“I’m sorry.” Ayden’s voice was strained and sounded tiny. Jet just held her closer and muttered soft words into her dark hair.
Asa gave her a sad smile. “I’m sure you are and I am, too, but I can’t be around you if you always think I’m going to be up to something.”
She gave a broken little laugh. “You always are.”
“I always was.”
With that, he turned around and walked over to where some of the grizzled regulars were still gathered. I watched as they all shook his hand and clapped him on the back. Clearly, just like they had done for Rome, they had welcomed Asa’s lost soul into their fold.
“You okay?” Jet’s voice was light as he kissed Ayden lightly on the mouth. She put her arms around his waist and rested her forehead on the center of his chest. They just looked like the perfect matched set.
“I don’t know.”
“He’ll get over it.”
“But he’s right. I do always think he’s up to something. I thought he robbed your studio, I could totally see him being behind the robbery of this place. There isn’t much I don’t think he’s capable of doing if he thinks it benefits him. I love him but I just don’t trust him.”
“You’ll work it out.” I looked down at my phone as it beeped an incoming text message.
It was from Shaw and all it said was:
I’m in.
I breathed a sigh of relief and put the phone away.
“We are all family, Ayd. Good, bad, and ugly, we figure it out.”
“With our history, I don’t think it’s that easy, Cora.”
I was reminded of Rome and how everyone had such an easy time caring for him before he came back lost within himself. Everyone still loved him, they just had to find a new way to do it to get around the what-was. Asa was the same way.
“You can love him, Ayden. You just need to find a way to love the new him that’s different from the love you had for the old him.”
She didn’t answer me, but Rome came up behind me and asked if I was ready to go. I nodded and Jet bundled Ayden into his Challenger and peeled out of the parking lot.
“What was that all about?”
“She’s having a hard time aligning Denver Asa with Kentucky Asa, which is silly since she had to do the exact same thing with herself not too long ago.”
He didn’t say anything but made a face when we got to the Cooper. It made me grin.
“Hey.” He looked at me over the top of the car and lifted that dark eyebrow that arched under the scar on his forehead. It made him look sexy and slightly sinister at the same time.
“We need to talk about what we’re going to do when this kid is here.”
He frowned and folded his massive frame into the tiny front seat. I had to admit he looked ridiculous. So I snapped a picture on my cell in case I needed it in the future. He swore at me and scooted around until he found a comfortable position in the limited space.
“What do you mean? We have it, we raise it, we send it to school, keep it from getting eaten by wolves or becoming a stripper, and we’re good.”
“Don’t call it an it.”
“What should I call it?”
“I don’t know, but not it, and I meant where are we planning on raising him or her? My place? Your place? Together under the same roof or are we going to bounce back and forth? I feel like we didn’t really think this through.”
“Well, shit.”
I cast him a look out of the corner of my eye. “Exactly.”
We hadn’t really been together long enough to take such a big step as moving in together, but considering having a baby together was the ultimate game changer, I wasn’t sure we could play by the normal relationship rules. He was pretty quiet, so I glanced over at him. He looked like he was thinking pretty hard, but he didn’t seem too freaked out or panicked by the questions. I let him muse over it in silence while I headed to the Victorian. When I pulled up out front, he turned to look at me with seriousness shining out of those cobalt eyes.
“What do you want to do, Cora?”
I wasn’t expecting that.
“I don’t know. I don’t want you to do anything just because of the baby. I don’t want you to feel forced into anything.”
“I’m one hundred percent here by choice, Half-Pint.” When he said stuff like that, it made my heart throb.
“I guess we don’t have to figure it out right this very second, but it’s probably something we need to have a plan for eventually.”
“My plan is to do whatever you need me to do.”
Every girl in her lifetime should be so lucky to have a guy like him say those words to her. I knew he meant it, so I figured now was as good a time as any to push my luck. I put a hand on his knee and turned pleading eyes on him.
“Good, then what I need you to do is agree to come see your parents with me next weekend.”
I saw him go stiff and a moment of panic flare in his gaze.
“Why?”
“Because at some point they are going to need to know that they are going to be grandparents and I figure we should break the ice first. Come on, it won’t be that hard and I’ll be there to protect you.” I wasn’t going to mention it was long past time for him to put his fears at rest about how they would or wouldn’t see him.
He swore under his breath and shoved the door of the car open. I tried not to giggle when he struggled to get out, but it was just too funny. I followed suit and he stared hard at me over the roof.
“I haven’t been in the same room with them for over a year.”
“Well, then it’s been long enough. I’m not asking you swallow all that resentment you have about the fact they didn’t tell you about Remy or about how your mom treated Rule. I’m asking for you to deal with it and get a handle on it so it can be one less thing that keeps you up at night.”
We stared at each other for a long moment of silence. Finally he pushed off the car and inclined his head toward the apartment.
“Can I think about it?”
I bit my lip and put my hands on each side of his waist so I could rest my cheek against the center of his back while he fiddled with the lock in the front door.
“You can, but I already had Shaw tell them we would be there.”
He went stiff in front of me but didn’t say anything back. Once he got the door open, he turned around and pinned me to the wood with my hands above my head. I looked up at him and refused to blink.