Page 18 of Will Bark for Pizza
“Want a coffee?” I asked, trying to be the bigger person. Trying to extend an olive branch.
“Why would I want a coffee? I just got off my shift, and I’m fucking wiped. I was almost in bed when?—”
“You know what, forget it.”
I shouldered my backpack, wedged the sleeping bag under my arm, and clipped on Husker’s leash. Luke stood in the doorway, like the roadblock he was, until I glared athim to move. Smart man that he was, he stepped to the side and let me pass.
“Kira?” he called from the top of the stairs.
“Yeah?” I turned to look back at him, hoping he had a change of heart about the coffee. If I could get through to Luke, the rest of the family would be a cakewalk. Or so I hoped.
“If I find out you’re lying about Travis?—”
I resisted the urge to give my brother the middle finger, mostly on account of not having any free hands, and rushed out the back door.
Maybe coming back was a mistake.
SEVEN
BECKETT
Madeline: Dad didn’t show up for court.
I staredat my phone screen for a long beat, rereading the words a second, and then a third time. Leave it to my sister to skip small talk or any form of pleasantries first thing in the morning. She’d always been a rip-the-Band-Aid off kind of person, even when we were kids. But fuck, this was not the way I wanted to start a day that was already overflowing with to-dos.
“Everything all right, dear?” Connie Weston asked, carrying a full plate of pancakes to the table and setting it in the center. Where Nana was tell-it-like-it-is sassy and full of vinegar, Luke and Connor’s grandma was sweet as a peach pie.
I scrubbed a hand over my face, hoping to rub away the frustration that had no place here. “Yeah, just family stuff.”
“If there’s anything we can do to help, just say the word.”
“Thanks.”
There wasn’t much anyone could do to help when it came to my family, unless they could convince my sister that my parents were a lost cause. I sure as hell couldn’t get through to her. Thirty-plus years had proven that.
I took a long sip of coffee, and shot off a quick reply just as Dale joined us at the table.
Beckett: How bad is it?
Madeline: They’re being evicted in three days.
I didn’t want to care. I spent too many years hoping Dad would get sober and stay that way. Or that Mom would kick him out for good, and stop taking him back. But the cycle never broke. No matter how much Madeline and I tried to intervene, it never mattered. Those two were an inevitable, unavoidable train wreck destined to collide over and over. It was best if we stayed the hell out of the way.
My saint of a sister, however, kept putting herself right in the middle. She still had hope.
I stayed in Richmond until she got engaged to Kyle. My brother-in-law was the best kind of human there was. I owed him a lot. The day after they married, I enlisted in the Army, and got the hell out of Dodge. I’d only been back twice to see their twins. I went no contact with both my parents years ago. Madeline was the only reason I even knew they werealive. And—at leastcurrently—out of prison. Dad for DUIs; Mom for writing bad checks. Most days, I really wasn’t sure how Madeline and I turned out so normal.
Madeline: You have any rentals coming available?
Fuck. This was not a conversation appropriate for the Westons’ breakfast table. I put my phone face down on the table, and took the offered plate of bacon.
Growing up, breakfast was always cold cereal—if we were lucky enough to have milk in the fridge. Mom only ever made a fuss about meals when she and Dad first reconciled. By the end of one of their toxic cycles, we were lucky if the bowls in the cupboard were still intact.
The Westons had spoiled me these past two months.
“Joe called,” Dale said as my phone buzzed. I ignored it. “Said the drywall is in for your latest project.”
I was grateful for a shift of focus, allowing a mental to-do list for the Kniffen Street house to run through my head now that the drywall order finally arrived. “Thanks. I can swing by and pick it up while I’m in town today.”
