Page 44 of The Anchor Holds

But I felt it, that painful, agonizing possibility that we might be past the worst of it, that my niece would finally be able tobe a child again. That my brother would be a father who wasn’t waiting to grieve the loss of his daughter, that he’d be more than a shell of a man.

When I entered the kitchen, he was sipping coffee in between cleaning plates. I was about to ask him if he was prepared for tomorrow, if he needed anything, but my brother did something rare and spoke first.

“You just missed her.” He had an interesting expression on his face. Not a smile— brother reserved those for his daughter. But it wasn’t that dreaded, heavy expression I’d grown used to, even though it was always a kick to the stomach.

I looked at the distinctive pink box, putting two and two together.

“Nora?” I settled down on the breakfast bar, pulling the box to me so I could indulge. That woman could bake. I let out a chuckle when I saw the remnants of a bright-pink spider, whose legs had been eaten.

“She’s ready to pop now, so I’m thankful she waited to give birth for this.” I swiped a finger’s length of frosting, resisting the urge to groan at the sugary decadence.

It would’ve been kind of weird to be groaning in pleasure in front of my brother over bright-pink cake.

“Not Nora.” He squeezed soap onto a sponge. “Calliope Derrick.”

I looked up at him, sure I must’ve misheard. Or I was so entrapped by the woman that I was imagining hearing her name everywhere. My brother looked appropriately serious.

I grabbed a napkin to wipe my sticky finger. “Calliope was here?”

He leaned back against the counter, narrowed eyes searching my expression. I hadn’t told him about my night with her, but my father had a big mouth and had told him about the interaction on the boat. My father was perceptive. He wasemotionally mature, and because he was quiet, he spent a lot of time watching people, learning them. He knew me. Knew what my reaction to Calliope on the boat meant, and though he hadn’t said a word since, I could tell he’d stored the information for later.

“She delivered the cake then stayed for coffee, hung out with Clara for about an hour while I got some accounting shit done and Clara’s stuff prepared for the hospital.”

My brows might’ve hit the ceiling. Not just at Calliope coming in for a coffee with my brother—although that certainly was not something I expected from her—but because she had hung out with my niece. And at my brothertrustingher to do that. He didn’t trust anyone but me or my father to watch her, and even then, she was rarely out of his sight. Which made sense, given that he was facing the real possibility that his time with her was limited.

“You’re shitting me.” The words flew from my mouth, even though I saw the three plates he had washed, the two coffee mugs, one with a distinct shade of red lipstick.

“Not shitting. She’s not what I expected.” He was still eyeing me. “Beautiful too. More than I expected.” Beau rarely commented on women’s appearances. I’d wondered if he’d become a monk in the past two years for all the interest I’d seen him give to the opposite sex.

Rage that came out of nowhere bubbled in me from the simple thought of my brother coveting her. “She’s fuckingmine.” The words were out of my mouth before I could control them or register how fucking unhinged they made me sound.

My brother raised his brows, the ghost of a smile emerging underneath his beard.

He wasn’t bothered that I was shouting at him, something I had very rarely done. He was the one with the explosive temper, while I was well-known for being the peacemaker in our family.

I was surprised at myself.

“She’syours?” My brother hummed. “Let’s put aside the fact that Calliope Derrick doesn’t strike me as the kind of woman who can be claimed like a possession… You have never called a woman ‘yours’ in your life. Not even the one who wore your ring.” His eyes darkened. “Thankfully.”

I chewed some cake thoughtfully, thinking of Janine. Beau was right, I’d loved her. She was pretty. Men had looked at her appreciatively, even when I was around. It never enraged me, never to the point of picking any kind of fight or feeling any kind of jealousy. And Calliope was a woman I’d only fucked once, my brother just stating the objective fact that she was beautiful, and I was ready to rip his face off.

“You gonna clue me in here?” my brother asked after I didn’t reply.

I let out a long sigh. “There’s nothing to fill you in on.” As much as I was never one to kiss and tell about the short list of other women I’d been with, my night with Calliope was something I was keeping sacred. No way in fuck would I cheapen it like that. And there was no way to properly articulate that night without sounding like I was writing a goddamn sonnet about her.

Not that you wrote sonnets about Calliope Derrick.

You wrote epic, Greek tragedies with disaster waiting at the end.

“You sure about that?” Beau asked. “You looked like you were about to kick my ass for saying she was beautiful. Which she is. And she’s not your type. Not in the slightest.”

He was right. My type was the small-town, simple, soft, rip your heart out before you know what hit you kind of girl.

Though both my brother and I had vastly different types, it didn’t escape me that we’d both chosen ones who fucked up ourlives, had left us. Maybe some kind of scar from the loss of our mother. Who knew?

“Calliope Derrick is every man’s type.” I imagined her full lips, her tits, the sharpness of her gaze, her silver tongue. Her glorious fucking pussy.

My brother chuckled, and the sound hit me in the gut. It was the first time I’d heard him do that in years.

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