Page 147 of The Business of Love Box Set 1: Books 1 - 4

PETER

T hemorning after the wedding was a little gloomy. The clouds were heavy with low-lying thick white clouds that turned dark and stormy over the ocean. It wasn’t raining, but I suspected it might only be a matter of time before it started.

The hotel room still managed to feel bright and airy when I cracked my eyes open and stared up at the smooth white ceiling. Katie was sound asleep beside me. Her deep steady breaths were peaceful background noise as I rubbed the sleep from my eyes with the heels of my hands.

The clock on the nightstand read that it was quarter past seven in the morning.

Part of me wanted to roll back over, pull Katie in close, and fall back asleep.

Another part of me wanted to get out of bed and go see my brother so I could get this day over with. Visiting my family had been on my mind during the entire reception last night. I doubted it ruined Katie’s night or that she even noticed I was ruminating on my sick father but I had been.

With a sigh, I sat up, gently pulled the covers down, and swung my legs over the side of the bed.

The concrete floors were cool under my bare feet as I crept silently across them to my suitcase on the bench at the end of the bed.

I flipped it open and rummaged through it looking for my jeans and a plain T-shirt.

I got dressed in the bathroom so as not to wake Katie, and when I returned to the bedroom, she was still fast asleep and cuddling one of the spare pillows.

A smile tugged at my lips.

I could have watched her for hours. Staying here with her was much more preferable to going to see my brother.

But I would regret not going. If I left California and went back to the island without seeing my father and doing the right thing, I would always wonder if I’d made a mistake.

It was time to just rip the band-aid off and do the damn thing.

Leaving without saying goodbye to Katie didn’t feel right so I woke her up with a hand on her shoulder. “Katie? Hey, I’m sorry to wake you up.”

She lifted her cheek from the pillow and blinked up at me. She still looked half asleep, but she smiled at me. “Morning,” she said thickly. “Is everything all right?”

“Everything is fine. I’m just going to run out and see my brother and my dad.”

She propped herself up on her elbow and pushed her hair off her forehead. “Do you want me to come with you?”

Yes. “No,” I said. I didn’t want her to see my father in his state.

And I didn’t want to overwhelm him by introducing him to a stranger.

There was no telling what state he’d be in today and he was far past the age of liking or understanding surprises.

“You stay in bed and get some more sleep. It was a late night.”

“Are you sure? I don’t mind. All I need is a cup of coffee and I’ll be good to go.”

I chuckled softly. “No, you stay here. You’ve had a total of four hours of sleep and I know you don’t get many days off. Enjoy it.”

Katie closed her hand over mine on her shoulder. “If you insist. Thank you.”

“I do insist.”

She let her cheek fall back to the pillow but continued watching me out of one eye as I put my watch on where it rested on the nightstand table and tucked my phone into my jeans pocket. “How long will you be gone?”

“I’m not sure,” I said. “A few hours at least. If the others are going to go out and do something, you should go with them. I’ll catch up.”

Katie snuggled deeper into her pillow. “Okay, maybe I will. I don’t get to spend as much time with these losers as I used to and I kind of miss them.”

I laughed. “I could tell they missed you too. Have a good day. I’ll touch base later, okay?”

She nodded sleepily. “You can’t leave without a stinky morning-breath kiss.”

I walked back to her side of the bed, stroked her hair, and leaned over for a soft kiss. I could feel her eyes on my back as I left the hotel room and I was sure by the time I’d reached the elevator that she had promptly fallen back asleep.

As I rode down to the lobby, a knot formed in my stomach. I didn’t want to do this, but I knew it was the right choice and the path that would leave me without regrets or guilt.

Put on your big boy pants, Peter. You can handle this. Then it’s back to paradise with the girl of your dreams.

The yellow taxi dropped me off at the curb in front of my father’s old house, the house Mike and I had grown up in.

It looked much the same. The house was a single-story gray homestead with a cracked driveway and siding in need of pressure washing. The roof looked to be in rough shape, the windows were cloudy, and the garage door had a giant dent in it that hadn’t been there when I left for the Virgin Islands.

I sighed and shook my head. “What have you been doing here, Mike?”

It was the ugliest house on the street. Several neighbors had petitioned me to get the house cleaned up so the neighborhood didn’t lose curb appeal.

Their requests had made my temper flare.

I had enough on my plate with my father’s ailing health and my useless little brother causing trouble and needing handouts every second week.

The last thing I needed was pressure from neighbors who were concerned about aesthetics.

I’d told them we’d sell the house soon and developers would likely come in, tear it down, flatten the lot, and build something new and shiny that would make their forty-year-old houses look like eye sores.

None of the neighbors had taken too kindly to that comment. I hadn’t really given a shit. They’d poked the bear and the last thing I had energy for was pussyfooting around their feelings.

To be fair, the house was looking especially bad, and if I lived across the street from it, I wouldn’t want to wake up and look at it every morning.

With a tired sigh, I began making my way up the driveway to the front door. I knocked, stood back, and waited with my hands in my pockets for Mike to answer it.

He didn’t.

“Great,” I mumbled as I reached out and tried the handle.

It was unlocked.

Shaking my head, I pushed inside and stopped in the small foyer that led down a narrow hallway to the back of the house where the kitchen was.

To my left was an open doorway exposing the living room, and to my right was another doorway leading to a dining room that was currently being used for hoarding-style storage.

The table was completely hidden beneath boxes, newspapers, and generic shit.

The beige carpets were dark and stained from my father’s years of smoking in the house.

Somehow, it smelled like wet dog in there, even though my father hadn’t owned a dog in over a decade.

My brother was passed out on the mint green sofa in the middle of the living room. The television was on, playing the news, but the voices of the reporters were muted. A couple of beer bottles littered the dirty carpet and I wondered what kind of bender my brother had been on last night.

I moved into the living room and kicked my brother’s foot to wake him up.

Mike sat up with a loud snort and gripped the armrest. “What? Who’s there? Pete?”

“Good morning.”

Mike rubbed the back of his neck and looked around the living room. If he realized how deplorable it was, he didn’t say anything. “When did you get into town?”

“Two nights ago. For a wedding.”

Mike frowned. He looked the same as ever. Shaggy, disheveled, and in need of a hot shower. “A wedding? Whose?”

“Friends. You wouldn’t know them.”

“You came all the way back to LA for a wedding but you wouldn’t come see me or dad?”

I shrugged. “Yeah.”

Mike rolled his eyes and slumped into the back of the sofa with an incredulous laugh. “My brother, the stand-up family man, huh?”

I arched an eyebrow. Every fiber of my being wanted to lay into him and tell him how much work I’d put in to get dad into his home and how long I’d been his primary caregiver, but I knew it would fall on deaf ears, and even if Mike understood, he’d take it the wrong way.

So I let it lie. “I’m here now, aren’t I?” I asked.

Mike looked me up and down. “Yeah, I suppose you are. What do you want then?”

“I wanted to make peace and go see Dad. Together. Me and you. Like we should have done a long time ago.”

“I’ve seen him.”

“When?”

Mike scratched his stubbly chin. “Uh, I don’t know. A week ago maybe.”

“Don’t lie, Mike. I know you haven’t been by the home. Neither have I. Not since before I left obviously. But it’s time we get our shit together and go see him. Regardless of how difficult it is.”

Mike licked his lips. “I don’t like that place. It’s sad, man.”

“Yeah, well, it could be worse.”

“How?”

“We could be one of the patients who doesn’t get to leave after the end of the visit. Now go have a shower. And put some clean clothes on for fuck sakes.”

Mike looked down at himself and smiled bashfully. “I am a bit of a mess, aren’t I?”

“A bit?”

Mike got to his feet and rolled his eyes at me. “Give me a break, bro. Not all of us have our shit together and can run off to a tropical island and come back looking all tanned and sleek in new clothes. All right?”

My brother moved out of the living room, and a minute later, I heard the water of the shower sputter on. I sighed and sat gingerly on the edge of the sofa and thought about Katie.

If I was really trying to do this on the right foot, didn’t it make sense for her to meet my father?

This might be the last chance I had for my old man to meet my girlfriend.

If I let this slip through my fingers, would I look back and always wonder what might have been had he been able to meet Katie?

What if I married her? What if she was the mother of my children?

What if I cost my father, myself, and the woman I was falling in love with the chance to all sit in a room together and swap stories and share a couple of laughs all because I was insecure?

That didn’t sit right with me.