“Still not interested.”

“Give me six hundred K and it’s yours. You can find him. Meet him. Talk to him. Wouldn’t that be amazing?”

Maybe it would. Maybe it wouldn’t. I was still on the fence. The fact that she thought it was okay to blackmail me, even after all these years, was mind-blowing in itself.

“I gave you twenty thousand dollars less than a week ago, so you would stay the fuck away from me. I gave you money to lay low and stop calling. I paid your way out of my life, and you still can’t seem to do the only basic shit you’re required to do. Maybe this should be my last payment ever, seeing as your word isn’t worth shit anyway.”

That was the fakest bullshit I had ever uttered. This cash cow wasn’t going to stop wiring her small sums of money. She barely had enough for bills and food—she never worked—and last time I attempted to stop the gravy train, she called me a hundred times a day, sent enough emails to block my account, and texted me so many times that I had to change my number. Twice. I knew I was nurturing her bad habit, but it wasn’t worth the hassle. She was a lost cause. All she wanted was to have me, to make me work for her, take care of her, and love her.

She had to settle for me merely keeping her above the poverty line. But as I said. The Luna shit opened my eyes. I didn’t want to meet him. I wanted to forget he ever existed and move on.

“Come on, baby,” she whined. “I really need the money.” She dragged out the word ‘really’ in a way that I found particularly annoying.

“Go work. It’s a foreign concept, but it’s doable. You’re a capable woman,” I said. Sort of.

“I don’t need to work. I have something that you want. Him.”

I did want him, and it killed me. I didn’t even want to get to know him necessarily. Just to see what he looked like. Maybe from afar. I tried hiring a few private investigators when I graduated from Harvard, but they came back empty-handed. She knew exactly what she was doing. Besides, it was really far-fetched. I think she genuinely knew where he was, but he was nowhere near her.

Small miracles to be thankful for and all. I bet he was better off without her.

“I met a girl.” I changed the subject. As if she cared. As if it made any difference at all.

“Oh?” she responded, sounding both surprised and unhappy. “I thought you always meet girls. Your reputation precedes you.”

“Our reputations are similar, Nina. You outshine me in the fucking-people department. At least there’s one thing you excel at.”

“Sensitive much, Dean? I was only being conversational.”

She was only being a fucking headache. Of course, Nina wasn’t deterred by my lack of interest in humoring her.

“Does she know that you don’t find women reusable?” She chewed on something on the other line. Someone else’s dick probably.

“She’s a keeper.” My jaw tightened.

“Why?”

“Because she is the opposite of you.”

And she was. Rosie was brave, sassy, loyal, and witty. With the potential to be an amazing mother. She was a hardworking girl who didn’t like taking favors from other people. And, unlike me, Rosie didn’t use any of the shortcuts given to her. Her illness meant she could have had it the easy way. But Baby LeBlanc never walked the line. She danced all over it, her flip-flops smacking on the floor throughout.

I brought a bottle of rum to my lips and took a swig, then another. I did so well for three days, not touching a drop of alcohol—even in Vegas—and it was all flushed down the toilet the minute I answered my goddamn phone.

“You know you still love me, despite everything,” Nina droned, laughing her coy laugh. And I had to admit that, horrifyingly, she wasn’t completely wrong.

I stared at the blooming trees from my viewpoint on Vicious’s balcony.

“Oh, and Dean?”

“Yes?”

“This is one truth you don’t want to miss out on. It will change everything.”

I had no doubt.

“Stop calling. I stopped answering. Bye, Nina.”

“Yo, shithead. Where art thou?” Trent’s voice echoed from the sparse landing. I peeled myself off of Vicious’s antique couch, holding onto my head like it was about to burst. Rosie’s parents lived on the second floor, but I don’t think they were home. Her mom joined the Todos Santos Pie Committee, and her dad worked part-time as a landscaper. Vicious once told me that there was no convincing the LeBlanc folks to slow down and stop working altogether, even after retirement. I wasn’t surprised. Their daughters weren’t any different.

“Right here,” I groaned, not moving an inch.

Trent and Luna entered the large living room. She wobbled on her feet like a duck, her honey-brown curls and smooth, tan skin making her green eyes pop out. Luna threw herself between my legs for a hug. I picked her up and brought her to my chest, and she wrapped her chubby arms around my neck.

Trent placed his temple against the wall, stuffing his hands into his pockets.

“How is she doing?” I asked, squeezing Luna to my body, sniffing her hair.

He shrugged, looking out the window.

“She thinks she’s on vacation with Grandma and Grandpa. She keeps putting my phone to her ear and expects to hear her mommy.”

“I read somewhere that our earliest memory can be from the age of two. Maybe she won’t even remember that bitch had ever left.” I offered my support by giving him bullshit data I picked from a dated magazine while I waited for my dentist appointment. I think most people tried to convince him that Val was going to come back eventually, but I wasn’t one of them. What was the point in lying? I knew her kind. They popped a kid, abandoned them, and would only check on their offspring if they saw an opportunity waiting to be cashed.

“And I read somewhere that your earliest memory could be from the womb. Maybe she’ll remember everything,” he offered me a dry look.

Touché.

I put Luna down on the floor. She swayed until she gained balance, then clutched my hand and smiled.

“Look, no offense, man, but you don’t know what it’s like, okay? You’ve never had to deal with this kind of bullshit before.”

I wasn’t going to correct him. It wasn’t about me. I wanted to be there for him, even if he was going to be a pissy little shit for a while.

“Put your big girl panties on, Trent. You have enough money to hire the best nannies in the world and Luna is a cool kid. You have your parents, your friends, me. You’re not alone in this.”

“I know, I know.” Trent scrubbed his face, walking over to the liquor cabinet and taking out a bottle of Glenmorangie. “Luna, show Uncle Dean how you dance,” he asked tiredly as he poured himself a drink, his smile flaccid. Girl started shaking it like Beyoncé in Madison Square Garden, and we both clapped for her for a few minutes, before Luna got distracted by a door and decided to close and open it five hundred times in a row.

“She’s pretty advanced for her age,” I remarked.

“Very. She’s blabbing all the time, too. Maybe it’s my bias-ass, but I think she’s special. So special.” He shook his head, frowning. “Too special to be discarded like this by her mom.”

“What are you gonna do, bro?”

He stared at me through the rim of his glass while taking a sip, his silence tipping me off that he already had an idea. Putting his glass down, he clucked his tongue. “My parents have a new house here in Todos Santos. Chicago is big and cruel, and I work an insane amount of hours.” He stared at me, long and hard, and I instantly knew what he was asking for. I tapped my lips with my laced fingers.

“Let’s talk shop.”

“This is my so-called life.” Trent gestured with his ripped arms, stealing another glance at Luna, who was still opening and closing the same double door with a devotion better saved for finding the cure to cancer. “It’s a Mess with a capital M, and my daughter is in the middle of the shitshow, dragged through the mud and filth, the consequences of her parents’ bad decisions ruining her life. This stops here. She needs stability.”

“What are you proposing, exactly?” I cracked my neck, looking him dead in the eye. Fiscal Heights Holdings’ headquarters was in New York, and I ran it. Smoothly, if I may say so myself. I was the dedicated bachelor, and I put down the hours. Vicious was working in L.A. and commuting from Todos Santos every day. He wouldn’t leave California for the world. This was where he was born, and this was where he would die. Jaime was in London, handling our European accounts, and Trent was in Chicago, our newest and smallest branch. But it was expanding, fast. There was money to be made, and money talked. It fucking screamed, especially to people like us.

“Vicious should take Chicago.” Trent stared at me with a death glare.

I smiled. “Vicious should do a lot of things. That gap between what he should do and what he actually does? That’s where he thrives.” I wasn’t joking.

“You need to back me up when I bring this up at our next meeting.” He held my gaze firmly, his jaw ticking. I tugged at my lower lip.

“You need more than my vote to make it happen.”

“Jaime’s in, too.”

“Jaime is going against Vicious?” My eyebrows jumped up. Jaime always took his side, even when it was time to call Vic on his bullshit.

Looking at Trent, I saw someone I was willing to fight for. Hard. The guy to always do the right thing. If someone deserved to catch a break out of the four of us, it was him. I nodded, placing a hand on top of Luna’s little head.

Protect the strays. Atone your past. Break the fucking cycle.

“When?” I asked.

“November sounds good. Thanksgiving and all. We’re all going to be here anyway.”

I nodded. “Let’s get you back in Cali.”

We bumped shoulders and clapped backs. “Fuck yeah.”

What makes you feel alive?