Page 48 of Lead Me On
“No, he stayed in one place. My mom collected lifers.”
Chase shook his head, fork paused halfway to his mouth. “Lifers?”
“She was a prison groupie. She married guys in prison. Four of them, to be exact. All of them men she met after they’d been sent to the big house. You are looking at the tender outcome of a conjugal trailer visit.” She put her hand to her mouth. “Oh, my God, did I say that out loud?”
“Yes,” Chase murmured, voice quiet with shock.
His slack face made her giggle. And then it made her collapse with laughter. “Oh, boy,” she squeaked. “Your expression is priceless.”
“Your momcollectedprisoners?”
“Oh, yeah. Like pound puppies.” She wiped her watering eyes. “It was quite a colorful existence for a kindergartner, let me tell you.”
“Jane,” he said, his face falling from surprise to worry, “how often did you move?”
She shrugged. “Whenever she got tired of visiting that man, she’d start writing to another. My dad was the first, though, so I guess that makes him special. God, is it hot in here? Whew. I’m hot.”
“I think it might be a combination of liquor and curry.”
“Oh, crud. Really? That’s embarrassing. Not as embarrassing as going to school with the children of your stepdad’s prison guards, though. Can you imagine?”
“No,” he said over her snort.
She took a deep breath and tamped down her laughter. “I don’t know why I told you all that.”
“It might have to do with that first drink you sucked down.”
“Maybe,” she agreed, just before regret hit her smack in the face. “Chase, I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking. About the drinks.”
He rolled his eyes. “Not that again. It’s fine. Get falling-down drunk. I promise not to call AA. And while you’re tipsy, is there anything else you want to get off your chest?”
Alarm sank deep into her bones. One more drink and maybe she’d spill it all. Not just the bad stuff her mother had done. That was easy to lay out on display. Her childhood had hurt, but it hadn’t been her fault. She’d been blameless…until she’d turned twelve and started making her own mistakes.
“Jane…”
“Nope,” she lied. “That’s all I have. Everything else about me is unremarkable. Boring. No need to ply me with more drinks.” Which was unfortunate. For a moment there, she’d considered getting seriously blitzed.
Chase’s head tilted slightly as he looked into her eyes, a furrow appearing between his brows. Fear wormed into her stomach at his look of confusion, but she talked herself down. He’d grown up in Grand Junction. He knew nothing, and she wouldn’t tell a soul.
Still, the puzzle turning behind his eyes scared her.
“What?” she asked.
“You just…” His eyes fell to the table. “You confuse me.”
“No, I’m simple,” she insisted. “This stuff with my family might be complicated, but I’m not like them. I’m different.”
“Is that why you’re with me, Jane?”
“I’m not with you.”
“Yeah, I got that. I mean, is that why you’re having a fling with me, instead of dating like a normal person? Because I remind you of them?”
Her mind rolled, turning over, picking up speed. She knew what it was, but she couldn’t say it. She couldn’t say,That’s who I really am. A woman who needs a big, rough man. A sad young girl who needs to be used so that she feels wanted. Someone who believes a man’s not really a man if he doesn’t have scars on his hands and dirt ground into his jeans.
She couldn’t say that, because now she was a woman who believed in refinement and education. She built relationships on respect, not on physical attraction. She measured a man’s worth by his ambition and intelligence and bearing. Not by the way he handled himself in a fistfight. Not by the width of his shoulders.
“Maybe I’m having a midlife crisis.”
