinet and pulled out two products. I waited until he turned the cornerwith Ami up on his shoulder before I said anything. Pointing to them I said, “Tell me what’s wrong with these.”
He rolled his eyes and bounced Ami softly in his arms. “Are we doing this again?”
“Yes, we are. So explain, since it’s an upbringing thing and not just a gender thing.” I motioned between the two items on the counter with my finger and waited for him to say something.
“I got the wrong thingonetime—”
“And what were you supposed to get?” I don’t know why I was teasing him. Maybe to distract him from this ridiculous car desire he had or that I was happy that he was back in a better headspace. Either reason seemed good enough to justify my actions.
“I was supposed to get allulose.”
With my brow quirked, I tried to hide my smile. “And what did you get?”
“I got aspartame.”
“You’re right. So again, what generation are you?”
Subconsciously, he leaned over to kiss Ami on her forehead as he held her to his chest like it was the most normal thing in the world. “You’ve made your point.”
I had to swallow because the way he looked comfortable holding her made my heart flutter. “Well, look at that! A man admitting when he was wrong.”
