“Can’t say you’re impressin’ me,” Alan fired back. “Me askin’ pertinent questions and you makin’ threats.”

High took a step toward him and it said a lot the man didn’t move a muscle.

“You’ve got no fuckin’ clue,” he stated low.

“I got a clue, Logan,” the man returned. “I heard everything Millie said about what you did to her when you two got back into each other’s lives. No decent man treats a woman like that.”

“You got no fuckin’ clue,” High repeated.

“Know we nearly lost her to your shit.” He lifted up his brows again. “She does somethin’ where you feel she needs taught another lesson, what’s she gonna get?”

“You know, you turn the tables, you know this shit isn’t any of your business.”

“You’re wrong,” he spat, losing it. “Millie’s absolutely my business. Been in my life for twelve years, Logan. Longer than you had her. Through that time, I watched her exist. Saw the mess you and your brothers made of her before she went to Paris. You turn the tables, man, and tell me again it isn’t my business.”

It sucked, but the man had a point.

“She kept comin’ back for more,” High told him through gritted teeth.

“Way I heard it, you kept comin’ back to give her more.”

“And she took it. Took it. Held on tight. And didn’t let go.”

Alan shut his mouth.

And there was High’s point.

“It would suck, what you got with Dot isn’t what I feel for Millie. What Millie gives back to me,” High said. “I’d want that for Dottie, to have something like that. She’s a damn fine woman. She deserves that beauty. I’ll tell it to you straight, when I saw Millie again, I had no idea the heartbreak my girl’s been dealin’ with for twenty years. What she sacrificed to give me all I got. But even if that shit wasn’t there, I wouldn’t care. The dance we danced when we hooked up again was fucked right the hell up. But it was a dance we had to dance. A dance that led us outta hell and back to beauty. Lotta folks work the hurt out a lotta ways. Even if Millie didn’t have the best reason in the world to get shot of me twenty years ago, I’d be back in her bed ’cause that’s what we got. That’s what we’ve always had. That’s what we been missin’. And older now, a fuckuva lot smarter, we know not to let it go.”

High stopped talking and Alan didn’t start.

So High kept going.

“Straight up, you got this kinda love for my girl, I dig that. But she’s walked through fire, man. That’s done for her. You don’t like my threats, don’t be a threat to what I gotta build for my woman.”

Alan held his gaze steady.

Then he looked to the fan belts.

High leveled his tone when he spoke again.

“Millie’s the kinda woman who deserves everything in life but life chose to fuck her and not give her the one thing she wanted most. Only way she can get even a little of that is through your kids and through mine.”

Alan looked back to him.

High went on, “I know you don’t like this now but we’re a team. We got a goal we gotta see to the rest of our lives. We both love Millie and we both got the job to find a way to give her what she deserves. You’re not with me on that, bud, that’s your problem. But I’m not gonna let you make it Millie’s. You don’t like me. Pretend. But I got a big job ahead of me. I’m not expendin’ a lot of effort on you.”

When Alan didn’t say anything, High decided he was done. So he made his way around the man and moved toward the front of the store.

He was five feet beyond him when Alan called, “Logan.”

High turned around.

“Millie calls me that. Dottie calls me that,” High stated. “I’m High to you. You don’t get that, man, I don’t give a fuck. Logan is theirs. It ain’t yours.”

Alan looked confused for a beat before he powered past it and focused, muttering, “Whatever.” Then, louder, like a command, “Be real.”

“I’m real,” High returned.

Alan again held his gaze steady and High could barely hear him when he repeated, “For Millie, for God’s sake, be real.”

He said nothing else and didn’t give High a chance to reply before he turned and walked away.

*  *  *

At five oh five that night, High found himself leaning against his truck again.

He was this way outside Deb’s work.

He’d called her and asked her for fifteen minutes after work to have a chat about Zadie.

When he’d done that, she’d replied, “Yeah. Figured Zade didn’t take this weekend too great.”

She said no more and agreed to meet.

High did not want to be there. It was the last place he wanted to be. The first place he wanted to be was at Millie’s waiting for her to come out in her sweater dress.

But their reservation wasn’t until seven.

He had time to do this and he had to do this.

So he was there, doing it.

He watched as Deb walked out, plastic lunch bag in her hand that she undoubtedly packed with carrot sticks, apple slices, and other shit that was good for you. Purse on her shoulder that he knew cost over five hundred dollars because he saw it on the credit card statement—handbags, dying her hair, and buying expensive makeup at department stores the only girl weaknesses she had.