Page 165 of Boys Who Hunt

I nearly choke on my own spit. “Jesus Christ, Dad, no!” Ivy looks mortified, so I shove my old license plate in his hands to change the conversation. “You’ve met her now, can I please have the old one back?”

“Fine, since you asked nicely this time.” He winks, embarrassing me all over.

Goddammit.

He goes to the back of the shop where the supplies are kept.

“So, that’s your dad, huh?” she mutters.

“Yup.”

“You two sure are alike.”

“Fuck no,” I growl, folding my arms.

She chuckles right when he comes back.

“What’s so funny?” Dad asks.

“Nothing,” I reply.

“I’m just impressed at how much you injected your genes into him,” Ivy muses.

“I know, I’m proud of my best work,” he says, patting me on the shoulder. “If only he didn’t get himself into so much trouble.”

I swat his hand away and snatch the license plate from his fingers.

“Would it kill you to hate me less?” he asks.

“Yes. It would,” I retort, and I promptly turn around and wave. “See you later.”

“Stop by the house some time, Heath. Mom misses you,” Dad calls as we make our way outside.

“She’ll be fine,” I yell back.

“Why do you talk to him like that?” Ivy asks.

“We’re not on the best of terms right now,” I reply.

“Why?”

I pause. “Do you have to pry like that?”

She puts her hands against her hips. “Like you’re prying into my life?”

Touche.

I open the car door, but she refuses to get inside until I finally speak up. I sigh out loud and run my fingers through my long hair. “He and my mom decided to ship my sister off to a boarding school and didn’t tell me until it was too late to say goodbye.”

The look on her face softens. “I didn’t know you had a sister.”

“Now you do. Well, I had one, because she hasn’t contacted me ever since.”

She steps inside and I shut the door before fixing the plate on the back of the car. Then I hop behind the wheel. It’s quiet for sometime as I start up the engine, but after I’ve driven off, she starts chewing her lip.

“I’m sorry.”

“About what?”