Better (Stark Ink Book 2)

by Dahlia West

  He gazed down at her as the water pebbled on her bare skin, reminding him again of better times. They’d never showered together in this apartment, but they had in the old one, plenty of times, but not nearly enough according to his way of thinking. His reminiscing was soon sidelined when she unthreaded her arms from his, turned, and reached for the soap on the shelf.

  “I’ll do you,” she told them, “you do me.”

  He smirked. “I think we’ve established that.”

  She gave him a sharp look that made him laugh. She grasped his arm and tugged. She wasn’t strong enough to turn him on her best day, but he got the message. He turned to face the wall as she started rubbing the bar between her hands. His cock grew in response, indicating it wanted to be next.

  He felt her soap-slicked fingers smooth over his shoulder. She paused, pressing lightly against the tattoo that had been drawn there. “This is the day your mom died?” she asked as she traced the date inked into his skin.

  He nodded.

  She touched the other shoulder. “What’s this one?”

  “The day I got sober.”

  They’d been the two most important events in his life thus far. Dalton, Adam, and Jonah had each had Mom’s date applied. Dalton had asked Adam to add the day he’d gone to rehab, as well. Ava wanted hers done, but she’d have to wait a little longer. Nobody thought waiting would actually deter her, but the law was the law and Adam was always on the right side of it these days.

  Slowly Zoey’s fingertips moved down Dalton’s back. She followed the outline there which was as familiar to him as the scar on his hand. Feathers, claws, beating wings. He couldn’t really see it in the mirror, but he’d keep the original pencil drawing.

  “It’s a phoenix,” he told her. “It’s-”

  “The bird that rises from the ashes.”

  “Yeah. Adam drew it for me when I got out of rehab. Maybe he meant it as an apology for dragging me there in the first place. Or… maybe I let him put it on me as an apology for making him do it. I don’t know. Either way, we needed a way to move on, start over. This seemed like a good idea.”

  Zoey was quiet a moment before she spoke. “What was it like there?” she asked.

  “Rehab? Pretty awful. For the first couple of days I was sick as hell while I was detoxing. I thought I was going to die. Then I wanted to die. After the hard part was over, it was a lot of group meetings. A bunch of assholes sitting around blaming everyone else for their problems. Took me a while to realize I was just another one of them.”

  He sighed. “Then I got out and came home to an apartment without you in it. Of everything that came before, I think that actually might have been the hardest moment. So, I had to move, to get away from it.” He turned back to her and cupped her face with his hand. The water had darkened her hair even more and it swirled around her shoulders. She looked impossibly beautiful, like a dream he’d had too many times that now suddenly seemed real. “I have a lot of regrets, Zoey, and you were always— always— at the top of that list.”

  She pulled him down until his lips touched hers. He would have settled for gentle, and it really did start out that way, but somewhere along the way their tongues joined in. The heat from her mouth rivaled the steam in the shower. He was surprised a little, but then again not really, because this was Zoey and he’d never been able to keep his hands off her. True to form, his thumbs grazed her nipples and she shivered despite the hot water raining down on them both.

  Zoey reached down and grasped the length of him. She stroked him gently. He groaned. “You keep teasing me and we’re going to end up right back here… after I get you all dirty again,” he told her.

  Instead of letting go, she squeezed— deliberately— the little minx. He snaked one arm around her and pushed her back gently against the tile. He leaned down and tasted every part of her he could find, her jaw, her ear, her throat. He was about to get on his knees when his phone buzzed on the counter of the sink.

  “Oh, no,” Zoey moaned.

  “It’ll keep,” he whispered in her ear, but it buzzed again as he ran his hands over her belly. He stopped when it actually rang instead. He glanced over his shoulder and then back to Zoey. “I have to get it.”

  “Do you?” she pouted. “Don’t work today.”

  He frowned. There was no way his boss would put together a crew on a Sunday. He stepped out, grabbing a towel with one hand and the phone with the other. He shut the bathroom door behind him as he answered the call.

  “Dalton? It’s Daddy,” Ava told him. In just those few words, he could hear the strain in his little sister’s voice.

  “Where’s Adam?”

  “He went out with Calla. I told him we’d be okay. I called him but they’re all the way across town.”

  Dalton threw open the closet door and yanked out a fresh shirt. “Keep him in the house if you can. I’m on my way.”

  As he dressed quickly, the bedroom door opened. Zoey, wrapped in a towel, stepped into the room.

  “Dalton?”

  “I have to go. It’s Pop. I… need to go to the house.”

  Zoey’s eyes widened? “Is he hurt? Is he sick?”

  Dalton shook his head and yanked on a pair of jeans. Zoey didn’t know about Pop and he didn’t really have time to explain it to her. “No, listen. I have to go,” he told her.

  “I’m coming with you,” Zoey insisted, throwing her towel on the bed and grabbing a shirt.

  Dalton frowned as he considered it. He didn’t much like the idea of leaving her here, but taking her to the house might not be a good idea, either. He didn’t know what he’d be walking into.

  “Okay,” he said, deciding she could stay in the truck with the heater on.

  They scurried out of the house as the phone rang again. This time it was Adam. Dalton helped Zoey into the truck before he answered.

  “I’m on my way,” he said as the line picked up.

  “I can be there in about 20 minutes,” Adam told him. “Damn. I should’ve known better. We had plans and I wanted to give you some space ‘cause you’ve got your own shit going on. Wrong choice.”

  “It’s fine,” Dalton told him. “You can’t be everywhere all the time. Neither can I. Look, don’t get into an accident trying to get here faster. I’m just a few blocks away. It’s all good.”

  He hung up and barely paused at the light before he blew through it.

  “Dalton, what’s going on?”

  “I don’t have time to explain it all right this second,” he said as he turned onto Pop’s street. He could just tell her, but Zoey knew Pop and the news would hit her hard. Delivering news like that and then running off didn’t seem like the most sensitive plan. He pulled the truck to a stop at the curb and put it in park.

  “I’m leaving the engine running. Stay here,” he told her. “Stay warm.”

  “But-”

  He slammed the door on her and jogged across the frosty lawn, crunching it under his heavy boots. He made it up the stairs and through the door in record time.

  Pop was in the living room, still in his pajamas, yelling at Ava. “I don’t care what your name is!” the old man shouted. “My sons know better than to be sneaking girls in!” Ava and Sienna stood next to each other, looking afraid. Sienna was nearly in tears, but Ava was holding it together. Occasionally Pop mistook Ava for Mom, which was difficult but manageable since Pop never yelled at Mom. Today they were in uncharted territory.

  “Pop!” Dalton said loudly.

  The old man turned to him. “What is this?!” he shouted. “You know the rules! Not in my house, Dalton! Not under my roof!”

  “Calm down, Pop,” Dalton said as he closed the front door behind.

  “I will not calm down! This is my house! And these hussies-”

  Dalton raised his hands. “Easy, now, Pop. They’re not hussies. They’re nice girls. Don’t you recognize them?” He pointed to Sienna, who was also in a t-shirt and sweat pants, apparently having slept over. “She’s our neigh
bor,” Dalton told him. “Sienna. She lives in the house across the backyard there.” He pointed through the sliding glass door to the back of the one-story ranch across the way.

  Pop followed his gaze but frowned. “Petersons live there.”

  “Nah, Pop,” Dalton said in a light tone. “They moved out. Remember?”

  “When?”

  “Oh, a while back. I don’t really remember when.”

  Pop glared at the girls. “Well, that’s no excuse.”

  “They didn’t spend the night, Pop. They’re just visiting.”

  The old man took a moment to think it over. “It’s early.”

  Dalton shrugged and grinned. “What can I say? Stark men.”

  Pop attempted to maintain his composure, but he smiled a little in spite of himself. “Don’t let your mother see them here.”

  Dalton tried hard to maintain a smile. He nodded. “No problem, Pop.”

  Suddenly, the door behind him opened. Dalton turned, half expecting to see Calla and Adam, or possibly Jonah. Instead, Zoey came in through the front door. She looked at Ava and Sienna, then at Pop, and finally to Dalton. “Dalton?” she asked quietly.

  “Well, now who’s she?!” Pop demanded, recovering his anger.

  Zoey’s eyes widened. Confused, she looked at Dalton. “Um… I… I’m Zoey. Mr. Stark, you don’t recognize me?” She reached up and ran a hand nervously through her still-wet hair. As she did, her unbuttoned coat opened in the front.

  Pop’s gaze darkened considerably. “Oh, sweet baby Jesus. You got a girl pregnant,” the old man said darkly.

  Dalton didn’t answer.

  Even over sixty, the man was still intimidating. He glared at Dalton. “Your mother will be beside herself.”

  Zoey gasped and Sienna started crying.

  Chapter Eighteen

  “Things happen, Pop,” Dalton replied, for lack of anything better to say.

  The old man grunted. “If you’d paid a little more attention during that talk I gave you, it wouldn’t have.” He shook his head. “I expected more from you, Dalton.”

  Dalton nodded. “I know. I… I’ve really let you down lately, Pop. I haven’t been the man you taught me to be. I’m working on it though, taking responsibility.”

  “I didn’t teach you leave someone else holding the bag.” He looked at Zoey. “Or the baby. ‘Course, I told you not to screw up in the first place. One ‘Oh Shit’ cancels out ten ‘Attaboys,’ you know.”

  Dalton smiled ruefully. Pop and his phrases were one in a million. “I guess that’s true enough,” he replied. “If I’d followed all your advice, I’d be in better shape than I am now. That’s for sure.”

  “You sure you know who the father is?”

  Dalton looked at Zoey then back to his own father. “Zoey wouldn’t cheat, Pop. She’s not the type. She’s Elaine and Lyle Connor’s daughter. You know them. From church.”

  Pop frowned as he struggled to place the name. “Don’t recall,” he admitted. “Your Mom knows them, I expect. Do you love her?” the old man asked suddenly.

  Dalton flexed his bad hand and nodded. “I do, yeah.”

  Pop nodded in turn. “Well, good. It’ll make it easier.”

  “Make what easier?”

  “Marriage,” Pop replied, as though the answer was obvious.

  Dalton actually considered his words. “Not sure she’d have me.”

  Pop glowered at Zoey. “Well, what kind of nonsense is that? You’re too good for my boy?”

  Dalton stepped in between them just in case things got ugly. “Nah, Pop. That’s not what I meant. You know how it is. She’s a nice girl, Like Mom. I’m… more like you.”

  Pop actually laughed, surprising them all. “You don’t know how true your words are, boy. Don’t worry. I’ll talk to your mom, smooth things over. She won’t give you too much of a hard time. You probably don’t want to look too closely at the math between your brother’s birthday and our wedding night.”

  “Oh, wow,” Ava gasped.

  The old man looked past Dalton to Zoey. “Don’t worry,” he told her. “My son won’t leave you. He’s a good boy. We should, ah, have your parents over for dinner. I mean, if we’re going to be family.”

  Zoey couldn’t seem to do anything but nod. “Um, okay. Th- thanks Mr. Stark.”

  Pop nodded and turned away. “Get your friends out of my house, Dalton,” he ordered on his way to his bedroom. There was a loud click as he shut the door tightly.

  Dalton turned to Zoey who had tears brimming in her eyes. He put his arm around her and guided her down the hall. He opened the door to Ava’s room, ushered her in, and shut it quietly behind them. As he sat down on the mattress he looked around the room. The walls were still the same dark blue they’d been when it was his space. Thankfully Ava wasn’t a girly girl and didn’t change it when it became hers. He felt comfortable here, at least. Familiarity wrapped around him like a warm blanket. Pop didn’t have that anymore, at least not all the time. As time went on, he’d have it less and less.

  If Mom’s death had been brutal, Pop’s slow decline was hellish in its own way.

  He sighed heavily. “It’s Alzheimer’s,” he told her, though by now she’d more than likely guessed that much. “We found out after Mom died. Or at least, Adam, Jonah, and I did. Apparently, Ava already knew something was wrong and just never said anything.”

  Zoey’s lower lip quivered and he squeezed her hand. “Why didn’t your Mom do anything?” she asked. “Why didn’t she say anything? How… how long was he like this?”

  Dalton grimaced. “Hard to say. A few months, Ava said, before she and Mom noticed it. Jonah wasn’t around much back then.”

  “And she never told you? How could she keep it a secret?”

  He gave her a long look. “The same way you could. First with me and then with him.”

  She tucked in her chin, looking guilty.

  “Zoey, when things first start to get bad, you don’t want to admit it, not to anyone, not to yourself. You know that. Because once you tell someone, once you open your mouth, it’s real. It’s real and it has to be dealt with. And maybe you’re not ready or you don’t know how to fix it. I don’t blame Mom for not telling us. She just wanted to hang on to her husband for as long as she could, or at least the idea of him.”

  She gripped his hand tightly. “I kept thinking you’d get better,” she whispered. “I kept thinking one day you’d wake up and you’d just… be better. But it never happened. And then I did the same thing with Patrick. Every time he yelled, every time he said we didn’t have any money, every time he hit me, I said it was the last time. I said he was just stressed out at work. He’d get a raise, or a different job altogether, and all of it would be behind us. I guess… people slip away from you, or they were never who you thought they were in the first place, and yeah, I can see how she wouldn’t have known what to do.”

  She looked at the closed door across the room. “What will you guys do?”

  “Well, Adam lives here now. In his old room down the hall. And Pop’s in a program. He goes to a nursing home with a Day Program during the week. They have cognitive exercises, enrichment activities.”

  “Sounds like a day care.” She gasped. “Oh, I’m sorry. That was rude. I didn’t mean for it to sound-”

  “No, it’s okay. It is. We know. He knows, too. And that’s the hardest part. He won’t remember today, but he knows he’s getting worse. He has medication, but it’s not helping as much as we’d hoped. We’re doing everything we can.”

  “God,” she said quietly. “God this is so awful. After your mom, after… you. How much more can you take?”

  He shrugged. “All of it,” he told her. “This is what we do, Zoey. This is who we are.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Adam arrived breathless and looking half-wild with concern, scanning the living room for Pop.

  “Relax,” Dalton told him. “He’s in his room right now. It’s under control.”

&nbs
p; Adam looked past Dalton and into the living room again. “You brought Zoey?”

  Dalton nodded. “I didn’t want to leave her at home alone. Though I did tell her to stay in the truck, which she ignored. Obviously.” He gave Zoey an admonishing look and Zoey smiled at him sheepishly. When he turned back, Adam was frowning.

  “I’m so sorry about your dad,” Zoey told Adam as she levered herself out of the chair to stand up. “I had no idea. It must be hard.”

  Calla came through the door and stopped when she spotted Zoey. She then continued to the living room, smiling warmly. “You must be Zoey.”

  Zoey made an apologetic face. “I am. I’m sorry for intruding. I just… well I was worried.”

  “No, it’s fine,” Calla told her. “I mean, I think it’s fine, anyway.”

  Dalton watched Zoey’s shoulders relax as she breathed a sigh of relief. “Oh, good.” Then her nose crinkled. “I’m… are you…?” She looked back and forth between everyone in the room, clearly not wanting to jump to any conclusion.

  “I’m Calla.” She extended her hand and Zoey took it eagerly. “I’m Adam’s girlfriend.”

  “Oh! Oh wow!”

  Calla laughed. “You look shocked.”

  “No! I mean, yeah… kind of. Adam never struck me as…”

  “The type to have a girlfriend?” Calla finished. “Yeah, I’m not surprised.

  Dalton grinned. “He never struck me as the type to have a girlfriend, either. Though for entirely different reasons.”

  “Shut up,” Adam snapped. He turned and looked down the hallway to the closed door. “I’m going to check on Pop.”

  He strode down the hall and knocked. Pop emerged minutes later, looking tired. Dalton thought that maybe the old man’s sleep may have been disturbed last night. When he got off a regular schedule, the episodes were more frequent. Pop looked at Adam, then down the hall until he spotted Calla. The corners of his mouth tugged down. “Don’t tell me she’s pregnant, too.”

  “No,” Calla said smoothly before Adam could answer. “No, Mr. Stark, I’m not pregnant.”