I thought the suitcase meant a family had decided we were not welcome.

It never once occurred to me that the suitcase meant a man had decided to keep welcome from ever reaching us.

Chapter 2 — Just How My Core Family Does It

“Daddy, can we please come this year?” Piper asked from the hallway, the summer she was old enough to ask it plainly.

Grayson did not so much as pause folding his linen shirts.

“Sweetheart, this is just how my core family does its getaway.

It always has been.”

Callum stood beside me, eleven years old, both hands jammed deep in his pockets.

He did not ask to come.

He had stopped asking years before, and watching him stand there with the hope already drained out of his face was, if I am honest, worse than any of Piper’s tears.

“We’re supposed to be your family too,” I said, and hated how my voice shook on it.

Grayson let out the long, patient sigh of a man greatly burdened by unreasonable people.

“You know what I mean, Sloan.

My parents, my siblings — the original unit.