Chapter 20
I SCRUB AT THE DIRT beneath my nails, working to dislodge a bit of grit from the cuticle of my right index finger.
Rage-weeding hadn’t been on my list today, but I needed somewhere to direct my energy.
When I stormed into the house earlier, I’d hoped that the guys would have left something for me to do, but all of the common areas were tidy.
Even the kitchen, where I found that one of my gold-rimmed bowls had been used.
Not only had whichever roommate who’d enjoyed it not left it in the sink with pasta detritus, but he’d hand-washed it and placed it in the rack to dry. Like an adult.
I lift my chin. I am making a difference, Ian. Not “fixing” them.
I wouldn’t use that specific verb, anyway.
Sure, moving in with them was influenced by my desire to mold them into men who know better than to mistreat bespoke dinnerware.
But it’s not like that’s a bad thing. It’s about expecting more from a person because you know they’re capable of more.
So what if it’s largely based on observations about the three of them and not especially tailored to their specific wants and interests?
It’s all baseline stuff! Everything we’re doing at the Dawghouse is something they had the capacity to do on their own; they just needed someone to light a fire under them.
Which is exactly what I didn’t do while I was with Cole. With Cole, I was the enabler. The Ian.
Ian, who can bite me. And not in a sexy way.
But…I sag against the sink. He can also bite me in a sexy way. Presuming that he ever gets his head out of his butt and acknowledges that I’m right.
Which I am.
And so is he.
Once again in a huff, I dry my hands and return to the bedroom. A hulking shape fills the doorway to outside. I let out a yelp at the same moment I realize it’s Ian. Because of course it is.
“Shit, sorry!” he says. He makes to step into the room but stops short of entering.
I hold a hand to my chest, heart still thundering from the fright… and him. “It’s fine. Just wasn’t expecting you.” I check the time. “Shouldn’t you be coaching?”
One meaty shoulder rises and falls. “Diego’s covering. I need to apologize. I was a dick.”
While not quite the white flag that would qualify him to bite me in a sexy way—not that I entertained that image for a portion of the time I spent weeding (Lies! I did!)—it is sufficient to grant him entry. I gesture him forward, and he comes in.
Toeing off his sneakers—ugh, the consideration!—he does a slow scan of his former dwelling. “It looks good,” he says, pleasantly. “The plants make a difference.” When his eyes meet mine, his smile drops. His brows draw together. “Grant’s told you about living with me when he was younger, right?”
“Yeah,” I say, not bothering to feign ignorance. I gesture toward my throne, tucked between Kronk the fiddle-leaf fig and the bookshelf in my reading nook. “Have a seat.” I pull up my desk chair for myself.
He sits, tugging off his hat and running his fingers through his hair. “I was twenty-seven. And living with me meant that he started living the bachelor life at fourteen.”
I wait him out, easing the rolling chair closer. Even though I know the basics, I like hearing this straight from him. I don’t like that I find it sexy, but that’s hardly his fault.
“Between my training schedule and, generally, being a late-twenties idiot, I didn’t get in a lot of lessons on laundry. As long as his grades were okay and he came home when I asked, we were good. But now…”
His frown deepens to a thoughtful scowl. On any other man his size, the expression would be intimidating, but on him, it’s like seeing a Great Dane puzzle over a chew toy. “You’re highlighting every way I failed him.”
I recoil so violently, my seat rolls back. “Failed? You think you failed him?”
His shoulders tense, like I’d made the accusation, not repeated it. “Everything you’re having to teach him—grocery shopping, laundry, how to live like he wasn’t raised in a barn. It’s all stuff I didn’t fill him in on back then.”
“Plenty of actual parents do worse,” I say, thinking of what I saw when I was teaching.
“Snowplowing every bit of resistance their kid comes up against, or helicoptering them until they’ve been so micromanaged that they can’t even get dressed on their own.
Granted, he does spend a lot of time without a shirt on.
” I shrug. “At this point, Alistair’s skewed my perspective on how much exposure is normal in their demographic. ”
This gets me a laugh, and some of the tension leaves the space between us. “Grant’s a good kid, Ian. A good man. That’s more important than whether he presorts his laundry.”
Ian half smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes.
We’re close enough that I nudge him with my socked foot, and he looks at the point of contact before making his leisurely way up to my face.
For a moment, I forget whatever insightful thing I was going to say.
The man just took a very thorough scan of my leg, thank you very much.
“If you’re bent on taking responsibility for the gaps in his knowledge, you also get to take credit for the good parts.
He’s kind and thoughtful, disciplined about the things he cares about.
Those things aren’t taught. They’re modeled.
So if you’re the primary influence, he learned all that from you. ”
Ian is back to puzzling over the imagined chew toy. I have to stop thinking about this man in canine terms. That’s some deeply weird Dr. Moreau nonsense.
But he’s looking considerably less domesticated when he meets my eyes. There’s something assessing in his gray gaze, and the trace of heat I’m seeing suggests it’s about more than my flattering observations. I am again entertaining thoughts of biting…
“You!” I blurt. “The impact talk, about size and leaving a door open. Your dad was abroad, so that was you.” He nods, and the confirmation does nothing for my sexy bite thoughts.
He clears his throat. “You’re a good influence, Ellie. He’s learning a lot from you.”
Something in my chest goes soft at the compliment. “It helps that the payoff is quick. He learns to grocery shop, he eats better. He cleans the bathroom more often, he doesn’t have to wonder whose hair is clogging the drain. He keeps his room decent, he’ll probably get laid more.”
Ian smirks.
“I—” I have to clear my throat against unwelcome emotion. I could skip over this, but it needs to be said to fully clear the air. “I’m not trying to replace anyone.”
His eyes tighten. “I shouldn’t have said that.”
He’s watching me too carefully, so I press on before he can ask why that had been my breaking point earlier.
“And it is a little self-serving. You’ve seen me in action.
There was no way I was going to survive in this house with dicks on the mirrors and mysteries in the microwave.
And—” I grit my teeth. He’s been vulnerable; I can, too.
“You weren’t off base. I did assume a lot when I came in here.
And I was already in the habit of picking up slack. ”
“With Cole.” He says it like an accusation. Or maybe I just decide to hear it as one.
“Just your standard expression of deep-seated issues around being needed and useful to demonstrate to others that I’m worth keeping around. Maybe a means to compensate for past failures to prove to myself that I’m not a loser. Normal stuff.” I pretend to shrug it off.
Ian’s eyes widen. “Jesus, Hayes.”
“I can be painfully self-aware. It’s a great defense. Acknowledge your faults before anyone else has a chance to use them against you. If… you want to try it?”
His expression shutters, but not as completely as it has in the past. “I have a hard time accepting help. It feels like…” His brow furrows. “The gym is what I’m good at. Or it’s what I’m supposed to be good at, now that I can’t compete. I’m assuming you know—”
“How you were injured and coached for your mentor who didn’t choose you to take over his gym when he retired so you started Firehouse on your own with the settlement money and your sterling reputation?” I say, stringing the words together on a single breath.
One corner of his mouth quirks, threatening a smile. “Diego’s wearing off on you.”
“Maybe. I’m still stuck on why your mentor wouldn’t sell to you.”
The almost-smile flattens to a pained line. “Denny said that I didn’t have it in me to run a place. According to him, I lacked ‘business acumen.’”
He pauses, brows high, like he’s waiting for me to tell him his mentor had been right.
“Dude,” I say, and genuinely wince. “I am needling at all your insecurities, aren’t I?”
He barks out a surprised laugh, one that rouses something in my memory. I’d gotten some of those out of him the night we met. Good for me.
But a moment later, the humor’s gone. “The man was a second father to me. He knew me better than anyone, and he didn’t trust me with what he’d built. He didn’t think I could do it.”
A response dances on my tongue, but I wait him out. I can connect the dots, but the teacher training says that the lesson will have more meaning if he draws the lines himself.
“That fucked with me. Hard. And I know it’s something I should be able to get over, but every time a member or one of the guys or you point out something that needs improving or a new way of doing things, it’s confirmation that Denny was right. I don’t have it in me.”
Again, I wait.
“But, Hayes? The nuts and bolts of operating the gym? I hate it.” He falls back into the chair. “I just want to coach and help people the way I’m good at, you know?”