Too bad it meant I couldn’t relax and enjoy the party like I wanted to. Asshole. Ever since he’d gotten back, he’d been nice. Too nice. It felt like a game, a show he was putting on to prove that he’d really changed and I should forgive him. This was fine and dandy, but ultimately it meant jack shit because Painter still danced on the wrong side of the law, and we both knew it. I couldn’t afford to get used to having him around, or depend on him. It’d destroy me if—no, when—the next crisis hit. Izzy couldn’t afford for me to be broken.
Just because he wasn’t in prison right now didn’t mean there wasn’t a cell in his future.
“You ready for this?” Jessica asked, coming up next to me. She knew exactly how I felt about the situation—I couldn’t exactly talk to Loni about the Reapers, but Jess was a different story.
“Yup,” I said, pasting a happy smile on my face. “It’s gonna be great. A blast. Too much fun.”
“You’re overdoing it,” she replied, bumping my shoulder with hers. “Just try to relax. It’ll be over in a few hours and then you’ll be back home again with Izzy.”
I closed my eyes, fighting off a wave of panic.
“No, I won’t.”
“What do you mean?”
“Painter is taking her for a sleepover tonight,” I said, feeling my smile solidify into something that couldn’t have been pretty. “He’s been wanting to for a couple months, so I set him a series of conditions. He met them. I never expected him to meet them.”
Her eyes widened. “Why haven’t I heard about this before now?”
I shrugged.
“Never thought he’d actually do it,” I admitted. “When he asked me to come over and check out his place, I was stunned. It’s totally childproofed. He’s even got a toddler bed for her, and he bought all her favorite foods. Loni’s scheduled to be on call if he needs help, and of course I’ll be watching my phone. Izzy’s all excited about it—we packed a whole suitcase full of stuffed animals to take to Daddy’s house.”
“Wow,” she said. “Didn’t see that coming.”
I watched as Painter pulled Isabella up onto the bike with him, letting her pretend to drive it. God, she looked more like him every day—that white-blonde hair of hers shined in the sun like a beacon, and if anything the blue of her eyes had gotten brighter. Not only that, she loved to finger-paint. Okay, all kids that age love to finger-paint, but even the preschool teacher at her daycare said she showed signs of talent. Wasn’t sure how I felt about that.
“Relax,” Loni said, wrapping an arm around my shoulder and giving me a hug. “It’s just a party and a sleepover. He’ll do fine.”
“That’s what scares me,” I admitted. “What if she likes him better than me? All he ever does is fun stuff with her. I’m the one stuck doing the real work and telling her no. At this rate she’ll hate me by the time she’s twelve, and then he’ll get married someday and she’ll want to go live with him and her new stepmom and I’ll be all alone and—”
“Mel!” Jess said, snapping her fingers in front of my face. I looked at her. “Pack up the crazy, babe. She’s only two.”
I blinked at her.
Shit, she was right. You’re losing it.
“I have a date tonight,” I admitted. “I’m a little freaked out by that, too . . .”
“A date?” Loni asked, staring at me. “Seriously?”
“Hey, it’s not that weird,” I said, frowning. “I date.”
“Twice,” Jessica said. “You’ve gone out twice since Izzy was born, and both times you cut it short to come home and check on her. It’s unhealthy—you deserve a life. And Painter should take on some of the responsibility. She’s his kid, too.”
In the distance, I heard Izzy screaming excitedly as Painter swung her up and onto his shoulders. Then he and Reese started across the grass toward us, laughing and talking along the way. Reese had been great, I had to admit. He and his daughters had welcomed me into the fold like one of their own, so much that I had to work hard to keep my distance or I would’ve gotten sucked into the Reapers’ extended family.
It wouldn’t have been all bad, I knew that . . . The girls had offered to babysit for me time and again, and I knew they meant well. But every time I saw the Reapers colors, I thought about Painter missing Isabella’s birth. About the endless nights sitting up with her in the NICU, still recovering from surgery. Then we finally made it home, and I’d spent weeks alone in the dark, holding her, terrified to sleep because the only thing standing between my baby and death was an electronic monitor that was supposed to go off if she stopped breathing.
I didn’t trust that monitor.
Not after the night I woke up needing to pee, only to find Izzy had turned blue from lack of oxygen. Fucking machine was useless. I’d never been so alone or afraid in my life, and it felt like forever before she grew out of it. Rebuilding my life hadn’t been easy, but I’d gotten there. Mostly. Eventually I made new friends. I wasn’t the only single mom in the nursing program at the college. Having Izzy had delayed my education some, but I’d done pretty well on my own.
Better than well, actually.
Now I had my own apartment, a decent job, and health insurance. No more state assistance, either—that was a nice change. Most of my childhood had been spent on welfare, and I remembered all too well how people looked down on me and my mom for that. They’d looked down on my dad, too, but I didn’t care about that. He was just the drunk in the living room.