“Don’t play dumb, Birdee. It’s unbecoming.”
“I’m assuming you’re talking about Creed’s sister?”
Mable narrowed her eyes. “You know that’s what I’m talking about.”
I swallowed hard.
Was it a bad thing to want Bernice to have her brother? I wished I had that kind of love.
“Why do you care?” I rolled my eyes.
“We care because Creed is important to us,” she said. “Why did you put your nose into something that wasn’t yours to begin with?”
I didn’t need to give them the reasoning behind why I’d done it.
I mean, what was the fucking point of telling them that I’d kill to have a family that loved me? That I’d love to have someone that always had my back. That would be there no matter what.
So sue me if I wanted to make sure that Bernice got that back.
I’d do it again, too.
“Now’s not the time and place for this, and you know it,” I said. “Please respect that we need to have this conversation privately.”
And they damn well knew it.
Mable looked around, cheeks flushing, as she realized that she was actually the one bringing up stuff better left unsaid in public.
Then again, it wasn’t my man that would be in trouble if they were to be found out.
I didn’t have a man.
That was made painfully obvious today, now wasn’t it?
Mable and Cody went back to their seats.
I looked back to see my father frowning at me disapprovingly.
My stomach soured, and the food that was placed in front of me by Shade made me want to puke.
“What was that about?” Shade asked as he retook his seat.
“Nothing,” I lied, then changed the subject. “What are you doing here?”
He jerked his chin at the door. “You remember her, right?”
I did.
“Yeah?”
“I want to go out on a date with her, but she thinks that I’m an asshole because of Mable. I’m trying to change her mind.” He sighed. “I’m not sure it’s going to work.”
We both looked over at Cody and Mable as they chatted with my dad and the woman that’d told us to sit anywhere we wanted.
Oh, yeah.
The way they were now all staring at us didn’t give me good feelings at all.
“Maybe it’d be better for you to find someone new,” I suggested. “Someone not in Sawtooth.”
