When You're Back(47)

Kiro rubbed his face and gave a frustrated roar before letting his hands fall to his side. “Did Dean call you? I don’t need this shit right now, son. Why can’t I deal with this the only way I know how?”

His way of dealing was getting trashed and upsetting Harlow. “Your way affects my sister, so that affects me. Dean didn’t call me. Rush paid me a visit. Grant was worried about his wife. He’ll protect Harlow any way he can. Surely you can understand that? Your little girl is loved just as fiercely as you love Emily.”

At the sound of Emily’s name, Kiro flinched as if it pained him. “What is it you want me to do? Be fucking Superman? I’m not motherfucking Superman! I’ve never been. Can’t start now just because you come in here demanding it.”

Kiro had tunnel vision. He was hurting, and that was all the man could see. He was losing Emily, and he could accept nothing more. I wanted to grab the man and shake him. Instead, I clenched my hands at my sides and took a deep breath to calm my frustration. “Do you want Harlow to lose you both? Do you think she can handle that? Do you want her brokenhearted? Don’t you want to be a part of your granddaughter’s life? Here’s your chance to be the man Emily would have wanted you to be. You and I both know you weren’t the father she would have wanted for Harlow. You can’t save her, but you can grant her the one thing we both know she’d want. She would want you to be the best damn grandfather on the planet for Lila Kate.”

“I’m the best grandfather on the planet. He’ll have to be second,” Dean spoke up as he kept playing on the Xbox.

Seriously? Did the man not realize this conversation was important?

“Fuck off, asshole,” Kiro grumbled.

“Just setting him straight,” Dean replied.

A hint of a smile touched Kiro’s lips. “I want to make Emily proud. She loves Lila Kate. She brightens up whenever Harlow brings her to visit. If she could, she’d be the fucking best grandmother there ever was.”

“I won’t argue with you on that one. Emily was special,” Dean said.

“Is special,” Kiro snapped. “She is fucking special.”

Dean tossed down the remote control and turned to look at Kiro. “She is special, Kiro. But we both know she’s not the same. The Emily who left the day of the accident didn’t return the same. She’s been locked in that body, unable to function, for twenty-three years. You’ve held on to her longer than any doctor believed possible. To want to keep her here like that is selfish, man. I miss her, too. She made you a better man. That man was lost twenty-three years ago, too. The boy is right. You can’t save her. But you can damn well make her proud of you. Don’t you want her to be thankful that she had a life with you? Of course you do! You would do anything for that woman. Do this for her. Fucking do this. For. Her.”

I didn’t need to say more. Dean had said it all. Perfectly. He’d lived in a world where my father had loved a woman and been happy. He knew things I didn’t. Seeing Kiro through Dean’s eyes was enlightening.

“She’d want me to be strong. She’d expect it,” Kiro said, staring at the floor in front of him.

Neither of us said a thing. We let him take it all in. Dean had stood up from his spot on the sofa, and we looked at each other over Kiro’s bent head. We both wanted our message to get through to him.

“I want there to be a heaven. I want it for her. She should be dancing and laughing. She has the best laugh. I want there to be a place where she can have all that. Tell me that when this life ends, it’s not over, that she has a new life ahead of her, full of all she was robbed of in this one.”

I swallowed through the emotion constricting my throat. God, I never wanted to go through this. Kiro had been an asshole most of my life, but no one deserved to deal with pain this intense.

Dean walked over and threw his arm over Kiro’s shoulder. “There’s a heaven, man. There has to be a heaven for angels. And Emily was an angel. She was yours. It ain’t over after this life.”

Kiro closed his eyes and nodded. “You’re right. My angel will be OK. She’ll dance again.”

Dean glanced over at me and nodded. Kiro was going to make it. He had a hard road still ahead, but he was now focused on making Emily proud of him. That was the only thing that could shake him out of this. He never wanted to let her down.





Reese


I was tucked into bed and holding my phone in my hand, waiting for Mase to call, when it finally rang and the image of his cowboy boots showed up on my screen.

“Hey,” I said, sitting up, excited to hear his voice. When he got home, I was going to tell him about my picnic with Henry and Captain; it would be too hard to explain over the phone.