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But everyone else was smiling at Brinkley, who looked like she was up to no good, as usual.
“Well, I’m glad you’re feeling good, Reese,” Brinkley said as she reached for her wineglass. “But, Gracie, what things doesn’t Daddy like to talk about at work?”
Fucking Brinks. The little deviant.
Hugh barked out a laugh, and Finn was smiling as Georgia looked at me with empathy. She knew what was coming. Brinkley could sniff out a body of water in the middle of the desert, and Gracie just made it clear she was keeping a secret.
“Badgering a child is beneath you,” I hissed.
Presley’s head fell back in laughter. Even though she had no clue what was happening, she knew my family well enough to know that they were giving me shit.
Gracie leaned forward and smiled as she watched Presley on the other side of me. “It’s not a secret here because we’re a family. Daddy doesn’t want the work people to know that me and Presley are inked on his heart and that he loves us.” She shrugged, all that innocence making it hard not to want to scold her for outing me to the nosiest fucking people on the planet. They would have a field day with this.
I groaned. “I’ll explain this later. Mom, how’s work going?”
“Nice try,” Brinkley said over her laughter.
Presley put her hand on my forearm as if she wanted to help. “It’s not literallyinked. She’s confusing something from a story he must have shared.”
She was trying to make it better, but I was fairly certain that she’d just made it worse.
“Can you pass the chicken please?” I asked, and my father handed me the platter with a ridiculous smile on his face, and I desperately wanted to change the subject. “Is this a new marinade, Mom? It’s really good.”
“It’s barbecue sauce in a bottle,” Finn said over his laughter. “The kind we have every week.”
“What story did Daddy tell you that made you think you and Presley wereinked on his heart?” Brinkley asked my daughter, with the widest grin spread across her face.
She was like a motherfucking dog with a bone.
Like Mr. Wigglestein if a bitch was in heat a block away.
“I don’t know. Daddy tells me lots of stories.”
Ahhh… good answer, kid. That ought to stop the feeding frenzy for a minute or two.
“Ink is kind of a strange word to take from a story. What was it about?” Georgia asked, completely clueless that she’d just asked the worst question possible.
“I don’t know a story about ink. I just know Daddy calls the writing on his heart his ink. And his heart says Gracie and Presley with my birthday. We’re his heart, and we’re there forever. Right, Daddy?”
I closed my eyes for a second and waited for it.
Three.
Two.
One.
“That’s why you wear a T-shirt at the lake now? I thought you were sensitive to the sun! Tattoos are works of art. Show that shit off, man,” Hugh said over a mouthful of potato salad.
“Don’t talk with your mouth full,” I hissed. “And I am prone to burning.”
“And let’s try to get through a dinner with our granddaughter without anyone swearing, all right?” my mother said, and Hugh laughed louder.
I couldn’t help it if I’d walked around with my shirt off at home and I had the most observant five-year-old on the planet. The tattoo wasn’t even that big. I’d gotten it shortly after Gracie was born. She’d noticed it over a year ago and had barely mentioned it after I said it was inked there on my heart forever.
They both were.
It was supposed to be just for me and no one else.
