She frowned.
“It’s a long story. Was an accident in my shop.”
“Not such a long story.” She arched her brow at me. “You okay?”
“Working on it. I left the city and bought a house. On the lake.”
“Here?” She looked out the window. “Crescent Lake?”
I nodded. “I own a business on the outside of town too.”
“Fuck you.”
Gideon shot her a look. “Mace.”
“I knew it.” She jabbed a finger into my arm. “You own that sweet shop.”
I resisted the urge to laugh. It wasn’t quite the time to do that yet. “Trick or Treat, yeah.”
“What the hell? You don’t even pick up the phone, but you buy a business in my town?”
Gideon cleared his throat.
“Fine, our town. Whatever. Not the point. What the hell were you being so sneaky about?”
I sighed. “I bought it and thought I’d be able to talk to you. Then I...”
“Bailed, as usual.”
I swallowed down the bile. She wasn’t wrong. “I hired Lyric to run it. I was going to come and see you and then one of my pieces got into a major gallery.” I rubbed the pad of my finger over the pattern in the wood. “Things got wild. I ended up in Los Angeles and time just kept going by.” I looked up. “Then you seemed happy. Settled.”
“How would you know?”
I shrugged. “I checked up on you.”
“Yeah, well, I can’t say the same. I didn’t know a damn thing about where you were.”
I slid my hands off the table. “Google works for you too, Mace.”
She lifted her chin. “I shouldn’t have to look up my brother on the web. Not after what Lou did.”
“I know. It was shit. All of it was shit.”
“You just left. Again. Even when I moved here, you had the chance to show up for me.”
“I know.” I met her gaze “I know I fucked up. And I kept fucking up.”
Gideon slid an arm around Macy’s shoulders. She stiffened and slid out of the booth, stalking down the spaces between the tables to the back.
I closed my eyes. The migraine was brewing like the clouds out the window. There was a rumble in the distance. Finally, the heat of the day and the storm clouds over the water were hitting one another. Much like my sister and I.
“I’m assuming she doesn’t talk about me.”
“Nope.”
I opened my eyes and met Gideon’s dark gaze. “I know I have shit to make up for. A lot of shit.”
“You hurt her. And I get that family does that from time to time, but now she’s my family.”
Not mine. That was definitely loud and clear.
“I just want her to know I’m here. I’m not going anywhere this time.”
“Guess we’ll see.” Gideon slid out and stood.
“I bought the Barrows’ house on the lake.”
Gideon whistled. “That’s not a small place.”
“Nope. But it’s mine. I want to get to know my sister again—if she’ll let me.”
“I’ll let her know where you are. It’s her decision to make.”
I nodded. “Fair.”
I slid out of the booth as the lightning squiggle of an optical chased the pain from the regular headache. I needed to get out of there before I was incapacitated. “I’ll get out of your hair. I don’t expect you to understand or give a damn that I want a relationship with my sister, but I’m really glad she found someone. You guys seem tight.”
“I love her more than anything on this planet other than our kids. I also won’t hesitate to tie you to a cement median and dump you in the lake if you hurt her again.”
