Firefly Lane (Briar County 1)

“Not on the team at school.”

“Why not?”

“Just don’t. Mom tried to get me to.”

Holden crossed his arms. He was sure Marilee wanted him involved. Knew she would be different than their parents, and even if it’d been a struggle, she would have found the funds for Sean if he’d wanted on the team. “I wanted to play, when I was in school. But my parents didn’t do stuff like that. We didn’t have the money, and even if we had, they would have rather spent it on themselves than me or your mama.”

Sean fumbled as he tried to catch the ball, as if surprised by what Holden had said.

“Listen, I don’t know how to do this. I have no experience with kids, but there’s a couple of things I can promise you. The first is that you can count on me. Even when I head back to Atlanta, if you need me, I’ll always be there for you. I know you probably don’t believe that, but eventually, I hope you’ll see it.” Sean didn’t reply, and Holden continued. “The second is that I’ll never blow smoke up your ass.”

His nephew bit back a chuckle at that. The kid didn’t have nearly as much anger in him as Holden had at his age. That was a good thing.

“What I mean is, I’ll always tell it like I see it. I won’t sugarcoat things for you. Sometimes you’ll probably like that, others you won’t. The third is that no matter how upset you are, how confused you are, your mama loves you. There’s nothing she won’t do for you. She’ll always put your well-being above everything else, even if that’s not what it feels like to you.”

Sean set the football beside himself on the bed and crossed his arms.

“I’d like to get to know you. I’d like to spend some time with you. I’m gonna go out and talk to your mama now. We’d love it if you joined us, but if you don’t want to, if you’re not ready, that’s okay too. Maybe tomorrow we can figure out something fun to do. Are there fun things in a town this small?”

Again, Sean bit back a grin. Even though he didn’t respond, Holden considered that a win.

“I hope to see you out there,” Holden added, then slipped out the door, closing it behind him.

Marilee was pacing the living room. He nodded toward the front porch, where there were a couple of chairs.

As soon as they went out, she lit up a cigarette. “I know, I know. Don’t give me shit. I quit but started again lately.”

“I didn’t say a word.”

“You don’t have to. I know you.” She gave him a sad smile. “What did you say to him?”

Holden gave her a quick rundown, then said, “I don’t want to lie to him, Mari. Like I said, I don’t know shit about parenting, but I don’t think lying to him is the answer. If he asks, I think he should know the truth.”

“You lied to him when you said it was your fault he didn’t know you.”

Holden didn’t agree with her about that. Marilee may have cut ties, but Holden was the one who’d brought Adam into their lives. And he could have tried harder to find her. “Hell, I don’t know. Maybe I’m wrong.”

“You’re probably not. You usually aren’t. You always took care of me, always cleaned up my messes.” Marilee had spent a lot of years a little wild. She’d gotten into trouble at school, did a lot of partying, drinking, drugs. He’d protected her as best as he could, helped her as much as he could. When she’d gotten cleaned up in her mid-twenties, he thought the hard times were behind them. Then Adam happened. At first, he thought Adam was good for her. Marilee had fallen in love fast and hard. She’d thought Adam was the best thing to happen to her. Holden had noticed him becoming more possessive, Marilee cutting out friends. That was when Adam had taken Marilee and left.

“I got in plenty of my own messes,” Holden finally replied.

“No, you haven’t, and if you did, you cleaned them up yourself.”

“We can go round and round about this, but it’s not going to get us anywhere.”

Just then, Holden saw a dog come running out of the other house, followed by the kid he’d seen, a woman, and—holy fuck, was he gorgeous. The man was tall and broad. He had on a backward ball cap, but Holden could see his black hair sticking out from under it. He wore a T-shirt and jeans that did really fucking great things for his ass. His jaw was square, with short, dark stubble—not the kind he would shave in the evening, but neatly trimmed that said he kept it that way. His arms were golden-tanned, probably because he spent a lot of time in the sun, and he oozed this ruggedness that always got Holden hard—which was the last thing he should be thinking.