“It’s not that.”
“We . . . neither of us are unaware of how both of us felt about Travis and—”
“It’s not that either.”
“Then what is it?” she demanded to know.
Again with the hesitation, the searching for words, and Luci had learned quickly that there were instances when Hap found her quick temper “cute” and times when it was damaging.
She assessed now, losing patience with him he would not find cute.
So she kept quiet, even though it cost her.
It took too long, but he finally found his words.
“I just need to get past the idea you’ll eventually figure it out.”
“Figure what out?” she inquired.
He said nothing.
Luci gave him more time.
She really wanted to be patient, she simply found she could not.
“Figure what out, George?” she asked irritably.
“I’m an asshole.”
“You’re not an asshole,” she shot back.
“And you got a quick temper.”
She could not argue that.
Merda.
“And you’re a supermodel,” he went on.
She looked to the ceiling of the cab of his truck. “Oh, for the love of—”
“And I’m a farm boy.”
She looked back to him. “I do not care.”
“With a criminal dad and a never-there mom you just could not understand because that’s so far from what you are, it’s not even in your DNA.”
“We’ve discussed this,” she clipped.
“And he’s gonna show, or she’s gonna show. They’ve been away way too long so they’ve had plenty of time to significantly fuck their shit, so they’re gonna land on my doorstep, one of them. And if you’re with me, you might be there and you’ll see the me they made, even if they had fuck all to do with raising me.”
“And who’s the you they made, caro?” she asked, not hiding her frustration.
“My temper, I don’t hold it, will make you understand why I think yours is cute.”
“So?” she asked. “Do you not think my temper comes from somewhere? My father’s is explosive. If I did not know him to be the loving, caring man he is, it might even be frightening.”
“I can guaran-damn-tee you mine has his beat.”
Luci fell silent.
“I told you when I was young, that shit could get physical, baby,” he said quietly. “And it’s only the fact that my grandfather and the sheriff were good buds that I didn’t have a juvie file a mile long and didn’t hit detention repeatedly back in the day.”
“That’s not you anymore, Hap,” she pointed out.
“One of them shows, I try to hold it, but they push it and it isn’t pretty, Luciana. Trust me, honey. I go off and even I hate the me I become when I do. And it itches in my goddamn bones, thinking you’d ever see me that way. A way it’s for sure to change the way you look at me.”
She always found it very odd how things that were so obvious to those on the outside were so very concealed to those who were closer to it.
This time was no exception.
It just made her madder.
“You do know, Hap, that you’ve explained some of your childhood to me and it is not something I understand because I was not brought up that way. However, you’ve explained enough that if I was there, and you went off, as you say, on one of those two individuals who created a precious life and then left that life in order to carry on doing criminal or selfish things, I would think nothing but they deserved the power of your anger. Even your rage. They earned it and you should feel free to offer it to them however you see fit. I would probably think they deserved more than you’d give them. And last, you should be aware should this happen, caro, that you might not have the focus to give it to them because you’d be holding me back from saying a few things myself.”
Hap stared straight ahead, continued driving and said not a word.
“Did your grandparents speak to you about your temper?” she asked.
“It bothered them,” he said softly.
“And you felt they worried it meant you’d turn out like your father,” she surmised.
“His first stint in prison was because he beat a man half to death for knocking over his beer in a biker bar. That being, he was pulled off that guy by some cops and therefore caught for a grocery store robbery for which he was wanted for questioning because he was tying one on to celebrate robbing that grocery store.”
Hmm.
“And you think you have that in you?” she queried.
“A man sees his father in him, Luci,” he whispered. “I figure good or bad, he searches for that. I don’t know about the good. But I know about the bad.”
“You’re not your father, George.”
He pulled her hand he was still holding to his stomach and pressed it there, using this like a tactic to soften the blow of the words he was about to say.
“You can say that until you’re blue in the face, baby, and it won’t matter. It just is what it is. I have him in me. He’s a part of me. I see him in me when I get like that. And that’s in a way that won’t ever change.”
“And there’s nothing I can do to help you with this?” she pressed.
“I wish there was, but I don’t see that happening,” he replied.
“Well, then, I suppose when you’re eighty-three and I’m still sitting beside you in your truck you’ll realize then that I’ll never figure it out and finally relax. It saddens me it’ll take that long. But if I’m sitting beside you in your truck, I’ll be fine with that.”
He was now pressing her hand deep into the hard muscle of his abs and holding it way too tight.
Luci didn’t make a peep.
He came to the realization of what he was doing so he released the pressure on her hand and moved it to tuck it into the crook where his thigh met his hip.
Luci turned to face forward.
“I want two children, a boy and a girl, the boy first,” she announced to the windshield, and the pressure on her hand came back.
She ignored it.
“If I have two girls, I will be happy,” she continued. “If I have a girl first, and a boy second, this will be disappointing, but I’m sure I’ll be able to live with it. If I have two boys, my life will be over.”
The pressure released but Hap carried on holding her hand.
“Your life will be over?” he asked quietly.
“If I can’t dress at least one child in frilly pink dresses, I’ll expire from sheer devastation.”
He started stroking her fingers with his thumb, muttering, “Best find a crossroads to make a deal with the devil for at least one girl.”
Luci grinned at the windshield.
“Though I want all boys,” he added.
Luci frowned and looked back at him.
She ignored his lips turned up and squeezed his hand irately. “Do not even say that out loud. It might cause a maledizione.”
“A what?”
“Maledizione. What is it in English? A spell, a bad one.”
“A curse?”
“Yes, that. Don’t speak of such things.”
“Baby, you know you’re gonna get what you get.”
No.
She knew they were going to get what they got.
She believed in God. She was a good Catholic (okay, she tried to be a good one, thank God He was forgiving).