Page 43 of All I Need (Hearts of the South)
He slanted a look at her. Man, he hated how well she knew him. He dropped his gaze to the curve of her belly. Was that what she was looking at and hoping?
“Besides.” She pinched his side. “If it doesn’t work out, you can always give them to Mama or me for Christmas.”
“That…shit, Landra.”
She laughed, and he reached for his wallet.
In the end, they spent the least amount of time in the infant section. Landra barely glanced at the items and didn’t touch anything, sending his suspicions into overdrive. His mother helped him select an incredibly soft hand-crocheted blanket, and once he’d stowed the purchases in his truck, they walked across the street to the Blue Sky Grill.
Inside, his mother requested a booth in the bar area and insisted he take the inner seat so she could sit with her favorite boy but still watch the bartender at work. He didn’t remind her he was her only boy and therefore her favorite by default.
They ordered, and light catching-up conversation hovered over the table. The inanity grated on Emmett’s nerves when he knew something lurked beneath the surface. That was the story of their lives, and it drove him as crazy as it always had.
“So tell us about her.” Landra sipped her water.
He stretched his leg out beneath the table and rubbed away an itch at his incision line. He hadn’t hurt for days, but the tension tonight activated all the normal physical irritations. “Nothing to tell.”
Brows arched, Landra pinned him with an exasperated expression. “Really?”
He frowned. “Why are you here?”
That took her aback, and visibly flustered, she brushed her bright blonde hair behind one ear. With the action, her blousy sleeve fell above her elbow, and he glimpsed the red-purple finger marks.
Fury exploded in his chest, and he wrapped a gentle hold around her wrist. With his other hand, he pushed the sleeve further up. The fresh bruises turned his stomach. “Fuck.”
His mother didn’t correct him.
Landra pulled her arm from his suddenly lax clasp.
“That son of bitch put his hands on you.” He tried to breathe, to think through the red haze fogging his brain. “I’ll kill him.”
“Emmett.” His mother covered his hand where he was gripping the varnished edge of the table. This was why they were out in public, why she’d put him in the corner, so he’d have to keep his voice down and the rage under control, so he’d have to get through her to get his hands on Frank Washburn.
“This is the reason you’re together.” He managed to get some oxygen to his brain. “Why you wanted to meet me.”
“I needed an excuse, and you gave me one.” Landra’s mouth trembled in a small smile. “I’m going to go home with Mama.”
“No, you’re not. You can’t.” He shook his head, struggling for logic. Frank was smart and wily, so Emmett had to be smarter and wilier. “He’ll show up at Mama’s to get you, and Dad—”
He bit off the words. A new thread of suspicion ran through his head, foreboding settling in his gut, and he turned to their mother.
“Where’s Dad?”
“Your daddy and I are separated again. He’s in the Bahamas.” She unfolded her napkin and placed it just so in her lap. “With the manager of his golf club.”
“Son of abitch.” He slammed both palms against the edge of his seat. Could this get any worse? “And nobody thought to tell me?”
“I didn’t want to—”
“Mama, if you say you didn’t want me to worry or to be mad at him, I swear to God I’ll lose it right here.” He reached for his water. Damn it all, he needed something stronger. “And don’t tell me swearing is a sin.”
He downed half the glass, then focused his attention on his sister. “This isn’t the first time.”
She looked away, her silence answer enough, and suddenly, all of her silence over the last few months made a sick kind of sense. Frank had hated him on sight, and Emmett hadn’t cared for him much either. Emmett had thought it was about him, but maybe it had been about Frank—and Landra—all along. Because no way would Landra have been able to keep this a secret from him if they’d had any kind of normal interaction.
His stomach flipped over again. He didn’t want to know how many times there’d been.
Maybe he could help make sure it was the last time.
