All About You (All Series Book 6) (22 page)

Sense of Pride

“I can’t wait to go swimming.”

Finn looked over at Trey in his truck on Sunday afternoon as he was driving to Olivia’s. He hadn’t heard a word from her since she walked out of his house on Thursday afternoon. He’d waited for her to call him that night, but nothing. By the time he went to bed, he figured he would try to call her, but he couldn’t make himself do it.

He was wrong—he knew and she knew—but he was still too upset to call her.

He’d told himself he would wait until Friday, but the day came and went with him losing his nerve. Same thing on Saturday.

By Sunday morning, the guilt was getting the best of him. Before he lost his nerve again, he asked if Trey wanted to visit Olivia.

“I’m not sure if she is home or not. And remember, I need to talk to her first, so we might not be staying that long. We’re just going to try her house first, then maybe go to the lake and look there.”

“You have to say you’re sorry.”

“What?” Finn asked, turning his head to look at Trey.

“You made her cry, so you have to say you are sorry. You told me I had to say I was sorry to Harper when she cried, so you have to do the same thing. You can’t make girls cry, Daddy. It’s not nice.”

“No, it’s not nice.”

“And it’s the right thing to do, right? You have to say you’re sorry when you’re wrong. Making a girl cry is wrong.”

“Yeah, you’re right, scout. I was wrong. I shouldn’t have made Olivia cry and I plan on saying I’m sorry.” If she’ll talk to me, that is.

They rode the rest of the way in silence, Finn pondering the words Trey just said. At least he was raising his son to know right from wrong. Too bad Finn didn’t heed his own lessons.

“Her car is here.”

“So it is.” He parked behind her car and reached in the back to grab Trey’s bag, then helped him jump down from the truck. “Hold on, Trey.” But Trey was already running around to the back of the house by the pool.

Finn jogged to catch up and saw Olivia sitting in a lounge chair under an umbrella, a sketchpad in her hand.

“Hi, Olivia, we came to visit.”

She turned with a start, joy filling her face as Trey ran through the open gate to her open arms for a hug. “I’ve missed you. How have you been?”

She lifted her eyes to Finn’s, held his stare, her smile fading, then she turned back to Trey and gave him another big hug.

“Good. Can I swim?”

Finn tried to get his tongue back in his mouth once he saw what she was wearing. He was guessing that was the sexy swimsuit she’d teased him about. “Trey, what did I say?”

“Sorry. Daddy needs to talk to you. He was wrong. Can I swim now?”

Finn watched Olivia’s lips twitch, but she still ignored him. “Why don’t you let your dad and me talk, and then you can swim. For now, you can see there is a surprise in the yard behind the fence.”

Trey ran to the back of the fenced-in pool and looked through it, yelling, “It’s a tire swing!”

Finn barely made it to the gate to unlatch it after he’d closed it behind him to let Trey run to the backyard. “That was nice of you.”

“I’ve been known to be nice. I found it in the garage and asked one of the men to hang it for me.” She looked at him—looked through him. “Have a seat,” she said coolly.

“I’d rather stand.”

“I’d rather you sat so I wasn’t craning my neck.”

He pulled a chair up and sat next to her, while she made no attempt to cover herself. Her lips twitching again told him she knew what she was doing to him and she didn’t care in the least. “Can we talk?”

“I’m listening.”

“I’m sorry. I was wrong.”

“For what?”

“For yelling at you. For getting mad because I thought you interfered with Ryan.”

“That didn’t bother me. Not really.”

“I figured. I’m sorry most of all for what I said about you. About your father and your life and everything else. I didn’t mean a word of it.”

“Finn, I told Sophia that a person who says those things may not mean them, but they still think them. It’s just you lost your control to hold them back at that moment. What hurt me the worst is that you think and believe those things about me, regardless of whether you voice them.”

“I don’t believe them. I really don’t.” He didn’t know what to do or say to get her to believe him. Running his hands through his hair, he took a deep breath. “Listen. When I first saw you, I knew you were way out of my league.” She went to open her mouth, but he held his hand up. “No, let me say this, please.”

“Go on.”

“I couldn’t stop myself from falling for you. I tried to hide it and I tried to fight it, but it didn’t matter. I thought you were too young for me, and I thought you were too good for me. I just saw everything you were on the outside and told myself not to go down that road. I didn’t have it in me again.”

“Can I talk now?” She waited for him to nod his head. “Finn, you hurt me. Everything you said was true. I’d like to say it wasn’t true a long time ago, but I can’t. A year ago, yes. I wouldn’t have argued much with what you said, and I wouldn’t have cared if you said it. But it’s not true now. I’ve tried really hard to be my own person, to break away from that life and the opinions people had of me. Hearing you say it made me realize that no matter what I do, I can’t escape that judgment.”

“I know you’ve tried hard to change. I didn’t know the person you’re describing from before. I know you now and you aren’t anything I accused you of…”

He reached over and took her hand, thankful she didn’t pull away. Her thumb was caressing his, and as nervous as he was to come here, he felt it was going to be okay. They were going to work it out; they just needed to clear the air. And if he had to grovel he would.

“You don’t know how hard it was for me. It’s easy to let someone else do everything for you. I guess I shouldn’t say that to you. You never let anyone do anything for you, so I guess we’re complete opposites in that aspect.”

“I understand. And I agree. It is easy to let others do things for you. That’s why I don’t accept that much help. Do you know how hard it is to raise Trey alone? Everyone wanted to help, and in the beginning, I let them. Then one day I came home and realized that my mother and sister were raising Trey more than me. It wasn’t right. They were setting his schedules, they were doing everything and I was letting them. I was asking them what time I should feed him, what I should do at every turn. I shouldn’t have to ask someone that. Trey’s
my
son.”

She snorted and cracked a little smile. “You are the most amazing and stubborn man I know.”

“So I’ve been told before. But why now?”

“No one expected you to know what to do, Finn. I’m trying to refrain from saying ‘you’re a man’ but seriously. Did you know the first thing about a newborn before Trey was born?”

“No.”

“Asking for help doesn’t mean you’re weak. For me personally, it felt like I was weak because I never seemed to do much on my own and I was okay with that. I was okay with having people do things for me back then. But you’re the other extreme. What happened when you stopped asking your mother and sister how to do things?”

He wasn’t surprised she figured out he’d stopped asking. “My mother pieced together what was going on. She told me she would never interfere with how I raised Trey and said if she’d overstepped her bounds she was sorry, but she wanted to help me. She knew how hard it was raising a child
with
a spouse, and doing it alone wasn’t easy for anyone.”

“So no one was upset with you?”

“No.”

“And yet you still had issues asking for help? Why? Is it a pride thing?”

He shrugged. He’d never said this before and never wanted to, but if he were going to say it to anyone, Olivia would be the person.

“I guess I wanted to prove I could do it. To prove to Becca that I didn’t need her, and I didn’t need anyone. That it wasn’t so hard to do and that she was selfish to walk out and say she couldn’t do it. She had me to help her and she said she still couldn’t do it. I was proving to her I could alone. To spite her.”

“That’s what she said? That she couldn’t do it?”

“It wasn’t what she wanted. Did she think it was what I wanted? It wasn’t, but I never backed away from it. I never gave up and I never would. Do you know how hard it is to grocery shop with a newborn? Hell, a toddler who is hungry and pointing at everything to eat at that moment in the store?” he said cringing, then laughing but shuddering just the same.

“No, I don’t. But I want to find out some day.”

“I’m not saying all of this for you to feel sorry for me, and I’m not making excuses. I still had no right to say what I did, and I understand if it’s going to be hard for you to move past it. I just want you to understand what I’ve gone through and how much her visit has shaken me. I’ve never said these things to anyone before, and that alone is hard.”

“I can’t believe you. I can’t believe you have shouldered it all by yourself, out of a sense of pride. Or proving to someone else why they were wrong. So what? You proved she was wrong; I don’t think anyone doubted that. Don’t do things for other people, do them for yourself.”

“Is that what you did? Changed for you?”

“Yes. I didn’t like who I was. I never did, if I was honest. My problem was, I didn’t have any pride at all. One day I decided I needed some. And it was hard. Hard to not want to walk away from things. I rarely asked my father for anything, I want you to know that. Not since I’ve been an adult. As a child, I did some stupid things to get attention, but I stopped asking him for things so long ago I can’t even remember.”

“Like going to Switzerland?”

“Did Sophia say that to you?”

“No.” Anthony alluded to it, but he wouldn’t betray the conversation he’d had with Olivia’s stepfather.

“Regardless, I tended to ask my mother and Anthony for more things, knowing my father would get mad. He couldn’t bother to call me, or come see me, but he hated knowing that Anthony was giving me things.”

“So you used that to get more? Playing them against each other?”

“When I was younger, yes. Then I did grow up a little. Every time my father sent me something or gave me money, I invested it. Or I invested the value of what he bought me.”

He had all he could do to keep his eyes from bugging out of his head. “Your car?”

“The value…all invested. Invested in the shop. I won’t bore you with any of the details. Just know that after college I
did
try to take a stand in that direction, but it didn’t stick. My behavior and actions didn’t change much. I still hung out with the same crowd and still did the same stupid silly things, played the same crazy games with people and never took anything seriously. You might even say I acted a bit like Becca at times.”

“Never. I don’t believe it.”

“It’s true. I partied a lot. I was in some reckless relationships. I took what people offered and said screw you to anyone who objected. It was my privilege, it was my right, I’d thought. I very rarely took anything in life seriously.”

“Except your jewelry?” he asked.

“Except that. That was the one thing I always took seriously. It’s probably the one thing that grounded me all this time.” She released his hand and patted the space next to her legs. Her legs that looked a mile long in the white bikini she was wearing. “I guess we’ve both matured in a roundabout way. Matured for me, maybe loosened up for you?”

He sat next to her, and pulled her in his arms, hugged her tight and didn’t want to let go.

“I’m getting there. I’m so sorry, Olivia. I never meant to hurt you. I never meant to say anything to make you think less of yourself or bring back a past you were trying to change, maybe even escape.”

“I’ll forgive you, I’m sure…in time.” She looked at the watch on her wrist. “Would you look at that? It’s time now.” She kissed him on the lips, held his head and looked into his eyes. “And I’m sorry you’ve felt you couldn’t let go enough to ask for help. And sorry that you’ve had to do it all on your own.”

“It’s been worth it. Trey is worth it.”

“He is. Very much so. And if you trust me enough, I’ll watch him while you get groceries.”

He laughed, he had to because he was deathly afraid he had tears in his eyes. He didn’t deserve her. He didn’t deserve her forgiveness, either.

“I’ll hold you to that.”

She leaned back and brought her thumb to his cheek, gliding it across like a feather. “I still love you.”

“Thank God,” he breathed out. “You have no idea how hard it’s been the last few days, listening to Trey ask about you and wondering when I could work up the courage to come talk to you.”

“Well, he said it simply when he said you were wrong.”

“He did, didn’t he?”

“Can I swim
now
?” Trey yelled from outside the gate. Finn looked over to see Trey trying to reach up and open the latch. “You’re hugging her—does that mean she isn’t mad and I can swim again?”

Finn stood up and walked to the gate, then opened it up. “She’s not mad at me anymore. But you should ask her if it’s okay to swim now.”