Andi flopped down at the table, breathless and warm from too much jumping around during Shout! A glass of water sat where her place setting had been, telling her that Ty had completed his mission to find hydration, but there was no sign of the man himself. On the dance floor, Jade and Kendall were laughing as they flung out their feet to Footloose along with half of the town.
It was a great wedding. The best wedding.
Where was Ty?
“Hey there, Andi-girl.”
She looked up as her brothers surrounded her, claiming three of the empty chairs around the table. Nearly all of the reception guests crowded the dance floor and those who didn’t were in clusters near the bar, giving them a rare moment of privacy. Just the four of them. Like it hadn’t been in years.
She smiled at her brothers. “Hello, gentlemen. Aren’t you looking dapper this fine afternoon?”
Aaron shot his cuffs. “I always try to look dapper when I’m tossing someone out of a reception for being a dick to my sister.”
Andi frowned, not getting the joke. But Aaron wasn’t smiling. None of them were smiling. “What are you talking about?”
And where was Ty? God, had they thrown him out? A flare of panic—which had nothing to do with job security—flashed through her.
Alex spoke, his voice gentler than Aaron’s had been. “Why didn’t you tell us Mark dumped you like that? Why did you let us think you decided to leave him?”
She flushed, embarrassed to be having this conversation with them, even after all these years. “You guys idolized him. I didn’t want to take that away from you.” Honesty forced her to add. “And I guess I was afraid if I told you, you’d still like him better.”
“How could you think that?” Adam asked. “You’re our sister.”
“I was always the annoying older sister until I started dating Mark and he made me cool in your eyes.”
“How are we supposed to protect you if you keep shit like this from us?” Aaron growled.
“I’m your older sister. How were you going to protect me? You were away at college when we got divorced. Alex and Adam were still in high school.”
But she could see on their faces that they were annoyed at not having been given the chance to beat Mark bloody. Something uneasy curled in her stomach as she remembered how Aaron had started the conversation. “What did you do to him?”
“We escorted him to the parking lot,” Alex said calmly. “And informed him he was no longer welcome at Cooper family gatherings.”
“Better than he deserved,” Aaron grumbled.
“We’re still going to take care of you, Andi.” Adam added. “Big sister, little sister. You’re ours.”
Tears pricked the backs of her eyes. She’d missed so much. She’d missed them. Knowing them. Seeing them become the men they were.
Andi swallowed thickly and reached out to hug Alex, since he was closest. The others huddled around her, hugging her tight, her little brothers who now towered over her.
She remembered when they were born. She remembered when Aaron used to pee on her Barbies. She remembered Alex stealing her books and Adam falling out of trees, breaking bone after bone and never learning, always climbing higher. But they weren’t those kids anymore. These men were her family. Her protectors. And her love for them filled up her whole heart.
“How did you find out?” she asked, using a linen napkin to dab away the moisture around her eyes.
Her brothers exchanged a glance. For a moment she thought they would evade the question, but then Alex said softly, “That actor seems like a good guy.”
Andi nodded, her throat closing again. “He does.”
“I think he really cares about you,” Aaron added.
Did he? And even if he did… would it last? Could it?
She was a planner. She wasn’t spontaneous. She didn’t jump into things. She thought them through. But the more she thought things through with Ty, the more she saw all the potential pitfalls. Her head knew he was a bad bet. The evidence was right there in front of her. But her heart didn’t seem to be listening.
Thankfully, Andi didn’t make decisions with her heart. She never had.
“Have you seen him?” she asked, rather than addressing Aaron’s loaded comment.
Alex nodded toward a door to one side. “He’s talking to Dad.”
* * * * *
Andi’s father hadn’t offered him a scotch—thank God. Instead he held his own beer by the neck and stood in the little covered walkway which, judging by the cigarette butts littering the pavement, had been used for many of the caterer’s smoke breaks. Mr. Cooper watched it snow, gently blowing smoke from a slim cigarillo into the night.
He had offered Ty one of those, but he hadn’t seemed bothered when Ty refused. “I should quit myself,” he said companionably. “Have quit a dozen times, if I’m honest, but I still allow myself one on special occasions.”
Mr. Cooper took a long drag, closing his eyes with pleasure before blowing a thin stream of smoke into the night. “Kath pretends she doesn’t know I still sneak one from time to time, but we both know she can smell it on my clothes. She can be oblivious about a lot of things, but that isn’t one of them.” He puffed on the cigarillo. “For instance, she has no idea you and my daughter aren’t really dating.”
Ty shot Mr. Cooper a startled glance, finding the older man watching him with a small smile on his face. “You’ve known the whole time?”
“No poker face on that girl. Never has been. It always amazed me that Kath couldn’t see right through her.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
He shrugged philosophically. “Figured you had your reasons. Might as well wait it out and see what happened.” Another pensive puff. “You care for her, don’t you?”
“She’s an extraordinary woman.” He hedged uneasily, not sure how they had gotten from you-aren’t-really-dating to discussing his feelings for this man’s daughter.
“That she is. Sensitive though. She may seem tough because she’s so practical. Always planning ahead, but that girl has a delicate heart. She’s so cautious now, holding herself away from everyone, but you seem to have a special bond with her.”
“I would never hurt her,” Ty promised, answering to her father’s unspoken question. He understood a father’s concern. Ty knew that a playboy actor’s reputation didn’t precisely inspire confidence, but he hadn’t been speaking lightly when he’d said he would never bail on Jade. And he would never bail on Andi. He wasn’t wired that way.
“I’m glad to hear it.” Another contemplative puff. “Daughters are tough. You’ll see. You worry about all your kids, but when your little girl is hurting you want to take on the world to make things better for her.”
Ty watched the snow falling in ever-thickening sheets, piling up in the parking lot. “I worry about screwing up,” he admitted. “As a dad.”
“I couldn’t respect you if you didn’t,” Andi’s father answered calmly. “Hardest job in the world, being a parent. You never know if you’re doing the right thing. Doing enough, doing too much. Teaching them to be independent enough. Protecting them enough. Giving them every opportunity, but not spoiling them. There’s no guidebook.”
“Your kids seemed to have turned out pretty well.” Ty thrust his hands into his pockets. “Any advice?”
“Put her first,” he said simply. “And always let her know how much you love her. It’s a tricky thing, learning to think of what your kids need rather than what you think they need or what will make them like you most. It won’t be easy, but she’ll teach you to be a better man. To be a man. I think a lot of us don’t really grow up until we have a kid. And then we see it’s not about us anymore.”
The door beside him opened before Ty could respond.
“There you are.” Andi slipped out, wrapping her arms around herself, shivering in the cold. “Aren’t you freezing?”
“We’re red-blooded American males,” her father teased. “We’re too tough to feel cold.”
Andi eyed him skeptically as she sidled up to Ty’s side and tucked herself against him for warmth. “Mom’s going to kill you if she sees you smoking that.”
“Then it’s a good thing she isn’t here.” He wagged his eyebrows and Andi chuckled, shaking her head.
“Come on. It’s almost time for the bouquet.”
Andi’s father met Ty’s eyes over Andi’s head as he stubbed out his cigarillo, tucking the remainder into his pocket for later. A message passed between them—the sensation foreign, but not unpleasant.
He’d never had a father. Never really realized what one could be. But now, with Andi’s family, he was seeing things he hadn’t before. Becoming a man he didn’t know existed.
And so much of that was due to the woman tucked against his side.
He looked down into her eyes. “You gonna snag that bouquet?”
“And feed my mother’s fantasies of planning another wedding? No, thank you.”
But she did catch it. The thing flew at her like it was laser guided and Andi trapped it against her chest in self-defense, her gaze immediately flicking to lock with his—filled with shock, laughter, and something else. Something he couldn’t quite define passed between them. Something like possibilities.
This wasn’t what he’d pictured when he’d pictured his future—but he could barely remember that silly idealized image now. Andi was real. Jade was real. And the two of them, they were everything.