28. Taylor

"The first documented sighting of a mermaid was made by Christopher Columbus." ~ Tim Rhodes

"Wow, they are incredible!"I marveled at the mermaids swimming in the community center pool as Ruby and I stood on the side. "You did such an amazing job!"

"Thanks." Ruby smiled. "I was happy to do it."

Ruby had planned the party while I was overseas after finding out that Harper was obsessed with mermaids. The thought of having a pool party for my little girl had never even crossed my mind since her birthday was at the end of October. But Ruby had not only thought of it; she had executed it to perfection. It was just one of the reasons I was so happy that she was in Harper's life.

Ruby was everything I wasn't. She was a singer, dancer, and actress who had been on Broadway. She was creative, talented, nurturing, and thought completely outside the box.

She was the opposite of me. I loved boxes. I needed boxes. Everything in my life was in a box that I could file away and compartmentalize. I was glad that Harper would have both of us in her life as she grew up and navigated this world.

"How was the mini-moon?" I asked, changing the subject. She and Kane had gotten home last night, and I hadn't had a chance to catch up with either of them yet.

The wide smile that spread across her face told me that she was being transported back to Cancún.

She sighed wistfully. "Amazing!"

As weird as people might think it was that I was asking my best friend/child's father's new bride how her honeymoon was, and genuinely hoping it was the best, most sex-filled getaway ever, it was even stranger that all I could think was, I had sex with your brother.

For some reason, my hooking up with Remi seemed worse to me. The first time didn't really count because I hadn't known it was him. But last week…last week I knew exactly who he was, and I jumped his bones anyway.

I hadn't seen Remi since he snuck out of my house six days ago. The only people I had seen this past week were Kenna and Harper. I'd been working twelve, sometimes sixteen-hour days. For most people, that might seem like a lot. But it didn't feel like that to me. The fact that I got to see my baby girl every single day, even if it was only for an hour or two, was something I would never take for granted.

Something I realized I had taken for granted was SRSs, Surprise Remi Sightings. All week, I'd kept expecting Remi to show up at the hospital or on my front or back porch. He hadn't. Every day, I'd had to actively fight the urge to text him. I'd written and deleted over a dozen messages. Some asked how his mom was doing. Some asked how he was doing. Some just said I missed him. Those were the scariest of all.

I was trying to plot an inconspicuous way to work Remi into the conversation with Ruby to see if she'd heard anything from her brother when the door to the pool opened, and the man himself walked in with their mom.

Due to my crazy hours, I hadn't been around town much and had no idea if he was still here. Now I had my answer. He was. Every cell in my body responded to his appearance like a teenager at a fifties Elvis concert. They were swooning, screaming, and crying.

Ruby noticed her brother's arrival as well. "I'm gonna go say hi to Remi and my mom."

She headed across the room, and I watched as Remi's face lit up when he saw his baby sister. There were so many things I loved about that man, but the way he was with his mom and Ruby was definitely at the top of the list.

"I didn't know Remi was still in town."

Kane's voice startled me, and I jumped an inch or two off the ground. When I turned to face him, he looked at me like I'd grown an extra head.

"You okay?" His brow furrowed, and his expression appeared disturbed by my display.

"Yeah, you just…startled me."

"Do you know why Remi's still in town?" he asked.

Yes. Yes, I did. Or at least, I had a pretty good idea. I'd heard from Kenna that Celeste hadn't been back to work at the Spoon, so I had a feeling Remi had been holding her hostage to rest.

I shrugged and turned my attention back to the pool. I might have blurred the lines by telling Remi what his mom's condition was, but there was no way I was going to tell Kane.

"Tay, what's going?—"

"Daddy, watch!" Harper shouted as she did her best ‘mermaid', flapping her legs together.

Thank you, Harper, I silently said to myself.

"Great job, Peanut!" Kane enthused.

"I can't believe she's five," I observed as a melancholy cloud settled over me. The past five years had dragged on because I was away from her so much, but they'd also flown by. Soon she would be in double digits, then teens, then she'd be going off to college.

"Yeah, I know. It seems like yesterday I was driving you home from the hospital with her." Kane reminisced before being called away by Sam Whitlock, who was waving him over from across the room.

I had actually driven home from that hospital yesterday. And like every day since Remi had shown up on my back porch, I'd arrived home half expecting him to be there. He wasn't.

The logical, sane part of my brain knew that I should be happy about that. He'd respected my unspoken boundaries and given me space. The toxic, unhinged part of my brain was disappointed he hadn't shown up at the hospital or my house to tell me he couldn't stop thinking about me, that he couldn't think, he couldn't sleep, he couldn't breathe without me.

I glanced down at my outfit and wondered if he'd remember that this was the shirt I'd worn the first night we'd met at the airport. Getting dressed today, I'd told myself I was wearing it because I hadn't had a chance to do laundry, but the truth was, I'd saved this shirt for today on the off chance he'd be here.

Remi had turned me into a preteen with a crush. The thing was, I'd never actually had a crush, so I was really bad at it.

Case in point: I should be concentrating on my peanut swimming with mermaids, but my eyes kept darting over to where Remi was speaking to Wyatt and JJ Briggs. And every time they did, I found him staring directly at me. He really needed to stop doing that. If he kept it up, people might notice, like Otto had at the wedding. But they'd probably noticed me constantly glancing in his direction, as well.

The next time my eyes went rogue as they scanned the partygoers and locked with his, I saw he'd left his friends and was heading straight toward me in long, purposeful strides.

Panic rose in me. I told myself I was being silly. There was nothing wrong with the two of us conversing. Except, I was scared that I might spontaneously combust if he got near me. Or, a more realistic probability, someone would notice how twitterpated I was.

I turned and speed-walked to the party favor table. I'm not sure why. It was just the closest thing I could find that had items on it I could pretend to be busy with. My breath grew shallow as I started reorganizing the party bags. I was surrounded by about fifty people, a third of whom were screaming children splashing around in water, but all I could hear was the whooshing of my heartbeat in my head.

Even before he spoke, I knew the moment Remi stopped behind me. The tiny hairs on the back of my neck and my arms stood straight up, just like they had at the bar when he'd sat down.

"Nice shirt," his deep voice rumbled.

He remembered, I thought as my lips curled at the corners. I didn't want to grin; it was totally involuntary. His statement was like a mallet tapping my knee, causing me to kick, or smile.

Trying to get my giddiness under control, I turned around and hoped that the mask of indifference I wore out in the world was firmly in place. "Thanks."

"I miss you," he rasped in a whisper.

My eyes widened as I looked around. "You can't say that."

"Why? Why can't I?" The twinkle of amusement in his eyes betrayed his innocent tone.

"How's your mom?" I changed the subject and walked back over to the pool to watch Harper and her friends.

Remi stepped beside me. "She's doing a little better. She has an appointment with a specialist in a couple weeks."

"Good. So, you talked to her?"

"Yeah. She told me everything."

I nodded. I'd had a niggling feeling of guilt all week that I'd broken her patient/doctor confidentiality, but I just hadn't been able to see Remi in that much pain and confusion and not tell him. I knew he was thinking the worst, and even though her condition was bad, the things he was considering were even more dire.

"Okay, it's time for cake!" Ruby smiled as she approached us.

The rest of the party, Remi kept his distance from me, which I was both grateful for and, I had to admit, a little disappointed. I also wasn't a huge fan of seeing him talk to one of the Turner Triplets. I had no clue which one it was, but they were looking up at him with hero worship. My first instinct had been to walk over to him, grab his face, and kiss him to mark my territory. Just like most of my reactions to Remi, it had been unsettling. Unsettling yet very, very telling.

I loved Remi Rhodes. Which was more than a little inconvenient considering the circumstances.