Melt (Steel Brothers Saga 4)

And I would tell him that I had fallen in love with him.

Chapter Thirty–Three

Jonah

Wendy Madigan opened her door. She had aged a few years, but she was still the nice-looking woman I remembered from long ago. Her hair was short now, but her blue eyes still sparkled.

She said nothing for a few moments.

“Wendy?” I said.

She shook her head as if to clear it. “I’m sorry. It’s just that…you both look so much like him. Especially you.” She nodded to me.

“Like who?” Talon asked. “Our father? I’m Talon, by the way.”

“Yes. I recognize you. Come on in.” She held the door open, led us to a living room, and gestured for us to sit on a silver brocade couch. “Can I get you anything? I made a pot of coffee.”

“How about a bourbon?” Talon said.

She laughed out loud. “That’s what your father would’ve said.”

Had our father been a bourbon drinker? He’d rarely drunk alcohol. I looked over at Talon. The inquisitive look on his face told me he hadn’t known that either.

“I’m not sure I ever saw my father take a drink,” I said to Wendy.

“Really? He did enjoy a good bourbon. I know it’s early, but if you want to drink, I do have some good stuff.”

“Yes, ma’am, if you don’t mind,” Talon said. “I know this is going to be a rough conversation.”

“What about you, Jonah? You’re Jonah, right?”

“Yes, that’s me.”

“You are the spitting image of Brad. It’s almost scary.”

I cleared my throat. “People have told me that before.”

She looked to Talon. “Not that you don’t look like him as well. But wow.” She stared at me again.

I squirmed, getting uncomfortable. I had been told before that I bore a striking resemblance to my father, even more so than Talon and Ryan. Why it was making me uncomfortable, I couldn’t say. Maybe it was the way she was looking at me, kind of in a wistful yet lustful way. I didn’t like it.

“What can I get you, Jonah?” she said. “You want a drink too?”

I shook my head. “Coffee for me. For now, anyway.” I wanted to keep my head. I was a little worried about Melanie. She hadn’t answered my call last night or this morning.

Maybe that was her way of telling me to fuck off. Maybe that’s why she had left yesterday so abruptly. Maybe she just couldn’t deal with—well, whatever this was between us.

Fine. I would learn to get along without her. Hell, we’d only known each other a few weeks.

Wendy went to the kitchen and came back a few minutes later with a bourbon for Talon and a cup of coffee for me.

“Aren’t you having anything?” I asked.

“Yeah. A stiff scotch. I’ll be back.”

Stiff scotch? She must have some interesting news to tell us.

I had met Wendy Madigan years ago, when I was a kid. She came around every once in a while, when she was in town. Evidently she had grown up somewhere near Snow Creek and had gone to high school with my father. In fact, rumor had it that they had been an item before he met my mother—a rumor that Jade had substantiated after her talks with Wendy. I still couldn’t quite wrap my head around that one.