Ben (The Sherwood)

“She was my friend,” Disa replied.

“Was?”

“We aren’t as close since high school ended. People lose their way. We hug when we see each other at the pub. She has Walker and their baby now.”

I laughed. My brother-in-law has a daughter that has taken him to his knees. India Rose Wild. She was a beauty who was a perfect combination of her mother and father.

“What do you want in life?” I asked surprising Disa.

“What most women my age wants,” she replied.

I didn’t know what that was. Our small town was different than other areas. The ones who wanted to do something more like a career got out of Sherwood and went to college. They didn’t come back except for holidays, weddings or funerals.

The women who stayed, married their high school sweethearts. Some of those marriages lasted a lifetime. Some made it ten years, some twenty. Those divorces were the hardest when one partner got bored and left the other one.

Should I ask what she meant by that? I decided to drop it. I wasn’t ready for her response and I wasn’t sure she wanted to discuss it with me anyway. Not after our painful history.

I had my chance with Disa. I had hurt her. Even if she broke it off with Kevin because she was thinking about me didn’t mean she wanted a second chance. Even I could see that Disa was guarded with me. She was hiding herself behind Asia. I was smart enough about women, I could see that was why she kept encouraging me to eat while she held Asia.

She wanted something to do with herself. She wanted to hold Asia and distract herself from me. She didn’t have to deal with me if she was holding my daughter.

I sat my plate down after the third piece and I reached for Asia. “My turn. You eat.”

Those eyes were like a skittish colt’s eyes. They focused on me for a moment, then she handed Asia to me. I leaned back and put Asia on my shoulder. She was fed, changed and content. She was a good baby. I held her while Disa ate. My hand ran over her back absently. Disa now watched me.

“What was it like being a Hatfield?” She asked me. “I mean from all outward, appearances your family is practically perfect.”

I snorted and shook my head at her. “All lies,” I told her.

She frowned at me.

How much should I tell her?

I licked my lips. A nervous habit I had. Each of us had our own idiosyncrasies. She was Dad’s employee and I knew that she liked him very much. Hell, I loved the old man, but he was rough on us as kids, but we turned out as good men with a sense of responsibility and honor. I decided to sugar coat it a little to protect the old man. I didn’t want anyone thinking badly of him.

“We’re all tight, but then you know that. Dad ran a tight ship too.”

She cocked her head to the side and stared at me. Her plate was mid-chest like she didn’t want to get crumbs on my couch. I hated to tell her this, but if she moved the cushions away, there was a boatload of crumbs, probably chunks of shit that one of us dropped and had worked its way beneath the cushions.

I needed to vacuum there, I reminded myself. I was sure in the cleaning spree the boys and Dad had done, they not thought to do that but everything else was spotless now.

“What are you not telli

ng me?” She asked sensing I was hiding something.

I was. In the night, when Dad dished out his discipline, I remember being held or holding one of my brothers, usually Elijah and I holding each other, or Matt holding one of us because Mom had given us the wait until your father gets home speech.

Then he did get home. Dad was a spare the rod and spoil the child kind of father because his father was that way with him, but I knew that he loved us. I never doubted my father’s love for us one bit. He wasn’t around much because he worked massive hours at the pub to support us but if you needed him, you just had to drop by the pub and tell him that you needed him. He would drop everything and sit out front for a moment with you. I remembered those things, those moments in time when I thought about being a Hatfield and what it meant to me.

“Let’s just leave it at my daughter’s punishments will be timeouts. If she’s as bad a kid as I was. Her butt will be numb, and it won’t be because she got a whooping.”

She frowned at me, but she let it go for which I was grateful. After we ate, this beautiful woman offered to bathe Asia while I cleaned up the kitchen.

“I knew you were an angel sent from Heaven.”

Disa rolled her eyes at me then left the room with my daughter. I was serious. That was a compliment not my usual charming bullshit. I think the woman was immune to my charms now or I had lost my touch.

Chapter 9