Page 9 of Hold You Close
Now I never will.
So many goddamn regrets.
“Do you think we’ll have to move to Florida?” Christopher asks.
My mother tried to bring that up last night, but I wasn’t in the right mindset to discuss it. Talking about all of it was too much. The idea of not seeing the kids anymore after losing Sabrina is a road I can’t go down.
I don’t claim to be the world’s best uncle, but I love those three. I’m the one who buys them the cool thing their parents won’t let them have. When I show up on Christmas, it’s clear who Santa Claus really is—me. I’m their godfather, all three of them are mine in some way. I spoil the shit out of them, teach them things they should know, and love them with my whole heart.
I’m well aware of what people think about me. I’m divorced, drive a sports car, own a nightclub, and get laid whenever I want, but that doesn’t mean things don’t bother me. I’ll never have kids, so they’re it for me.
“I really don’t know what’s going to happen.” I give it to him straight.
Right then my mother walks over. “We’re all going to follow the lawyer back to his office.” She touches Chris’s arm. “All of us, Ian.”
“I have to get back to the club.”
She gives me the look that makes even grown men shit themselves when they see it. The eyes that demand you listen. “The lawyer stated that you, London, living parents, and the children were to be at the reading of the will.”
Even in death, Sabrina is in charge.
I open my mouth to refuse. I have a business to run and Drea is really not as capable as I’d like her to be. We’ve only been open four months, and I can’t screw this up.
“Please, Uncle Ian,” Chris pleads.
Well, shit. I can’t say no now. This is my first godson. The one I hoped to corrupt and teach to drive his mother to drink. He's supposed to become my protégé, and I can’t let him down.
“All right, I’ll be there.” I clasp his shoulder and walk to the car.
“Thanks.”
London walks over with huge black sunglasses on her face, but they don’t disguise her grief. She has had no problem shedding tears. I’ve never seen her cry as much as I have in the last five days. I had to lock myself down to keep from trying to comfort her with each sob she released. She’s made it clear, however, that I’m not the person she seeks out when she’s in pain.
I’ve managed to keep it together for now. Mostly because my father always taught me that when the women are struggling, they need the men to carry the weight. So he’s helping Mom, and I’ve got the kids.
He and I share a look as my mother starts crying again. I hear him in my head. “Men are fixers, Son. Men are strength. Men don’t let anyone see vulnerability. When someone hurts your mother or sister, you’ll fight. If someone you love is in pain, you fight, got it?”
Those words were drilled into me, and every part of me wants to fight, but there’s no one to battle. I wish there was.
“Can I ride with you? I don’t have my car,” London explains.
Under normal circumstances, London would never ask to go anywhere with me. And if she did, I would throw out some smartass remark or give her crap about it, but since we lost Sabrina, neither of us has taken a single jab at the other. Part of me wants to pick a fight with her just to have something be the way it was before.
But I can’t do that.
“Fine.” I start walking toward my car, and she falls in step beside me, her arms crossed over her chest. Her dark hair is twisted up in that strict-librarian style she always wears. She should wear it down more often.
“Have you seen the will?” she asks.
“No.”
“What do you think will happen with the kids?”
I shrug, irritated that she brought up the one subject I’m trying to avoid thinking about. “My parents will probably get them.”
“Will they take them back to Florida?”
“How should I know?” My tone is a little too sharp, and I feel like an asshole for being rude to her today. She and I have our issues, which are not entirely my fault, as she would like to believe, but she loves those kids—she’s their godmother. They call her “Aunt London,” and she was there the day each one of them was born.
