The smirk fades into a sigh. “Because he wasn’t built to be a lone wolf, but he insists on being one anyway, which means that sooner or later, he’ll do something stupid.”
Again?
No one will come right out and say it, but in the past few days, I’ve gotten the impression that Davis has done something stupid before.
I would’ve had to be voluntarily clueless to have missed it.
“You care about him, but he frustrates you.”
“I care about my clients and they care about him, and he frustrates all of us. The thing about ghosts—they haunt you until you fully let them go. That man’s lying to himself if he thinks he’s let go of his ghosts. And he’s the only one who doesn’t see it.” She blows out a breath. “Go on inside. Nobody will care what you’re wearing. Ms. Wilson and Ms. Remington are making eggs and bacon and spoiling the kids too.”
Ms. Remington.
Oh my god.
Davis’smotheris here?
Giselle cocks a brow at me.
“I’m glad you didn’t quit,” I tell her.
She grunts, then makes a face that tells me I have about three seconds to get my ass inside the house before she has to tell me twice, and she won’t enjoy telling me twice.
So I dash across the deck around the pool and head inside.
Beck’s feeding Francie, Ava’s not-quite-one-year-old sister, at a table near the back door as I slip inside. He grins at me. “Hey, you woke up! We weren’t sure that would happen. When Sarah’s parents stay with us, they sleep for hours. They say it’s the bed.”
Every adult in the dining room, living room, and kitchen peers around whatever they need to peer around to look at him.
“I’m just glad he married someone who knows where babies come from,” an older woman murmurs to a second older woman while a third snickers.
He winks at me.
The man might be funny, but I don’t think he’s stupid. And I don’t know how, but he doesn’t look tired at all.
He should. He was up at least as late as the rest of us, but he’s bright-eyed and radiating with energy.
“You want some cinnamon rolls?” he asks me. “My mom made them. They’re famous. And better than Grady Rock’s cinnamon rolls. Ask anyone except for the Rocks. And anyone from all of Shipwreck and Copper Valley when the Rocks aren’t around. Actually, maybe only talk about it when we’re in Copper Valley. Oh, hey, this is my mom, Michelle, and Levi and Tripp’s mom, Donna, and Davis’s mom, Alice.”
I say a softhi, and the next thing I know, the three older women are shoving me into a chair with a plate of scrambled eggs, bacon, cinnamon rolls, and a side bowl of fruit salad in front of me.
Giselle appears with a cup of coffee that she couldn’t have had time to make in the thirty seconds since I walked in here, then disappears again.
While I sit here with three of the four women who gave birth to Copper Valley’s most famous residents.
Okay then.
Not weird at all.
“It’s so good to meet you, Sloane,” the one with Levi and Tripp Wilson’s eyes says. Donna. Beck said her name is Donna. “Ingrid told me you helped Hudson out when he stuck pirate coins up his nose. That boy. I’m so glad he finally grew out of the things-in-noses stage.”
“We all are,” I reply.
“And I hear you’re—” Michelle Ryder starts, only to be interrupted by her two-year-old granddaughter.
“Sooooooooaaaaaaaaannnnnnneee!!!” Ava barrels into the dining room and dives at me. “You have sucka?”
I catch her and pull her into my lap, fully aware of why I’m her favorite nurse.
