Total pages in book: 157
Estimated words: 161899 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 809(@200wpm)___ 648(@250wpm)___ 540(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 161899 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 809(@200wpm)___ 648(@250wpm)___ 540(@300wpm)
Okay, this made sense.
I mean, one could not argue that religion, and money, had been the root of a lot of very bad shit for, I didn’t know, say, the last ten or twenty centuries (and longer).
“I just don’t want my sister to marry that guy,” I shared.
“I can imagine, because I’ve seen him, and I’ve looked into him, and the dude is not right. But if you intervene the way you were going to, you might be playing with fire.”
“So instead, you’re going to play with fire?”
“Sure. I do it for a living, babe. It’s just another day at the office.”
Ummmmmmm…
It was safe to say, when your business card (if he had one) said, AUGUSTUS HERO, COMMANDO, your days weren’t filled with sharpening pencils for your boss and developing surveillance photos in their company darkroom.
However, I had not thought on this because I had not gone far enough to consider a date, much less having this man in my life.
And as such, needing to deal with what he did for a living.
“Later on that,” he muttered, watching me closely.
That would be wise.
“Agreed,” I said. Then I noted, “There’s also my mom to think about. Now I know why she’s not letting me come visit. But she’s sick. She’s my mom. I want to see her.”
“And she won’t come to you?”
I shook my head.
“We can hash that out later too.”
I exhaled a restless breath.
“You haven’t talked about your brother,” Auggie remarked cautiously.
“That’s because I decided to focus on only one section of the crazy pie that’s my family. I’m not gonna shove my full face in the pie, that’s just gonna leave me with pie on my face.”
His perfect lips were quirking again. “Interesting metaphor.”
“It’s also made me think we need pie after Chinese tonight.”
He started laughing.
Okay.
Not all better, but watching Auggie laugh?
It was a little better.
When he quit laughing, he said, “Though that’s probably smart, not biting off more than you can chew.”
I shot him a grin as he took my metaphor and ran with it.
“You do need to get in touch with him,” Auggie went on. “And you didn’t ask for his contact details. But I have them.”
“Thanks, but I haven’t decided if I’m going to get in touch with him,” I shared. “On the one hand, Juno has cousins. It might be a mess of dysfunction we’re stepping into, but she doesn’t have a huge family and what she knows of it is looney tunes, and as I’ve learned today, maybe worse. On the other hand, it might be a mess of dysfunction we’re stepping into and I don’t want my daughter buried under that. So I need time to think on this.”
“And then there’s Birch,” Auggie replied.
I shook my head. “I’m even less decided about whether or not I want to see my brother. But I’m leaning on the not side of that. That said, I don’t know how to meet his kids without him being involved. So as you can see, this is a conundrum.”
But Auggie was looking at me quizzically, and I didn’t think he was quizzical about my conundrum.
So I asked, “What are you thinking?”
“Pepper, sweetheart…” He lifted a hand, wrapped it around my neck and smoothed the pad of his thumb along my jaw before he went on, “It’s his mom too.”
Holy hell.
I hadn’t thought of it that way.
And the girls hadn’t thought of it that way.
That was because your girls thought about you, and your kid, not the best interests of your nefarious, prodigal, long-lost, now-found brother.
But the new guy in your life could still look after you (we could just say the thumb maneuver was effective) at the same time giving you an important new angle, shedding light on a different side of things.
Damn.
“I’ll leave you with that and we’ll talk about it over crab rangoon and orange chicken with everything fried rice tonight,” he confirmed he got my order.
I smiled at him.
He did not smile back.
He asked, “What kind of pie do you want?”
Right.
It was time to file away the work it was seeming I might need to do to stop myself from kicking my own ass that I waited so long to let this guy in.
I did.
There was reason.
He got that reason.
We were here now.
Onward.
“I’ll get the pie,” I declared. “Or I’ll make one. Do you like French silk?”
“Did one of the women tell you about that?”
My head ticked. “About what?”
He backed off that question and just said, “Yeah, I like French silk pie.”
I didn’t allow him to back off, and noted, “You didn’t answer my question, Auggie.”
“It’s my favorite pie.”
Uhhhhh…
“Seriously?” I asked.
He nodded.
“It’s my favorite pie too.”
He didn’t respond.
“And Juno’s,” I kept going.
Auggie said nothing.
Okay, I’d learned, if you listened, the universe spoke in a lot of different ways.
But an all-’rounder of us having the same favorite pie was not, in my estimation, the universe speaking.