Jared looked over my shoulder and saw Travis returning with his drink. He let go of my hand and took a step back, his green eyes changing instantly from fierce to teasing. “Anyway, welcome to the family, Quinn. Mac’s always been the runt of the litter, but that crown passes to you now.”
“Thanks for the talk.” I folded my arms, a little irritated at having to listen to another lecture and then getting called a runt on top of all that. “Just remember, I did all this for you.” I waved my hand around, my attempt at encompassing the whole venue. My eyes narrowed. “You owe me.”
“Interesting,” he murmured.
“What is?”
“Well when the crown passes, apparently so does the attitude.”
I gasped. “You…”
He cocked a brow. “I...”
I let out a weak laugh. “Oh my God, you’re right.”
“Shut your mouth, Quinn. Rule number one of surviving the Valentine family, and you can consider this little piece of advice payback for the party, never and when I say never, I mean never, concede defeat. You do that, you’ll get walked on. And no Valentine gets walked on. Ever.”
“But…I’m not a Valentine.”
Travis reached my side and handed the beer to Jared.
Jared looked at Travis and then at me. “Yes you are.” I watched in amazement as he gulped down half the glass in one go. Then the hand holding his glass pointed at me. “There’s no escape for you now.”
“No escape from what?” Travis asked, taking my now empty wine glass and replacing it with a full one.
Jared winked at me. “From planning all the Valentine birthday parties in the future of course, seeing how she’s done such an amazing job tonight.”
Rumour on the street according to Evie when she took me aside later that night was that Jenna had a dream. As the sharp and all-knowing mother of the Valentine clan, I really liked her, but her dreams didn’t bode well for me. They included healthy, bouncing grandbabies and lots of them. That was off the table for me. If Travis and I remained together, it was off the table for the both of us.
I rubbed at my chest.
The thought of Travis never having his own babies gave me indigestion.
Travis looked down at my wince. “Okay?”
“Indigestion,” I replied, moving my glance from Jared climbing the stage to look up at him.
“Can I get you something?” His gaze softened as he smiled down at me. He’d make a great dad. Of that I was sure.
Crap, were those tears lurking in the back of my eyes?
I blinked them away, hearing everyone clap after Jared said something. My hands clapped numbly.
Standing on the other side of Travis and Jenna was his dad, Steve. Steve had his arm around Jenna, forming a strong family unit.
“Thanks everyone for coming tonight and sharing Evie’s birthday with us.”
I blinked again and focused on Jared as the crowd around us clapped wildly, all eyes turning to Evie when the spotlight hit where she was standing. She gave a bright smile and waved her glass in a jaunty salute.
I looked around the entire room, suddenly breathless.
“No Valentine gets walked on. Ever.”
“But I’m not a Valentine.”
“Yes you are.”
“Travis?”
He looked down at me, concern in his eyes. “Sweetheart?”
“I think I need some fresh air.”
In a matter of moments I was out the back of the bar and sucking in lungfuls of it. I wish I could say it was fresh, but it was the back of the bar. The air was cool at least, soothing the embarrassment burning my cheeks from freaking out.
Travis looked down into my gasping face. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” I puffed and waved airily, certain I was about to vomit. “I’m just…having a moment.”
“Talk to me, Quinn.”
“Family,” I blurted out under the pressure of his burning eyes. “I’ve never had one. Not really. It’s a bit overwhelming.”
“Sweetheart, our family is a bit much for anyone. It’s not just you.”
Travis reached out and tucked my hand in his, and the nausea took a back seat to his touch.
I cleared my throat. “I need to ask you something, and I need you to be honest with me. A hundred, no...two hundred percent honest with me.”
His eyes searched my face. I had no idea what he could see besides my red cheeks, the fear in my eyes maybe, because what if he wasn’t okay with what I was about to ask?
Travis nodded, patient, a little cautious.
“If you’re asking me to try, for us, then I figure that means you want us to have a future.” I looked down at my hands and forced the words out. “But you know I can’t give you a family. What I need to know is if you’re okay with that.”
“Quinn—”
“Travis,” I cut him off as I looked up, focusing somewhere over his shoulder. “Maybe you should take some time to think about it. Not just answer based on how you feel right now. What about in five years, when your brothers and Mac are all having babies. All of a sudden, it’s nappies and cute baby talk. Then all they’re talking about is how little Dean is doing with potty training, or how little Juliet got an A on her spelling bee. Years later, their weekends are all caught up in taking their kids to soccer or netball and dealing with kids’ parties and raging sleepovers. Then it’s teaching them how to drive, glaring down potential boyfriends for your daughter, or seeing them graduate from university. You would be watching all of that happen to everyone close to you. What if one day you resent me for not giving that to you. For having to stand on the sidelines and watch it happen to everyone else…but you.”
Saying that out loud sounded so much worse than how it sounded it my head. It wasn’t indigestion. It was goddamn agony.
“How can I deal with being the one that couldn’t give that to you?”
My chest burned as I tried not to look at Travis. Maybe I was having a heart attack.
He stepped forward, right in my space, until his face was all I could see. “Lucky for you I’m going to ignore the fact you think I’d only be with you for what I could get from you. Why does this have to be so hard?”
“I…what?”
“If one day we wanted kids together, why can’t we just adopt? Or be foster parents? There are so many beautiful children out there just thrown away. Why can’t we be the ones to love them? Give them parents, grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles, friends.”
Foster kids? The very thought had the next breath I sucked in lodge tight in my lungs until I thought I’d pass out.
“Quinn?”
“Huh?” His voice sounded far away because suddenly I’d been shown a way to give to someone else what had been taken from me, and that was huge. Huge.
Travis said something else but I didn’t catch it. Instead I said, “You…you want that?”
Even I could hear the wonder in my voice.
Travis tilted my chin until his eyes held mine.
“I would love that. There’s only one thing I love more than the idea of doing that with you.”
Silence fell as a cool wind gusted through, ruffling my hair around my face. I could hear the tinny noise of music coming from inside and the tinkle of glassware and laughter going on around us.
“You,” he said.
“Me?” I tried to say. I felt my mouth move, but I didn’t hear anything come out.
“I love you.”
Travis reached out and squeezed my hand, and for some reason he may well have just moved heaven and earth. I wasn’t whole, I wasn’t sure I ever would be, but Travis loving me made me realise that no one ever really was. If we were, how did it explain the need for someone to fill us with their love?
“Perfect is for people who don’t know how to be real, and I don’t want any of that. I want you.”
I swallowed, feeling tears spill over. Travis was the peace I’d been struggling to find since as long as I could remember.
“Travis.”
He slid his hand around my neck and pulled me in. His lips touched my forehead for a brief moment before he pulled back. “Sweetheart, I promise, soon David will be a memory and then we’ll have time for us.”
I wiped at the tears on my face. Travis swatted my hands away and tilted my head as he took over. “It’s not a party without a few tears,” he offered.
“Well.” I chuckled. “Glad I could help out.”
“Just don’t start throwing chairs,” he joked.
I straightened my shoulders because finally I was finding my place. Quinn. The survivor. Jesus. I sounded like a television show.
“I could totally Jackie Chan your ass.”
His eyes crinkled. “Oh you could, could you?”
My eyes narrowed at his patronising tone. I bit down on my lip enticingly and lowered my lids. “Uh huh. When you least suspect it, I’ll have you laid out flat and begging for mercy.”
***
Chapter Twenty
The next morning I was in the kitchen making a cooked breakfast when the knock at the door of the duplex came. It was Sunday and even with the sun already high in the sky, everyone was still bunkered down in bed.
Not for much longer, I thought as I filled the frypan with bacon and the scent overtook the kitchen. All I’d done was remove the packet from the fridge, and already Peter and Rufus were banging at the back door, frantic to get inside. Rufus was letting out intermittent powerful barks amidst Peter’s desperate yips, both of them busy informing me they were famished from the morning walk Travis and I took them on.
I peered out the blinds. Seeing Casey standing there, I swung the door wide. “Casey! How did you know I’d just put breakfast on?”
He shrugged. “I know everything.”
I rolled my eyes and he grinned, stepping inside and following me back into the kitchen.
Travis came down the stairs dressed in a T-shirt and jeans, tying his wet hair back after his shower. My heart swelled as I turned back to the kitchen counter and started removing eggs from the carton.
“Did you get my message?” I heard Casey ask Travis.
“Yeah,” he replied unhappily.
I tuned out as they spoke, busying myself with putting bread in the toaster and getting mugs down from the top cupboard.
“Oh, Quinn? Did you know your car’s leaking oil on the drive?”
I spun around. “What?”
“Your car. Leaking oil,” Casey told me.
My eyes narrowed and I balled up the tea towel and tossed it on the counter. “That horrible mean bitch,” I muttered angrily and started for the front door.
Travis snatched my wrist.
I gave him a look. “Travis. I won’t go further than the driveway.”
“Don’t care if it’s the front door or the goddamn moon. I’ll go move your car onto the street and then I’ll have a look at it. Probably just needs a new oil filter or something.”
He snagged the keys off the hook by the front door.
“Thanks, Travis!” I called out.
Travis rolled his eyes. “I’m buying you a new car.”