Giving the room another once over, she still couldn’t find him.
Dax was back and was talking to both Lily and Rachel, so she assumed he’d had no luck finding him either.
Biting her lip, she was about to rejoin Sex Piston when a thought came to her. Retracing her steps, she went back to the kitchen and looked outside, and as she was about to give up, she spotted movement in the shadows by the picnic table.
It was cold as hell out there, but she had never let the cold deter her in the pursuit of a man, and she wasn’t about to start now. She was glad now she hadn’t taken her coat off. Twisting the doorknob, she went outside and closed the door behind her.
Using the cuff of her sleeve, she wiped a part of the bench down, so she could sit.
Zipping her jacket closed, she crossed her legs to stare down at the tips of her leather boots.
“You should go inside and get a jacket,” she said, not looking toward the gazebo as she shoved her hands in her pockets. “You finish with your calls?”
“I didn’t have any to make.” His chilly voice came from the darkness.
T.A. sighed. “I know. I should have kept my big trap closed about where Lily was.”
“Contrary to everyone else’s opinion, I don’t need to be handled with kid gloves.”
“I don’t think people think that. I just don’t think they want to add to your pain.”
“They’re not going to add to my pain. Every day does that.”
“I’m sorry for your loss,” she said simply, not knowing what else to say.
When he didn’t reply, she stared up at the starry sky.
“Dax was looking for you.”
She heard his steps as he came out of the gazebo. “He and Grace are worried about me taking off again. I told them the last time I did, but now they’re acting as if they need to know my every move. I let them both lead the life they want; I wish they would return the favor.”
“They lost their mother and couldn’t do anything about it; they don’t want to lose you. They’ll loosen up.”
“I keep telling myself that, but I think it’s getting worse,” he said, giving a curt laugh.
She lowered her eyes when he stopped to stand in front of her. Tilting her head to the side, she could only make out his dim features in the light coming from inside the house.
“Then quit giving them something to worry about.”
She wasn’t a woe-is-me type of person. You lived the life you were dealt. She felt bad he had lost his wife, but at least he had found someone to love and had decades of a happy marriage. Shit, that was more she’d ever had, and it was a hell of a lot more than half of the fucking population.
“If I can see how much losing your wife is affecting you, you think Grace or Dax don’t? I’ve only known you maybe forty-five minutes tops, and I can figure that shit out.”
“You think I should put on a happy face just to make them happy?”
T.A. didn’t give a fuck that his voice had gone cold as fuck. Sexy or not, he needed to have the truth pointed out to him. Sex Piston and Crazy Bitch weren’t here, so she had to be the bitch and tell him like it was.
“No, you don’t have to put on a happy face,” she mocked. “Just don’t walk around like you have a stick up your ass and stop looking like you have to eat beets or broccoli when you’re around other people, including your kids.”
“I don’t—”
“You fucking do. You might not know it, but you do. Those aren’t my words; they’re Grace’s. That’s what she told Killyama when she asked her to find you.”
Dalton sat down hard on the bench next to her. “I didn’t know.”
T.A. shrugged. “Now you do.”
He leaned his elbows on his knees, burying his face in his hands. “I don’t want to live without her.”
She wanted to put a hand on his back and give him the sympathy that had her crying inside for him but didn’t. He had been given so much from his kids, friends, and acquaintances, and it hadn’t helped. What he needed was the cold, hard facts, and even if he never talked to her again, she was willing to take the risk.
“How long has Oceane been dead?”
She knew the answer, but she wanted him to say it out loud.
“I lost Oceane three years, six months and twenty-one days ago. Let me guess, you think I should get on with my life? Find someone to get over her?”
The disdainful way Dalton was looking at her hurt her pride, but it wasn’t the first time a man had looked at her that way, and it wouldn’t be the last.