Page 11 of Leave It to Us
To punctuate her words, she made a check-off motion in the air. “Find out Grandma Betty is dead.Check.Sell the house she worked so hard to build.Check. Check.Make Tami feel like crap.Check. Check. Check!”
“You gotta make them see your point, then,” he said gently, and dropped a hand to her knee. “People aren’t generally mind readers, Tam. If you don’t tell them how you feel, how will they know?”
She let out a heavy sigh and, instead of continuing to eat, placed the remaining pizza on her plate so she could slump back on the couch. “They never listen to me—just tell me what I’m doing wrong, how I should fix my life. Act more like them. Be what Mama worked so hard for us to become.”
This part of the conversation wasn’t new. In the past year since she’d known Gabriel, he’d become an excellent confidant, which was probably why, on several occasions, she’d been able to give her body to him so freely. They had a special friendship that she not only appreciated but also, on some level, needed.
“Or you can just tell them that the only life you want to live is the one that’s authentic to you. Stop letting them beat you down with their words and opinions, and stand up for yourself the way you do witheveryone else you come across,” he said, his hand still on her knee as he looked back at her.
“You don’t know them,” she replied, hating how whiny those four words sounded. “They’re like this indomitable force of strength and tenacity. They’re the poster duo for Superwoman, and I’ve always felt like the incompetent sidekick, running behind them all my life.”
Now he sat back on the couch, an action that put him closer to her, the bare parts of his arm touching the bare parts of hers. He angled the other half of his body just enough so that his left hand could come up and cup the side of her face, turning her toward him. “There’s nothing incompetent about you. There’s resilience and fearlessness. Humor and compassion. Intelligence and beauty. And you don’t need a damn superhero title to prove any of that.”
His words—spoken with such determination and a tinge of force that sent tiny pricks of arousal scattering along her skin—made her smile. “But I’d look really great in a white catsuit—because black is too damn depressing—and a fly-ass mask with like a burst of color. Turquoise, maybe.”
When he grinned, the sizzle of tension that had suddenly dropped over them dissipated, and she felt a wave of relief. “And what would your superpower be?” he asked. “Because you hate running—or any type of physical activity, for that matter.”
He wasn’t wrong about that. Well, he kind of was. “Not true,” she replied. “I like sex.”
But she probably shouldn’t have said that, because then that strange-ass tension was back, clogging up the air until her next breath came out shakier than she’d anticipated.
With his hand still on her face, Gabriel brushed his thumb over her cheek. “That is true,” he said with a slow nod before he dragged his tongue over his lower lip. “And lucky for you, I like sex too.”
Her gaze remained fixed on his mouth then. It was a familiar sight; the low timbre his voice had dropped to was a sound she’d heardbefore too. And because she was used to this happening here and there throughout the course of their relationship, she wasn’t alarmed by the arousal swirling in the pit of her stomach. “Two peas in a pod,” she whispered, words they’d often used to describe their friends-with-benefits status.
“Yeah,” he murmured, and brought his face closer to hers. His usual response for whenever she referred to them that way now fell in a warm breath over her lips seconds before their mouths collided: “Something like that.”
Chapter 6
YVONNE
“Contesting a will—even small parts of it—could take months or even years to resolve,” Pat Glenn said, reading a text from her husband while sitting in the guest chair across from Yvonne’s desk.
Pat was the administrative assistant at Kentrell Middle School and had been ever since Yvonne had come to the school as vice principal five years ago. Over the last three years, as Yvonne had migrated into the role of principal, Pat had become more of a friend, in addition to being a vital resource in the office.
“And Manny also says the fact that this is an out-of-state will could make the process even more tedious and expensive for you and your sisters in the long run,” Pat continued before looking up at Yvonne again.
“Well, damn,” was Yvonne’s response. She sat back, legs crossed at the ankles as she moved just enough to cause a slight swivel in her office chair. “More bills are the last thing I need.”
The school year had just ended the previous week, but there were still a few administrative things she, Pat, and some of the other staff members in the building had to finish up before they left for the summer. So they were both dressed down in jeans, T-shirts, and tennisshoes. They’d been there since ten that morning, and it was now almost three o’clock.
“Do you know how long it’ll take to renovate the house? I mean, if you’re just looking at making a few repairs, slapping on some new paint to give it a fresh look, maybe that’s just like a few weeks, and then it can go on the market,” Pat said. “When I was talking to Manny about it last night, he said that rich folks are dying to snap up property on the Sea Islands—especially Daufuskie, since it’s still largely undeveloped.”
In the two days since she and her sisters had sat in Robyn’s office to receive the news, Yvonne had done some research as well, so she’d come to the same conclusions regarding real estate on the island. Selling the house could be very lucrative for them, a windfall that Yvonne had been desperately praying for in the past few months since their mother’s rehabilitation had suffered one setback after another.
Her mother had been at a church meeting when she’d collapsed a little over two years ago. It was Back to School Night, so Yvonne had been at the school, meeting parents, smiling at her students, and supporting her teachers when she got the call. Lana and Tami had made it to the hospital within moments of her, and the three of them had sat vigil in the waiting room for almost two hours before the first doctor appeared with any news. From there, it’d been an emotional and financial struggle to get their mother situated in her home. Three months ago, the strain had grown deeper, and Yvonne had barely been holding on before the news of Grandma Betty’s death came.
Now she was desperately trying to maintain a semblance of hope, no matter how bittersweet it felt.
“I haven’t been on that island in twenty-two years,” she said, and laced her fingers together on her lap.
“I heard it’s beautiful,” Pat replied. “My sister-in-law has family in Charleston, and when she visited with them last year, they took a trip out to the island for a couple of days. The whole place is so rich with history, but I imagine it’s awe-inspiring to see firsthand.”
Yvonne gave a slight shrug. “You know, I never appreciated the historical aspect when I was a child. It was just nice to get away from the city every summer. And after my parents divorced, it was nice to spend that uninterrupted time with my father.”
Her father. The first man she’d ever loved and the first man who’d ever broken her heart.
“Well, I can think of worse ways to spend your summer off,” Pat added. “I mean, I know you’re looking at it like one big headache since you rarely like to travel—”
