Kipling grinned. “I don’t think they’ll notice. Old is old.” He pulled Aidan aside. “I heard about your gift. Thanks. Destiny and I both appreciate it. I was prepared to take it on myself, but this really helps.”

Aidan had given Starr a certificate for ten driving lessons. “You have enough on your plate,” he said. “Plus I think having someone other than family teach her will make it easier for everyone.”

“I owe you.”

Aidan started to say that was what you did for family, then stopped himself. He and Kipling weren’t related. Being friends with Shelby didn’t make them family. But he did think of Kipling as more than just a guy he knew.

Kipling returned to Destiny’s side. They’d left the baby with a sitter and were enjoying their night out. Shelby had joined the teens and was learning the new dance. Music played and laughter filled the vast space.

This was good, he thought with contentment. How birthdays were supposed to be. When he’d been a kid, his mom had tried, but Ceallach had inevitably done something to ruin the day. It had taken Aidan a long time to figure out his father always had to be the center of attention. Even on one of his kids’ birthdays.

He wondered what it had been like for Shelby—growing up terrified of her father. He doubted her birthdays had been very fun, either. At boarding school, she would have been safe, but away from family.

For the millionth time, he wondered why his mother had stayed. He knew she would say what she felt was love, but he had his doubts. But she’d been stuck and—

Aidan watched the girls dance and Shelby laugh. The music played and the scent of the upcoming meal drifted through the space, but he was removed from it all. Thoughts formed, faded, then reformed. Then he got it.

Love didn’t mean being stuck. What he’d most disliked about his parents’ relationship wasn’t that his mother couldn’t leave. It was that she chose not to and his father had abused them all. Maybe not with his fists, but in other ways. Shelby’s mother hadn’t been stuck. She could have walked away at any time. And she hadn’t. She’d stayed for reasons they would never understand.

It wasn’t that she’d chosen her husband over her children, it was that she’d accepted what her husband had done to her children. Love wasn’t supposed to allow pain to happen to your kids. Not when it could easily be prevented.

Whatever those women felt, it wasn’t love. Because love meant giving, not taking. Love wasn’t about making excuses or having to choose between the father and the child. Love wasn’t being stuck—it was about being set free.

* * *

“DIDN’T WE JUST do this?” Shelby asked as she followed Madeline into Jo’s Bar.

“You did,” her friend told her. “I was working. Now we’re having a girls’ lunch that I can attend.”

Which all sounded great, but Shelby wasn’t buying it. There was something about the way Madeline had insisted they go to lunch that made her wonder if something else was going on.

Maybe her friend wanted to talk to her about her upcoming wedding. Or there was yet another pregnancy to celebrate.

She saw Taryn and Patience were already waiting at a smaller booth along the back wall. A booth that only sat four.

“Not a big crowd today,” she said as she and Madeline approached the table.

Madeline did her best to smile, but it was obviously fake. There was a hint of nervousness as she said, “Sometimes that’s more fun.”

Shelby sat down next to Patience, looked at the other two and asked flatly, “What’s up?”

Patience sighed. “I knew we couldn’t fool you for long. I was hoping for at least ten minutes.”