Total pages in book: 126
Estimated words: 121734 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 609(@200wpm)___ 487(@250wpm)___ 406(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121734 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 609(@200wpm)___ 487(@250wpm)___ 406(@300wpm)
Little Dylan was watching her dad, an avid intensity on her face because she was fully engrossed in what the adults were talking about. She began edging our way as if she could spy on us.
Dane shook his head and pointed at the game. “Finish up. Your dad and your aunt have to talk when you go to bed.”
“But—” Her face puckered up. She was going to launch a counter attack except Dane shook his head, briskly. “Nope.”
She glowered back at him, and that was hereditary, but she was no longer about to start crying. “Dad!”
“I mean it. Finish the game. Your sister looks like she’s winning. The Batmobile seems to be impenetrable.”
She harrumphed at him before going back to her shoot-out.
“Nice,” I said under my breath.
He said under his, “Thanks. Years of experience.”
I paused, side-eyeing him.
He paused, side-eying me.
We were both gripping our beers.
“For the record, this does not make us best friends.”
He exhaled, “Thank God.”
Then the older sister piped up, “Dad, you really need to start going to church.”
I tipped my beer toward her. “Amen to that.”
81
RAIN
Dane looked terrified when he took me to the dungeon, but immediately I relaxed when I saw he had a makeshift goalie set up in the back corner along with two hockey sticks. He picked one up and held it out to me. “You always had a killer slapshot.”
He didn’t use real pucks. I took the stick from him and bent down to assess what I was expected to hit. “Is that a wiffle puck?”
“Lindy made me buy those. She got tired of me trying to fix the wall all the time. I hit a pipe one time too.”
I whistled. “Impressive.”
He sent me a grin. “Thanks.” He hooked one of the wiffle pucks and brought it over to where he was standing before lining up to take a shot. “So.” He hit it and it sank behind the goalie, which looked taped together with pillows, duct-tape, and determination. “You want to talk about anything?”
I gave him an unimpressed look. “What a way to start. You should be a therapist. The skills you have at making people want to open up to you? Top not-notch.”
He flashed me a grin as I wound up and sank another wiffle puck in the net. “I see you’ve already picked up our ways in this Connors’ household. We keep it together with dry wit and sarcasm. Lindy already fucking loves you. I can tell.”
I began to swing on a second puck, but then I whiffed it before rounding to him. “What?”
He gave me a cool look, then sank his second puck in the net. “She gave me a look when I came into the living room just now. It was a whole conversation in one look, but she told me that I better make things right with you and insure you come around again and want to be a part of our family or I will be sleeping on that couch for a very long time." He indicated a ragged couch that looked as if it had been the net most of its life. It was more stuffing than couch at this point.
I remarked, “If we were in Minneapolis, I know a good couch person.”
“What?”
“Nothing.” I lined up for a third shot and didn’t miss this time. “So. Yeah. This is our conversation, huh?”
“Seems like.” His tone got serious.
So was mine. And I chanced a look at him again, seeing him watching me.
A burst of nerves exploded inside of me. “I don’t know what to say here.”
“You can say anything you want,” he remarked, lightly. “I’d deserve it.”
“Why?” I rounded to face him directly. Hockey, wiffle pucks, the net, all of it was forgotten.
His face shuddered, but I asked further, “Why didn’t he love me?”
“He?”
“Keith.”
He flinched. “I—I don’t know, to be honest. He—” He glanced at me, uncertain.
“Don’t hold back. I was there. I know how he treated me.”
His mouth twisted before he swung, distractedly, at nothing on the floor. He was just swinging while he was thinking. “I don’t know why he treated you the way he did. I think it was a mix that you were a girl. He wanted a boy. You weren’t going to be in the NHL, though you could be in the women’s professional league. And you were nice, Rain. You didn’t demand his attention. I think that was part of it too.”
“It was my fault.”
“You didn’t demand your space. You were owed it. Fuck. You were owed so much more than you were given, but you never cried about it or threw a fit. It was like you were nothing.”
Now I flinched.
“I didn’t mean—”
I waved that off. “Don’t. I acted like nothing because that’s how I was treated by you, by him, by Daniel.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I know.” I averted my gaze to keep from breaking down. I hadn’t expected our conversation to be like this, where I wanted to cry because Dane seemed to care. I had known he wanted to apologize. He already had, and I knew Lindy wanted to meet me, the girls too, but actually seeing he cared was a whole other experience.