“I have the stick,” Decker said.
Brian reached over and yanked the stick out of Decker’s hands. “You feel taken advantage of? I cooked dinner last night, and you didn’t even do the dishes. You left the kitchen a complete shit show, and I had to clean it up before I went to work.”
“You invited me to dinner. I was a guest.”
“And what do we do when we have these kind of feelings?” Miles asked.
“Put this stick to good use and beat the shit out of each other?” Brian said.
“Again, not productive.” Miles grabbed the stick and handed it back to Decker. “Would you like to try?”
“Beating the shit out of him? Sure.”
“Acknowledging what Brian said.”
“I’m sorry if your pansy-ass feelings got hurt, but I was also working hard.”
Miles sighed, which Decker guessed they deserved. They were acting like they were teenagers all over again. But Decker was tired and hurting and the last thing he wanted to do was talk about his feelings.
“That’s derogatory. Let’s try another word.”
“Sorry you got your panties in a wad.”
Miles grabbed the stick. “Why don’t we try this from another angle? Let’s get directly to the point.”
“Fine,” Decker said, holding his hand out, and Miles gave him the stick. “I’m willing to appear in ten episodes of the show decorating the houses and doing the finishing touches. We can move forward as long as you guys understand that that’s all I have to offer.”
Brian grabbed the stick. “The producers aren’t going to go for that. They want twenty-four episodes. It’s all or nothing.”
“Why can’t it be a compromise?” Decker asked, ignoring that he didn’t have the stick. “It’s always all or nothing for you.”
“Because the only choice I have is all or nothing. Do you know how hard it was to pick up where Dad left off? I didn’t have a choice to do it half-assed. I had to go all in.”
“And so did I. We both chose different paths, but ‘chose’ is the key word,” Decker said, remembering what Poppy had told him the other night.
At the reminder, his stomach bottomed out. Because he’dmade a choice, too—to walk away. And right now he needed to make sure that whatever decision he came to with his family would be the right one for him.
“I didn’t leave you behind,” Decker said quietly. “I left to follow my dream and I’m sorry if that stopped you from following yours. But building was you and Dad’s thing. You chose to take over the company to hold on to the memories. Hockey was my thing with Dad, so that’s how I honored his sacrifice. It doesn’t mean I left you behind, and I’m sorry if I made you feel like I did.”
For the first time since Decker started working with Brian again, he could see a glimpse of the big brother he’d always looked up to. And it broke Decker’s heart that all this time they could have been making memories, leaning on each other for support. Instead, they’d been drifting further and further away over a misunderstanding of where the other person’s feelings lay.
All it would have taken was for Decker to reach out, and all of this could have been avoided.
Just like with Poppy. If he’d just stopped instead of reacting, she’d still be in his life. But instead, he’d chosen pride over family. Because that’s what she was to him—family.
“Jesus,” he said, resting his head in his hands. “I blew it.”
Brian lifted a brow. “Are we still talking about us or about Poppy?”
“I just walked away from her after I told her I loved her and would fight for her. What kind of man does that?”
“A man who is in love and scared of the past repeating itself,” Miles said. “Can you allow for the possibility that she’s different?”
No hesitation, he said, “She is. I’m such an idiot.”
“You are,” Brian said. “But she’ll get over it. We all have.”
“Then what do I do?”
