She nods. “Finish your tea first. Give Dale a chance to cool off.”
“I’m afraid, though.”
“Of what?”
“That he won’t be there when I get back.”
“I can understand why you’d think that, but he’ll be there. He just got home after two days in the mountains. After surviving a fire. He’ll be there, and he needs you.”
I shake my head. “He doesn’t. He told me not to go, but when I did, he told me not to come back.”
Jade waves her hands dismissively. “If I had a dollar for every time Talon told me to leave when we were just beginning—” She laughs. “Well, we have a lot of money now, but I’d have several dollars more.”
I can’t help chuckling as well.
“Listen,” she says. “I’d like to go over there and read my son the riot act for being a dick, but we both know that’s not what he needs. Especially not from me.”
“Then it’s up to me,” I say.
“He needs you, Ashley. He may say he doesn’t. He may even believe it, but he’s wrong.”
I finally remove the tea bag and set it on my saucer. “He said he wouldn’t be at the family meeting tonight.”
“He will be,” Jade says. “He’s never missed one. Even Donny and Dee are driving home as we speak. Everyone will be there. Bree’s coming home from school. So are my nieces—Gina, Angie, and Sage.”
“You all really take care of each other, don’t you?”
She smiles. “We’re a family. That’s what family does.”
“I never had a family,” I say. “Other than my mom.”
“And you took care of each other.”
I nod. “I suppose we did. And do.”
“Of course you do. She’s lucky to have you, no matter how you came into the world.”
I set my cup and saucer, tea undrunk, on the coffee table. “I should go, then.”
She nods. “Go back to Dale’s. He’s calmed down by now.”
“He won’t open up to me.”
“Maybe not today. Maybe not tomorrow. Eventually he will. Until then, just be there for him. Show him the world isn’t all chaos and horror.”
Chaos and horror?
Strong words. Chaos, maybe. But horror?
I suppose losing half the Syrah is horror to Dale.
“Okay.” I take a quick sip of my tea. Its warmth soothes my throat, which hurts from gulping back sobs. “Thank you for the tea and the talk.”
“Anytime,” Jade says. “And Ashley?”
“Yeah?”
“Be strong. Dale is so strong—stronger than he gives himself credit for—but right now, he needs your strength.”
Chapter Fifteen
Dale
My body and hair are squeaky clean. My jeans and shirt are freshly laundered. The soiled clothes are in the washer.
Still, I feel dirty.
Like my reflection earlier that showed on the outside what I am on the inside.
Did I really tell Ashley not to bother coming back?
I did. I regret it, yes, but in all honesty, she’s better off not coming back.
It’s time for me to think about her instead of myself. It’s time for me to stop being self-absorbed.
So my father sold me into slavery when I was ten. So half of my Syrah vines are lost.
God knows I’ve been through worse.
All thanks to the man who sired me.
“Fuck!” I say out loud, grabbing at my wet strands of hair.
I’ve been through so much worse than losing my beautiful vines. All of which could have been avoided but for Floyd Jolly. “Fuck it all!”
“Yes,” says the voice that’s sweeter than honey. “Fuck it all.”
I turn. Ashley is in the kitchen, having let herself in. Penny pants at her heels.
“You’re back,” I say.
“I am.” She walks toward me. “And I’m not going anywhere.”
“Even though I told you not to bother coming back?”
“Especially because you told me not to bother coming back.”
I scoff. “You’re the one who left.”
“I did. It was a mistake, and I own it.”
“Why did you, then?”
“Because you told me not to. Because you were being a dick.” She shakes her head. “No. Dick is too tame a word. You were being a prick, Dale. An asshole. A—”
I hold up my hand to stop her words. “I get it.”
“Now,” she says, “none of that negates what you’ve been through. Getting caught in a fire that destroyed something you love so dearly. And then the death of your father.”
“Not my father,” I say adamantly.
“Okay. Not your father. I get that. But his death affected you. It’s obvious.”
I scoff. “I’m glad the fucker’s dead.”
She cocks her head and wrinkles her forehead. “Oh? Then why—”
“I’m not talking about my birth father. I’m never talking about him again.”
“All right. We don’t have to talk, Dale. Not now, anyway. But I’m here when you’re ready.”
“Trust me, Ashley. I’ll never be ready.”
She smiles. “That’s fine too, then. No pressure. But there is one thing…”
“Of course there is. What?”
She smiles triumphantly. “You promised me these two months, until the end of my internship, that we could be together.”
I shake my head. “A lot has happened since I made that promise.”
“I don’t recall the promise having any conditions.”
“Ash…”
“You love me.”
I can’t deny it. “I do.”
“And I love you. Nothing has changed.”
“Are you fucking kidding me? Everything has changed.”
“You lost part of the Syrah.”
“That’s huge to me.”
“I know.” She closes the distance between us, looking up to meet my gaze, only a couple inches separating our bodies. “It’s huge to me too.”
“Not the same.”
“You’re thinking I don’t have the relationship with those vines like you do, and you’re right. When I say it’s huge to me too, I mean because it’s huge to you. Anything that’s important to you is also important to me, because I love you.”
Fuck. “You’re not making this easy.”
In fact, telling her not to bother coming back was the most difficult thing I’ve ever done. I told her she wasn’t going anywhere. It was her decision to leave.
“Dale…” She parts her lips. They’re glossy and pink, so ready for a kiss… “Very few things in life are ever easy.”
Don’t I know it. Nothing is easy. Nothing has ever been easy.
“But the things that matter most, that are worth the most,” she continues, “shouldn’t be easy. If they’re too easy, we take them for granted. It’s human nature.”
I stare into her vivid blue eyes. They’re bloodshot, and her eyelids are swollen. She’s been crying, and I only now notice.