Page 161 of This Bitter Sweet Temptation
“Maybe,” I counter.
“Dad, you don’t need to be so negative all the time.”
Dammit, I do.
I should know better than anyone how stupid it is to keep thinking we’ll just keep living like this forever. Even if a mad, desperate part of me wants to.
Kit sighs, a heavy look in her eyes.
“What? What did I do?”
“You know.”
No one ever tells you having a daughter this age is like trying to talk to the wall.
“Kit, if I knew, we wouldn’t be having this talk.” I nudge her shoulder. “Help your old man out.”
“Fine.” She rolls her eyes. In a couple more years, she’ll be in peak door-slamming, ‘Dad, I hate you’ form. “It’s okay to have a girlfriend, you know. You’re old enough.”
I almost choke on my coffee.
“I know you guys are dating. That’s why she’s living here,” Kit says without a doubt. “I can handle it. I’m not gonna get mad because you’ve got a love life. I barely knew Mom, so I don’t care.”
Gut punch.
I set my coffee down and reach for her.
“Who are you and what have you done with my daughter? The real Kit knows we don’t talk about my love life.”
Or lack thereof.Just saying those words heats my face.
I pretend to inspect her ear for an alien parasite. She giggles and tries to swat my hand away. In my blood, I feel fire ants on the march.
“I’m beingserious. Come on, I’m not dumb. You guys hold hands when you think I’m not looking. You even kiss her. You used to wait until you’d get a room or whatever, but now… eh.”
The girl has no filter.
Can’t deny it either when Kit’s probably hit the age where she knows we do a hell of a lot more than trade kisses. At least she knows better than to call us out on that.
Small mercies.
“It’s complicated,” I admit.
“But why?” She pouts. “It’s easy. You just need to stop being a grumpy McScruff Face andtell heryou want her to stay. She’ll be pumped the minute you say it. That’s what she’s waiting for, Dad. Just tell her.”
I go quiet, taking the world’s slowest sip of coffee.
“That simple, huh?”
“Yes,” she insists. “Just like when you’re working and you tell me going to Grammy and Gramps’ place doesn’t mean you don’t want me around.”
I wrap an arm around her shoulders and pull her against my side. She hasn’t lost her childish innocence yet, not completely, but it’s fading by inches.
I dread the day it’s gone.
Hell, I wish itwasas simple as she makes it sound.
Just me telling Cleo we could build a brand-new life. Magically ignoring the barbed wire fence between us, without getting cut up by our differences.
