Part of me wanted to believe they wouldn’t be there. Or maybe if they were, they wouldn’t have the balls to say anything to me. They picked on people they thought were weaker than them. I was older. Not tougher, but I was older and stronger.

Lily and them might be mad when I told them that I didn’t want them to go, but they’d get over it.

We had made a pact when I had picked them up and taken them back to Mr. Cooper’s house. We weren’t going back there. We were going to start over again, together. We were going to do great.

I stared at the notes written on the work order I needed to get started on, but not remembering a single word of it because...

I didn’t want to go.

Just as quickly as that thought entered my head, another one did too.

Hell.

I had something to think about.

Chapter 5

I had made a lot of dumb decisions in my life.

A lot.

I could be honest about it, mostly because I had learned valuable lessons from each screwup in my life.

Don’t waste your time expecting people to change, and if you think you might be starting your period, don’t risk it and leave your house without a tampon.

Honestly, the list was pretty freaking long, but those were my favorite lessons.

But as I sat there at the bar, at an empty table, all by myself, I accepted the fact that coming here tonight could easily go down as one of those dumb decisions. Dumber than when I’d bought clothes a size smaller than what I usually wore to “motivate me to lose weight.” They were still in my closet with the tags on. The problem with this dumb decision was that I doubted there was some lesson to be learned from it.

Nobody had forced me to come to the bar. No one had whispered into my ear, “Luna, ruin your entire day by contemplating the idea of asking Rip to cash in your favor. Rush through work, head to the bar to sort-of celebrate his birthday, and then act like everything was fine.”

I was going to ask Rip for a favor.

A favor he technically did owe. A favor he usually asked me about every single day we worked together, unless it was one of those mornings that had me breaking up an argument between him and Mr. Cooper and then we didn’t see each other the rest of the day.

I didn’t want to ask though.

I didn’t want to ask him for anything.

The problem was, I didn’t want to go to my grandmother’s funeral alone. Just the idea of going by myself made me more nauseous than asking Rip for something. But the near panic I got at the idea of having my siblings go with me trumped everything else by far, and asking Mr. Cooper or one of my friends to go with me and possibly see up close who I was related to…

No. Just, no.

It was just a trip to San Antonio. Nine hours total. He would just have to sit there and possibly give people that death glare he’d perfected before he had started working at CCC.

It was nothing to worry about. If anything, Rip should be happy this was all I was going to ask of him. Shouldn’t he? Maybe he’d be in a better mood, not having to ask me the same question only to get the same answer all the time.

He’d wanted to get rid of this loose end between us from the very beginning. He had never hidden that. Not once. So I was going to do him a favor and get it over with after so freaking long.

Maybe he’d even thank me.

Yeah, right. I’d lost my mind. I was seriously going to ask Rip for a favor? Ripley the same man who, based on the scarring on his knuckles that marred the letters he had tattooed on them, had more than likely gotten into more fights in his life than a professional MMA fighter? I was going to ask him to go with me to my grandmother’s funeral so that he’d hopefully stop my family from trying to talk to me?

I was pathetic. I really was. Just like my dad had said for so much of my childhood.

Sad, stupid-ass.

That memory came out of freaking nowhere.

I stomped it back down into its little box.

I was having a good day. My sister had put a piece of cherry pie into my lunch, and that was something great about today. I had gotten all of my work done and then some.

I was happy. I was loved. I had everything and more I could have wanted.

I could do it. I had done scarier things than asking for something. I was past all this crap.

That’s exactly what I was going to think to myself as I sat there, alone, watching Rip at the bar as he got a drink, and waiting for more of my coworkers to show up because so far no one else had gotten there yet even though I’d been the second to last one to leave. Knowing most of my coworkers, they either wouldn’t come or they were at home pre-gaming, aka having beers so they wouldn’t spend as much drinking at the bar. It wouldn’t be the first time they did that.

The good thing with me was, I didn’t drink that much in the first place. I didn’t like the idea of being in a car with a stranger drunk or even slightly out of it. Plus, there was also that worry that I had always carried inside of me about how I would act if I was under the influence of anything.

Was I really going to ask him?

My phone buzzed from inside my purse. I took it out and saw my best friend’s name on the screen, and an idea came to me. If Rip told me to fuck off, I could always tell her to ask one of her friends to go with me. One of them would say yes. I wouldn’t care what someone I didn’t know thought.

There was always a plan B.

Lenny: What are you doing tonight?

I didn’t hesitate texting her back. It wasn’t like there was anything else to do but look around and stress.

Me: It’s my boss’s birthday and I’m at the bar.

Lenny: Rip?

Me: Yeah.

I realized right then that I had been so busy I hadn’t texted her all day.

Me: My grandma died a few days ago. Her lawyer called to tell me about the funeral arrangements. She had asked that he let me know….

A wave of sadness and guilt had me holding my breath before I kept typing.

Me: The funeral is next week in San Antonio. I don’t want to go, but I kinda owe it to her to have one of us go. Better me than Lily, Kyra, or Thea.

Was my head starting to hurt or was I imagining it?

Gripping my phone in my hand, I glanced up and took in the man ten feet away. I studied his wide back, no longer covered by a gray shirt but instead by a deep green Henley that hugged the flat expanse of his stomach, every notch of his spine, and curve of his lateral muscles, yet managed to still cling to his waist. He was plain big all over. Everywhere. I’d watched him enough to know. I could live the rest of my life and not forget any part of what he looked like.

I sighed, but I still didn’t look away. He’d already been standing at the bar for at least five minutes, either still waiting for his drink or pretending like I wasn’t the only person from work here.

My phone buzzed again.

Lenny: That blows. I’m sorry.

Lenny: I’ll go with you. I ain’t scared.

I bit the inside of my cheek and typed my response.

Me: I know you would, Len, but you’re still healing from your surgery and can’t choke anybody out.

I knew I should tell her that I was thinking about asking Rip, but she didn’t know about the favor. She had heard, better than anyone, just what I thought about him. It wouldn’t make sense to her why a man who barely spoke to me would go with me back home.

I had buried myself in a lie by not telling the truth, and now there was no way to get out of it without having to explain the whole thing, and as much as I loved and cared for Lenny DeMaio, it wasn’t my business to tell her what had happened.

Rip and I were the only two people in the world who needed to know the truth.

Me: Next family funeral.

Next family funeral. Like there was someone else in my biological family other than my sisters who I would miss or go visit when they were gone. How sad was that?

When I’d been growing up, I would have done freaking anything for a dad to tuck me in. For a mom who would hug me and put Band-Aids on my boo-boos. For an older brother to protect me when people were mean. For my dad to play with me. For the person I had called my mom for years to hug me. For my older brother to just pay attention to me.

I had a faint memory of writing a letter to Santa when I’d still been holding out hope that he would finally be able to find my house so I could ask for things. But Santa never took my letters. He never answered any of my requests.