I stood up and leaned forward, resting my weight on my hands on the wooden table.
“I respect and love the hell out of you both for everything you’ve ever done for me, and I will be grateful till my dying day for the love and support you’ve given Tisha. But I will no longer sit back while you spew your bigotry to that girl or anyone else I care about. You’ve already lost one son, and I know how hard that’s been for you. But I can’t continue to pretend like I don’t die a little on the inside every time you put down the man I love or pass judgement on the way I am. You stole me away from him ten years ago, and I’ll be damned if I let that happen again.”
My mom’s voice was shaky when she spoke. “Seth, wait. You can’t expect us to—”
I interrupted her. “To respect me? To love me? To respect and love the person who means more to me than anyone? Yes, I can.”
Her jaw tightened and her arms crossed in front of her chest. I looked over at my dad and saw his gears turning.
“I don’t appreciate being threatened in my own home, Seth,” he said in his deep voice. “We raised you better than that.”
“What exactly will you do with Tisha if you don’t have us around to help you?” Mom asked with a sniff.
“I’ve already spoken to Otto’s sister Sassy about babysitting. West and Nico would go in with Jolie and me to share her. Tisha loves their baby Pippa, so you don’t need to worry about that anymore,” I explained.
I saw the minute my mother realized how serious this was.
“Wait. Wait, Seth,” she said. “Let’s… can we maybe take some time to calm down and talk again about this tomorrow? None of us want to lose you or that precious girl. Just… just give us some time to come to terms with it, okay?”
I looked over at my father and saw the concern laced in his expression as well. “Okay,” I said with a nod. “Thank you for listening to what I had to say.”
I turned to exit the house, feeling freer in a way I hadn’t felt for a very long time.
After making my way to Otto’s, I thought maybe this would be a turning point in my life in Hobie. But my optimism was short-lived.
That night, for the first time since we’d reconnected, things were awkward between Otto and me. It started when he answered the door to his place but wouldn’t let me in. It was as if I’d surprised him.
“Oh, hey,” he said, closing the door to his cabin behind him so he was standing on the front porch with me. “You’re early.”
“I’m actually late,” I corrected, holding out a bouquet of daisies. “I told you I’d be here at seven and it’s seven thirty. I stopped to get you these flowers but Lee Edwin wouldn’t shut the fuck up about how the streetlight out front of his house needed a new bulb. As if I’m the damned maintenance department around here.”
“We should… we should go for a horse ride,” he said quickly. “Come on. I’m sure Gulliver’s antsy after I’ve been gone.”
“What’s going on with you?” I asked, moving past him to open the door so I could at least put the flowers down.
He lurched between the door and me to stop me. “Uh, nothing. What makes you think something’s going on?”
I stared at him. “Really? Because you’re acting like a mouse in a snake house right now.”
Otto reached out his hands and cupped the sides of my neck before pulling me in for a deep kiss. I might have dropped the flowers by accident and sprung a boner right there on the front porch.
“Come ride with me, Seth.”
Fuck. He knew what that damned growl did to me.
“Fine. Let me just put these in water first,” I said, holding out my empty hand before realizing the flowers were on the ground. I looked up at him with a grin.
“Leave them, let’s go. We’ll be back super quick. C’mon.”
He dragged me off the porch and over to the barn where we saddled up the horses and mounted up for a ride. Out of habit, we headed toward one of our favorite spots where a creek ran across part of the ranch and there was a giant weeping willow tree that leaned across the water.
Otto didn’t say a word while we rode. It wasn’t unusual, really. Sometimes he was a very quiet guy. But I could tell something was bothering him and it didn’t take much to figure out what it was. His life was in limbo. He didn’t know when and if he’d be able to return to work, and he didn’t know when and if he’d be charged with a crime he had no way of defending himself against.