Here With Me (Adair Family 1)

But we loved it. Coming home to the blue-and-white house was nice. It was weird to be living at home again, but so far it was good. Knowing it was only temporary helped a lot. Mom and Seth graciously offered up my old room when my landlord announced a week after my arrival that my lease was up in two weeks and he wasn’t renewing it. Jaz and Autry offered me a spot on their couch, but my old bedroom was a much better solution.

Though I loved hanging out with them. I didn’t realize how much I’d missed them all. In fact, I’d just come from a morning of soft play with Jaz. The girls were great, but an afternoon of peaceful chill-out time on my parents’ porch was exactly what I needed after a raucous, chaotic morning.

Feeling Seth’s eyes on me, I glanced to my right where he sat on the other porch seat, sipping a cold beer.

My stepfather was of Cornish stock, thus the name Penhaligon, and a prime example that my mom had a type. Although not as tall as Mac—because who was—Seth was six two and broad-shouldered with rugged, handsome features, chestnut eyes, and thick hair that was once a copper red but was now faded through with gray. When he smiled, dimples creased each cheek, and to my everlasting envy, he’d given those dimples to Regan. Seth was ten years older than Mac and looked his age in a way my father didn’t. But he still had that big, commanding presence and sense of capability that always made me feel safe growing up.

“What are the plans now, darlin’?” Seth asked.

I shrugged. “Hang around for a while. Get all my preorders mailed out. And then I’m going to travel for a bit.”

He nodded, but there was a little furrow between his brows. “You’ll keep in touch while you travel, right?”

I’d known from the moment I’d come home that Regan’s behavior was affecting my stepfather more than he let on. He was unusually quiet, stuck in his own head, and clearly worried sick about my little sister. I could kill her. Despite Mom’s assurance she and Seth would deal with Regan, I’d tried calling her every day, to no avail.

“Of course, I will.”

He nodded again but looked away, taking another sip of his beer.

Feeling more than a pang of guilt for being so distant while I was in Scotland, I reached over and curled my hand around his arm. Seth looked at me. “Things were crazy in Scotland and I was going through a lot, but I promise to keep in touch while I travel.”

My stepfather patted my hand. “I know.”

Despite what I’d found with Mac, a natural bond that I was immensely grateful for because it completed a part of me I didn’t know was missing, I realized I would never give up what I had with Seth. I also realized I had never made that clear. “You know I love you, right?”

He gave me a curious look—we weren’t the type of people to throw “I love you” around. It was just implicit. “I do. I love you too.”

“I’ve never thanked you for being my dad. I couldn’t have asked for a better one, and reconnecting with Mac doesn’t change that.”

To my shock, Seth’s eyes brightened with emotion and he swallowed hard, blinking as he looked away. It took him a minute to get himself together before he looked at me again, his love clear in his eyes. “You’re my kid, blood or no.”

It was my turn to get choked up.

“What are you two whispering about?” Mom broke the moment as she strutted up the stairs, whipping off her dirty gardening gloves. “Darlin’, give me a drink of that beer, will you?”

Seth held out his beer with a small smile and watched her nearly empty the thing.

“So?” She handed him back the beer as she settled on his lap. His arm wrapped around her waist, pulling her against him. “What’s the chat?”

“Just telling Seth what an amazing dad he is,” I answered honestly.

Mom looked proud of me. “Isn’t he, though?”

“Right, you’re embarrassing me.” Seth snorted. “Subject change.”

As if on cue, we heard the faint ring of the doorbell.

“I’ll get it.” Mom popped up and hurried through the porch door into the house.

“More shoes?” I asked Seth.

Mom had a small shoe addiction.

“Who knows.”

Only a minute later, Mom stepped back out onto the porch, her eyes on me, worried. I understood why when a tall man appeared behind her. I barely heard her say, “Robbie, there’s someone here to see you.”

Knees goddamn shaking, I stood up, a sense of unreality coming over me to see Lachlan Adair standing on my childhood back porch next to my mother.

“You’re Lachlan Adair,” Seth said, and his tone broke through my dazed state.