Page 55 of Hero for the Holidays

“Whatever you need.”

Lila went upstairs, and they heard a door close.

“I bet you kind of wish she would’ve spent the night with me now,” Fia said, looking at him in a way he could only describe asgentlyantagonistic.

“Kind of,” he said.

“I’m going to go over to Mapleton to get what she’s asking for.”

“I’ll go too,” he said.

“Really?”

“Yeah. I’ll just let Denver know that she’s here, and she’ll be fine. She’s got tons of family all around her. And she’s just doing school.”

“No. I meantreallybecause... You actually want to go on a period underwear buying mission?”

He shrugged. “I need to know what she’s talking about. I got a pretty sound lecture on not being ashamed of basic bodily functions.”

Fia grinned. “Well, Landry, she is correct. You shouldn’t be.”

“I mean, I’mnot, as you know.”

He looked at her meaningfully, and her cheeks went fiery red.

He had never been squeamish about sex while Fia was on her period. Hell, he had wanted her all the time. But that didn’t mean that he knew the array of feminine products available.

She coughed. “Great. Thanks for the memories. Let’s head out to Mapleton, then. We’ll buy a couple months’ worth so we don’t get caught unawares next time.”

“Good idea.”

They decided to take Fia’s car, which got better gas mileage, and they set off down the dirt road after he made sure that Lila knew where they were headed, and that his brothers and sister were on deck to handle anything she might need.

“She got upset earlier,” he said. “Because she told me something that her mom said and she forgot to make it past tense. I feel bad for the kid.”

“Ah,” said Fia, her eyes glued to the road. “You haven’t had to deal with this yet, have you?”

She meant the period thing.

“No. It just didn’t occur to me. Which I realize betrays my lack of experience with...living with women. But you know, we all had to be super independent. If we weren’t, then life was just going to be hard. And my mom wasn’t around anymore by the time I was old enough to know what a period was.” For the first time he wondered how Arizona had handled all that. It made him feel like a jerk that he’d never wondered about it before.

“I’m sorry. I guess we both have parental abandonment in common.” She grimaced. “Even though I was a lot older than you when my parents split.”

He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. It’s all the same bullshit, no matter how old you are. My parents were—” he pulled his teeth back into an approximation of a smile “—toxic.”

It felt like the word had come up a lot lately. It felt like it was a good one for him and Fia, and his mom and dad, and if that wasn’t sobering, nothing ever could be.

“Sorry. Wow.”

“I really never wanted to repeat the cycle,” he said. “That was never what I was asking for. But I would have, wouldn’t I? How did you see that back then, when I didn’t?”

He looked over at Fia’s profile. At her neat frown. The way that her brow pleated as she thought.

“I don’t know,” said Fia. “Maybe it was because of my dad’s affair. Because I found out right around then that he was...cheating.”

“How did you find out?”

“I saw him. I saw himwithher. I couldn’t even bring myself to tell you. I just shoved it down and I kept it to myself.” She looked at him, just for a moment. “But it made us feel so fragile. So intense.”

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