Piece of My Heart (Fostering Love 4)

“I try to keep my mouth shut,” she said. “I don’t talk badly about him to her, even though I think moving in together was a terrible decision.”

“Yeah,” I said again. I’d been surprised as hell when Sean had asked me to help him move. It seemed like a bad idea, but it wasn’t my business.

“But tonight”—she shook her head—“he was such an asshole. Why would she put up with that?”

“I don’t know,” I replied honestly. “In my family, that shit is never okay. You treat your partner with respect no matter how pissed you are.”

“I don’t like it,” Sarai said. “Get on the highway here.”

“I don’t like it, either,” I told her as I turned where she directed me. “Tonight, I thought the best course of action was to put his ass in bed. I didn’t want to make anything worse, you know?”

“Yep,” she said quietly. “I can imagine how Sean would act if you tried to correct him.”

“Like a big toddler?” I half joked.

“Like a bully,” Sarai replied seriously.

“I’ll see if I can talk to him at work on Monday,” I said after a few moments of quiet. “He might feel like shit about it when he wakes up tomorrow.”

“Somehow, I doubt it.”

I didn’t reply, but I agreed with her. Sean was cocky and selfish on his best days. Alcohol only magnified his bad traits; it didn’t create them.

“I have to ask,” I said after the truck had been silent for a few minutes. “Where are you from?”

She looked at me and smiled. “Missouri,” she said easily, watching for my response.

I laughed, because she was clearly messing with me. “That accent isn’t from Missouri,” I argued.

“It’s true,” she replied. “I was born in Missouri.”

“And then?”

“And I moved to New York when I was fourteen,” she said. “That’s probably the accent you’re hearing.”

“New York, huh?”

“Yes.”

“Really? That’s all you’re going to give me?” I was worried that we were almost to her apartment and I still barely knew anything about her. This was my chance, and once again I was kind of blowing it.

“I lived in New York with my aunt and uncle until I came back for college,” she said.

“The Big Apple,” I said, making her laugh.

“Both of my parents were New Yorkers,” she explained.

“They were from New York and they chose to move to Missouri?” Wait, she said were?

“The heart wants what it wants,” Sarai said, lifting her hands in a who knows gesture. “My father was an architect, and there was a firm here that offered him a good job.”

“Was?” I asked carefully.

“They died when I was fourteen,” she replied.

“Which is why you moved in with your aunt and uncle,” I murmured in understanding. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Thanks,” she said softly. “My uncle and aunt never understood the lure of Missouri, either,” she said. “They’re still waiting on me to move back home.”

“Is New York home, then?” I asked as she pointed to an apartment complex on the right.

“Home is…illusive. I thought Missouri was home, and so I came back.”

“It wasn’t what you expected?” I asked as I pulled into a parking space and put the truck in park.

“It was everything I remembered,” she said, turning to look at me. “And nothing like home.”

“Do you think you’ll move back to New York when you’re done with school?”

“I don’t know. I’m keeping my options open,” she said with a sigh. “I miss my family, of course, but I also like the freedom I have when we don’t live in the same place.”

“Freedom?”

“My aunt is a little overbearing,” Sarai said, rolling her eyes. “And family is everywhere in my old neighborhood. I can’t walk a block without seeing someone I know or someone who knows my aunt and uncle or remembers my parents. It’s impossible to be anonymous. But if I moved back to the city and didn’t live in our neighborhood, my aunt would take that as a personal attack.”

“It sounds kind of great to be surrounded by people who love you,” I replied. I’d been in the Army and moving around for so long I had a hard time remembering how that felt.

“It is, and it isn’t.” She took off her seat belt and smiled. “And I have no idea how we got on this conversation.”

“It’s my charm,” I said with mock seriousness. “People spill all their secrets around me.”

“Did I tell you any secrets?” she asked, cocking her head to the side like she was trying to remember.

“Not yet,” I said.

Her hair was falling over her bare shoulder, sliding this way and that every time she shifted her head, and I was mesmerized. I wanted to touch it. Grab it. Run my fingers through it. I’d never seen anyone with hair that shiny before. Like silk.

“Not ever,” she replied with a wrinkle of her nose. “But thank you very much for the ride home.”