My brother sat in one of the spindly room chairs at the dining room table, his woman, Cressida straddling his lap and facing him, her hands in his tumble of curly blond hair and his hands at her ass. They were laughing loudly at something, which was something they did a lot of together, but they both turned to look at me the second I hit their space.
Nova, not my family by blood but by right, was thrown across my sofa, a hand over his eyes, his legs spread, one over the back of the couch and one over the coffee table, his dirty boots still on. Even hungover as I knew he probably was, he looked beautiful lounging there, like some Greek God fallen from Olympus. He peeked out from under his arm when my best friend Lila, sitting on the ground at his side painting her nails on the coffee table beside his boot, hit him in the side at the sight of me.
If I rounded the corner, I knew I’d see Dad in the kitchen finishing up the bacon, adding it to whatever his wife had whipped up for breakfast, probably lemon ricotta pancakes knowing my step-mum, but before I could take that step, the woman in question was in front of me beaming so bright a smile at me I blinked.
“Harleigh Rose,” she rasped softly in her husky voice, and just the sound of my name in her mouth made me want to cry again.
Man, I was turning into a fuckin’ wuss.
Before I could blink again, she was against me, her caramel scent in my nose and soft hair against my cheek. I clutched her to me, loving the warmth of her body and spirit against my aching counterparts.
“You disappear like that on us again, swear to God, H.R., I won’t hold your dad back from the rampage he’s gonna go on, you get me?” she whispered in my ear.
I smiled into her shoulder before releasing her to give her an eye roll. “Like you can control the monster he becomes when he’s on the warpath.”
Lou gave me a small, feminine smile as her hand went to her huge belly, swollen with my half-siblings. “Oh, I have my ways, babe.”
“Okay, barf. How many times do we have to have this talk, huh? No more sexual innuendos or information about your sex life with my father,” I ordered her.
Of course, she laughed her beautiful laugh and winked at me as we rounded the corner to the kitchen. It was nearly impossible for me to believe that four years ago I tackled her to the ground and beat her up because I’d found out the same girl that got my dad shot when I was six, was the same girl fucking him then. I’d hated her for that and for taking away a massive chunk of his time and attention because I was young and selfish as shit. It was only after she’d been disowned by her family and I realized the horrors cancer had wrecked on her life that I came around.
Now, I couldn’t imagine my life without her and I sure as fuck didn’t want to imagine my dad’s that way either.
I took a seat at the bar as she slid under the arm my dad held up for her while he dished out perfectly crispy rashers of bacon onto plates.
“Grubs up,” he called as he twisted down to plant a kiss on Loulou’s upturned mouth.
God, the men in my family were sweet enough with their women to give a girl a goddamn toothache.
“How’s my pretty girl?” Nova asked, sliding up beside me to grab the plate of food Dad tried to slide to me.
He intercepted it, lifted it to his chest and bit into a piece of buttered toast as he waited for me to answer the question.
“That was mine,” I informed him.
“Don’t see your name on it and my mouth’s been on it now. You still want it?”
“I wouldn’t,” Lila drawled as she popped up to pressed a kiss to my cheek and then accept a plate from Lou. “The devil only knows where that mouth has been.”
We all laughed as she faked a shudder, but Nova only shrugged and took another enormous bite of toast. “Who am I to deny the ladies what they want?”
“You’re disgusting,” Lila said with a sneer as she pushed Nova with a solid hand to the shoulder.
A huge diamond winked in the light as she did so and I gasped. “Fucking hell, Lila babe, please don’t tell me that rock is an engagement ring.”
My best friend beamed at me and wiggled her hand in the air as she crowed, “You better believe it, baby! Jake proposed.”
I launched myself off the stool and into her arms. “You’re kidding me!”
“No way, bitch. This five-carat diamond is no fuckin’ joke.”