“Noted,” I grunted. I pulled away and began walking down the steep embankment.
It took everything in my power not to glance back to see what Dom was doing or if he was following me. Not that I thought he would, he had said his piece, and probably assumed that would linger with me for a while. The worst part was that he wasn’t wrong; I wasn’t going to forget what he said anytime soon. As a matter of fact, I was sure that no matter what I did, no matter how long I did it, I was going to be thinking about what he said. I was going to be eternally looking over my shoulder, wondering when he was going to pop up again.
I could alter my patterns, evaluate myself, and check any urges to return to places connected to me. In normal circumstances, I was sure that would minimize the chances of running into him again. Except, and I hated that part of my thoughts, I wondered if that would matter at all. The chances of him picking the right day at the right time to find me on the cliff were incredibly low, and yet luck, chance, fate, or something else entirely had conspired to make sure he found me. Who was to say that he wouldn’t have that sort of serendipity again?
Paranoia...again.
Yet the worst part was waiting for me as I slid into my car and sat down with a grunt of frustration. I was far enough away from the cliff that I could barely make out what was up top, and although I couldn’t be sure that the dark sliver near the top was him rather than a bush, I thought it was him. The thought was accompanied by a highly unwelcome feeling of...peace, and comfort. As though knowing he was alive, well, and, God save me, still willing to talk to me gave me a sense of peace I hadn’t felt in years.
I hated it.
DOM
Taking a deep breath, I sucked the smell of greasy food and frying burgers deep into my lungs. The diner was thick with the smell of it, along with the aftershave someone at the booth behind me was wearing, more alcohol than scent in my opinion, so it was probably cheap.
I took a sip of my coffee and smiled. The food quality might be questionable, the cleaning standards weren’t all that high, but damned if the coffee wasn’t always fresh and perfectly brewed. I set the ceramic mug down so it thunked pleasantly on the table, which still shone with the remnants of the last group in that booth.
Glancing across the table, I smirked. “It’s not going to bite, I promise.”
My nephew wrinkled his nose as he stared at his salad. “It looks likesomethingin it might bite.”
“Micah, I’ve been here more times than I can count over the years, including when it was a true shit hole, and I’ve never gotten sick once.”
“There’s a first time for everything,” he grumbled, stabbing at a particularly large chunk of lettuce and holding it up. “Do youthink they actually chop it up back there, or just rip it apart with their bare hands?”
“Actually, they might,” I snorted, watching him. There was still the same scowl on his face that had been there when I’d found him and his mother...not having a good time with each other. Moira seemed at her wits’ end about what to do with her son, who had apparently decided to skip the slow descent into being a moody teenager and taken a flying leap into being one. Whenever I saw the two of them together, they were fighting. It didn’t help that Micah’s moodiness had come with an extra helping of meanness, making her ready to pull her hair out.
Jace had been trying his best to run interference and maybe get Micah to ease off, but lately Micah had started giving his father the silent treatment. Matty wasn’t a whole lot of help; she only shook her head and said that Moira had been even moodier when she’d been younger, but she couldn’t account for the rest of his foul attitude. No one was going to say it, of course, but I was pretty sure we were all thinking that it might have come from Jace. He had come a long way, but there was no denying he was a grumpy guy and had been worse when he’d been a teenager.
Micah crunched through the chunk of lettuce and sighed. “Did you bring me here to talk about Mom and Dad?”
“I was thinking maybe I should get you out of the hotel so everyone, including you, could have a moment to breathe,” I said, shrugging as I took another sip of coffee. “If you want to talk about whatever you want to talk about, be my guest. But I’m not Milo, I’m not going to pester you to talk, and I’m not Mason, so I’m not going to trick you into talking. If you want to talk, do it.”
He scowled at me. “I just...Mom gets on my nerves.”
“What, do you want me to agree with you? Because yeah, your Mom can get on people’s nerves. I grew up around her, dude. I know she can be annoying.”
That stopped him short. He stared at me, and while I wasn’t on the same level as some of my siblings when it came to reading other people’s emotions, I was pretty sure I had caught Micah off guard. “What?” I asked as the silence between us stretched on. “Did you think I didn’t know that?”
“No, I...thought a lot of people thought it,” he admitted a little sheepishly. “I just...didn’t think anyone was going to say it around me.”
“Seriously? Mason is always going on about how irritating she is.”
“Yeah, but it’sMason.”
It was said with the air of someone who thought that answer was effective enough on its own and...well, I guess it kind of was.
“Okay,” I said with a soft laugh. “You’ve got me there; he doesn’t really count.”
Micah gave an almighty huff. “She just...she always has to have things her way. And like...it’s fine if I want to do things my way in her eyes, but only what’s on her approved list. And whenever I try to tell her that, she gets even more pissy. I can’t say anything without her getting upset anymore.”
“Mmm, yeah, your mom can be pretty stubborn,” I admitted. “I mean, it runs in the family.”
“Most aren’t even related by blood.”
“Okay, sure, but I mean, there’s a pretty good case to be made for people still sharing stuff even though they don’t share blood. We all grew up in this family to different degrees, Arlo, I guess, less so because he came in kind of late, but I knew this family before I joined it, and Eli came in early enough. We were all bound to pick up stuff, and let’s be honest here, kid, you were born into the genetics of this family, and your dad isn’t exactly known for being laidback and easygoing. You were pretty doomed from the start.”
“Yeah, I just...wish it didn’t have to be so annoying.”
