Randi quickly doctored her coffee with cream and sugar so she could escape the stinky kitchen, realizing that the way Evan treated animals was just one more reason to like him.
Dammit!
CHAPTER 9
“Fuck! Evan never mentioned his childhood to any of us. No wonder we hardly ever saw him.” Jared Sinclair’s grip tightened around the mug of coffee he was holding. “Why didn’t he tell us?”
“Maybe because we were all too involved in our own problems to notice that he had his own challenges. It was easier for him to just stay quiet,” Grady observed from his position on the leather couch. “He’s always been the one to take care of us, and I’m betting that he’s not used to talking about his problems with anyone. I’m not saying it’s fair. It’s just not comfortable for Evan not to be in a position of control.”
“No shit,” Jared admitted, possibly because he was remembering the dark times in his life that he might not have survived if not for Evan.
Micah Sinclair felt just a little remorseful himself as he remembered a few jests he’d thrown at Evan, trying to take his pompous eldest cousin down a few notches. He liked Evan, he even understood him a little since he was an eldest son too, but he could never resist a poke at the arrogant, stuffy side of him. No doubt Evan was arrogant, but maybe not quite as much as Micah had previously believed. Oh hell, honestly, his cousin definitely was a cocky bastard, but not quite for the reasons he’d imagined.
He looked at the three men sitting with him in Jared’s living room, all of them pretty somber about Hope’s earlier revelations regarding the things none of them had known about Evan. The women had retreated upstairs to finish up plans for Hope’s party. The guys were still trying to make sense of Evan’s silence.
Hope had said that Evan had never asked her not to share, and she thought that everyone should know about the issues he had dealt with while he was growing up. Micah was pretty sure Evan’s omission didn’t mean he had wanted his sister to tell the whole family about his problems. In fact, knowing Evan, he never wanted anyone to know at all. Micah could relate to feeling that way. But Hope had taken a chance and shared what she knew about Evan because she cared about him.
Hope just wants all of her family back together and whole after what they experienced earlier in their life.
Micah knew how she felt. Right now, his own immediate family was so torn apart that he was pretty sure nothing would or could put them back together again.
Looking at how far his cousins had come to being a complete family again, Micah envied them. He rarely saw Julian because he’d been in Hollywood for so long trying to make a name for himself. And Xander . . . his youngest brother seemed to have a death wish; it appeared that he simply didn’t care if he lived or died.
He mourned the days when all three of them had been close, thinking no amount of distance would ever tear them apart. Admittedly, distance hadn’t been the only thing that had separated them; one nightmare tragedy was the biggest factor. They’d all handled it differently, and separately. The one who had come out of it the worst was Xander, and Micah still wasn’t sure his youngest brother would recover from his emotional and physical wounds.
Looking around the room, he noticed that the men, and now their brother-in-law, Jason, were deep in conversation about how they could help Evan. Grady and Jared were in a heated conversation, with Jason throwing in his occasional opinions. Dante was out handling calls and checking on the elderly in the community because he was a police detective, and the force here in Amesport was fairly small. Micah had no doubt that it would be even more chaotic if Dante were here.
Micah stood, knowing he had to get back to the guesthouse to make a couple of calls. He’d decided to stay until the party on Saturday night, but he still had to conduct business while he was away from his company.
A big part of him wanted to stay, wanted to keep talking to his cousins. He’d felt more relaxed being here with his extended family than he’d experienced in a long time. But he had responsibilities to his own siblings, and he couldn’t ignore them any longer.
Julian had delayed his arrival since he couldn’t get through the bad weather, but he should get here by Friday night. Even so, Micah knew he wouldn’t share many of his burdens with Julian, who was finally accomplishing everything he’d ever dreamed about in the film industry. He deserved his time to bask in the limelight without worrying about his family right now.