“I know. Tru called to check up on you. Are you okay?” Tru had also wanted to check up on Bear and make sure he wasn’t losing his mind, which he was, but he was keeping it under control.
“Yeah. She didn’t hate me.” Her eyes dampened, and another wave of guilt for not being there tonight hit him. “Tru called? Does that mean everyone knows?”
He helped her to her feet. “No. He just wanted to make sure you were okay. I’ll make you a key tomorrow. I don’t want you waiting outside for me. Why didn’t you call? I would have come to you.”
“I don’t know. I missed you, so I packed up and came over.” She glanced down at her backpack beside the chair, and he picked it up.
They went inside and headed upstairs. He was glad she was there, but Crystal sitting outside alone at night didn’t sit well with him. He took a quick shower and found Harley sleeping on his pillow. Leaving Harley where she was, he climbed into bed and cuddled up to Crystal.
She turned toward him. “Is it too presumptive that I came over?”
“I want you to be presumptive.” He pulled her closer and pressed his lips to hers. “I hated the idea that you were alone tonight. I hate every night that we spend apart. I always want you with me.”
“Me too.” Her eyes turned serious. “I’m dreading seeing my mother this weekend. I know I didn’t want you to meet her, but now that I’m not hiding anything from you, would you consider coming? Jed will be there, and we don’t have to stay long.”
“Of course. Whatever you want.” He touched his lips to hers.
“I keep thinking about Gemma. She doesn’t see her mother regularly because her mother is so awful. In a different way from mine, of course, but still. And seeing my mom…Well, you saw me that day we were supposed to paint Tru and Gemma’s house. Every time I see my mother, I feel like I fall into a tar pit and I have to claw my way back out again afterward.”
“Then why do you do it? I’m a loyal guy, but if it’s that bad, why go? Are you helping her in some way by visiting?”
She shook her head. “She doesn’t even seem like she wants me there. She’s hateful and says horrible things about me and my father. She’s even bitchy to Jed, who has always been there for her.”
All his protective urges surged forward. “Then why put yourself through that?”
“Because I think my dad would have wanted someone to take care of her.”
The sadness in her voice slayed him. “I think your dad would have been more concerned about taking care of you.”
“Maybe. How did your meeting with the guys from Silver-Stone go?”
He didn’t want to talk about Silver-Stone. He wanted to convince her not to visit her mother. But if there was one thing he’d learned, it was that Crystal did not like to be told what to do.
“They need a commitment, but it will mean hiring more staff at the bar and the auto shop, and the timing sucks, with my father’s plans to expand the bar.”
She snuggled in closer and pressed her lips to his. “Or maybe it’s perfect timing. If you think my father would be concerned about me taking care of myself, don’t you think the same goes for your father? That he’d be concerned about you taking care of yourself for once?”
I’m not even sure I know how to do that anymore. He rolled onto his back and draped his arm over his head, pulling her against his side. “I don’t know, babe.”
“I wonder if there’s such thing as being too loyal.”
“If there is, then we’re both guilty of it.”
Chapter Nineteen
“BABE, YOU LOOK a little green.” Bear pulled Crystal closer as they drove toward her mother’s house Sunday evening.
“It’s a special look I get just for my mother. You don’t find it attractive?” She hadn’t even been able to muster a smile when they’d picked up Jed. Nothing good ever came from visiting her mother.
“Our mother has that effect on people,” Jed explained.
Bear squeezed her hand. “You seriously hate this.”
“That’s putting it mildly.” She fiddled with the radio. “It was a mistake to ask you to come. You don’t need to see what a mess our mother is.”
“That’s even more of a reason for me to be here with you. I don’t want you going through that at all, much less going through it without me.”
She pointed to the stoplight, her stomach knotting up tighter. “Turn right there. Then it’s the second street on the right.”
“I feel like I’ve been here before.” Bear stopped at the light and glanced at her. “Are you sure you want to do this?”
“No,” Crystal said. “But I have to. We’ll stay just a few minutes, so I can feel like I’ve done my daughterly duty.”
He turned the corner and followed her directions into a trailer park. “Now I know I’ve been here before.”
“Really?” Jed pointed to their mother’s trailer. “It’s the yellow piece of shit.”
“I know this trailer. You moved here when you were eight?” he asked as he parked.
“Yeah,” she said.
“How do you know it?” Jed asked as he climbed from the truck.
Bear helped Crystal out. “I think I drove your father home. He was at the bar, too drunk to drive. I was a kid. Sixteen, maybe? I don’t remember. But there was a little girl peeking out that window.” He pointed to the window on the side of the trailer.
“That was my bedroom.” Her pulse quickened. “But I don’t remember that.”
“Funny.” Bear slung his arm over her shoulder. “I’ll never forget it. Seeing you made me realize how much my dad cared about other people. He could have thrown customers into a cab and sent them on their way, but he never did. He said he didn’t know how a cabbie would treat a guy who wasn’t in his right mind, but he knew how the children he’d raised would.”
It made her happy to think that Bear had met her father, even if it was under those circumstances. But if her father had been too drunk to drive then, had he also been drunk the night he died? Had he caused the accident that had killed him?
She looked at Jed, and he must have read the fear in her face, because he shook his head and said, “He was no longer drinking when he was killed. He wasn’t at fault. He’d been sober for a while by then.”
Tears of relief filled her eyes. “I’m so glad to hear that. I know your father has weird ideas about women and work, but I love him even more knowing that he took care of my father like that. Do you remember anything else about our father? What he was like?”
“Yeah, I remember. He looked like Jed, tall with dirty-blond hair, but older of course. He talked about you guys the whole trip. His beautiful, smart little girl and the son who tried his patience at every turn.”
It didn’t matter that her father had been drunk. Bear had a memory of him that was new to her. “I love hearing that. Wait. Is this true, or are you trying to make me feel better because my mom is such a mess?”
“It’s true, babe. I told you I don’t lie.”