Completing the Pass Read Online Free

one or two jokes, I might crack.” Maeve looked guilty for a moment, then shook it off. “Your father would joke the same way about me if the roles were reversed. I’d expect nothing less.”
    Carri had heard loved ones dealing with someone who had dementia often dealt with burnout quickly. If a little quiet humor helped ease them through, it didn’t seem that bad.
    â€œI’ll stay with Daddy,” she said, then hurried to add, as Maeve’s face split in a wide grin, “but I can’t stay forever. I have a life in Utah. Houses, and a business to grow.”
    Maeve nodded silently, but Carri could already see the wheels turning.
    â€œLet’s get back to Dad.” Carri nearly took another sip of the coffee on autopilot, then remembered the vile aftertaste. “But first, a stop at a vending machine on the way.”
    ***
    Josh laid a hand over Herb’s bandaged one, fighting back tears. “It’s good to see you, Herb.”
    â€œGood to see you too, son.” The older man gave him a weak smile that had pain moving through his eyes. His face wasn’t bandaged—just the top of his head carried the stark white gauze wraps—but it was still red, with a few blisters showing. Moving it at all had to hurt. “We miss you when you can’t stop by during the season.”
    â€œYeah.” Josh swallowed hard. Herb had been more like a father to him than his own who had taken off when he was a child. Josh barely remembered him, but he remembered his mother’s tears for years, and her grit and determination to raise him alone.
    It was Herb who had stepped in when he’d needed a male influence. Herb who gave him the first talk about puberty, who explained sex in a rudimentary, generic sort of way—using more euphemisms and innuendos than a preteen Josh could really follow—who talked to him about condoms and the repercussions of not using one . . .
    Who had been to all of his home games in high school, and the few college games that had been within reasonable driving distance.
    â€œSo,” Josh said, fighting for calm. “You got yourself some sun, huh?”
    â€œJust a little.” Herb cracked a smile again, but his eyes started to flutter closed. “Never can remember my hat.”
    â€œHe’d forget his head if it weren’t attached, according to my mother.”
    Josh turned in his seat to find the bane of his childhood existence standing in the doorway to Herb’s room. How had he thought she wouldn’t come home? She’d been a raging bitch to him growing up . . . but she was still her father’s daughter. “Carri.”
    â€œJosh.” She stepped inside, arms crossed over her chest. Her dark hair was cut close, barely sweeping the collar of her shirt. It should have looked mannish, maybe. Instead it made her look sleek and sexy. Dangerous.
    Sleek and sexy?
Dangerous?
Wrong words for Carrington. More like annoying, picky . . . wrong.
    â€œDoing some male bonding, I take it?”
    â€œSomething like that.” Josh carefully patted Herb’s hand, noting the old man’s eyes had closed. He should have stood, given Carri his chair. Instead he settled back and had the pleasure of watching annoyance flash in her eyes. Immature, maybe, but satisfying. “How long are you swinging through this time, Carrington?”
    â€œNone of your business, Joshua,” she said in the same taunting tone.
    â€œNice to see your dad’s health warrants the time of day from you.” The second he said it, he wanted to bite his tongue. Carri’s face blanched, and he readied himself to catch her if she pitched over. Too far. “Sorry. That was bad.”
    â€œYeah.” She looked at her father for a long moment. “Yeah.”
    â€œLook at these two.” Maeve walked in, arm in arm with Josh’s mother, Gail. The two had been inseparable since