“I just… I heard you a little on the phone. Not much, just that it was him.”

He cracked his neck, digging into his omelet. “He’s fine.”

“Are you two close?”

He stilled, fork frozen in the air.

“Come on,” I said. “I spilled. Your turn.”

He let out a sigh, then took his first bite of the omelet. His face shifted then, and he groaned, turning to me with an incredulous look. “Thish ish delishush.”

I laughed. “English, please?”

He swallowed. “This is delicious. What’s in it?”

“Egg, basil, mozzarella, avocado, and turkey bacon.”

Clay blinked. “You’re like a fucking chef.”

“Hardly,” I said with a laugh. “And stop deflecting. Tell me all your deep, dark daddy issues.” I playfully leaned toward him like a reporter, speaking into my fork like a microphone before I angled it toward him.

He rolled his eyes. “Nothing original about them, I promise. He and my mom divorced when I was young. According to him, she was manipulative and jealous. According to her, he was stepping out on her. Who knows the truth. All I know is he had a new wife less than a year later, and a new family shortly after that.”

“New family?”

“I have two half-brothers,” he explained. “Both of whom I’ve spent only a handful of holidays with. They get all Dad’s attention, though — save for when I’m playing a football game.”

I frowned, pushing the egg around on my plate. “I’m sorry.”

He shrugged. “It is what it is. Mom and I are pretty close, though she has her issues, too. One second she’s flying high with a new guy in her life, and the next she’s…” He paused. “Well, she’s not herself.”

“What do you mean?”

A shadow of something passed over his face, his eyes on his plate. “She struggles mentally. When things get hard, when she’s alone… she turns to things she shouldn’t.”

He left it at that, letting me put together the missing pieces.

“Seems like you had a lot on your shoulders growing up,” I mused.

His eyes met mine, brows unfurling. “Yeah. Yeah, I guess I did.” He searched my gaze. “Sounds like you learned to make it on your own pretty young, too.”

The corner of my mouth slid up. “I think I prefer it that way.”

He met my smile, but then his phone buzzed, and he picked it up quickly, frowning when he saw it was Holden before he sat it back down again.

“Something happened with Maliyah yesterday, didn’t it?” I asked.

He cleared his throat, nodding.

“What was it?”

“Ran into her after the game,” he said, sniffing. “We talked a bit.”

“And?”

He smirked at me. “Nosy.”

“Come on! I tell you everything about Shawn.”