Chapter 2 #2
“Say no more—of course I’ll pick him up.” I changed direction and headed for the hallway. “Do you want me to watch him till you get off work?”
He worked with Chloe at the inn when he wasn’t studying field medicine for SAR missions, of all things.
“Thank you,” Gray replied, the relief evident. “No need to watch him, just drive him over to the inn. He gets fussy when he’s sick, so I don’t think he’ll accept anyone’s company but mine and Dare’s.”
That made sense. Chloe had told me the boy was sensitive to certain things—and that he might be autistic or something like that. They’d decided he was too young to go through a screening.
“No problem,” I said, grabbing my car keys. “Let the day care know I’m on my way.”
“I owe you, Aunt Nat. Thank you!”
Heck, this was one of the reasons I’d moved here. I wanted to be closer to family.
“Do I pick up a car seat at the inn or at Darius’s restaurant?” I asked.
“Oh no, he has one at day care,” Gray said. “He’s got two grandmothers with sticky fingers, so we’re always prepared.”
I grinned, and I heard Chloe defending her innocent baby-snatchings in the background.
My rescue operation was uneventful and successful, and less than forty minutes later, I pulled into the guest parking outside the inn with a sniffling four-year-old.
This place was freaking gorgeous. A large, three-story Victorian with a wraparound porch and perfectly maintained flower beds and fruit trees.
The house sat at the end of a cul-de-sac and had nothing but tree-covered mountains as a backdrop.
“We’re here, sweetie. You ready to see Daddy Gray and Nana?” I got out of the car and opened the back to let Justin out.
He was nonverbal when he was alone with me, but he was evidently comfortable enough around me to extend his arms, a silent request for me to carry him. And that was how he made my day. Sweet darling. No wonder Chloe couldn’t stop gushing about the boys.
I unfastened his belt and picked him up, then earned myself a soft giggle when I hurried along the path toward the house. The rain was picking up.
Gray must’ve been keeping an eye out from inside, because he came out just as I climbed the porch steps.
Even though I’d seen him plenty since I’d moved up here, it was so difficult to comprehend how much he’d matured. How tall he was, how adult he looked—heck, he was growing a beard! My hockey-playing goof of a nephew was simply gone.
“Hey, you two.” He smiled warmly at the sight of us, and Justin whipped around in my arms and immediately reached out to him.
“Daddy!”
My heart.
“I’m right here, buddy.” Gray gathered the boy in his arms and kissed his forehead, and I knew exactly why. It was such a parent way of feeling a child’s temperature. Gray was a natural. “What’s this I hear about you being sick, huh? We don’t like fevers, do we?”
“Nuh-uh.” Justin shook his head. “Can Nana give me ice cream?”
I grinned.
“You bet,” Gray assured. “She’s turning our reading chair in the staff room into a movie zone for you as we speak.”
Justin nodded. “We speak.”
I sighed, finding them both too adorable for words. I guessed part of it was because I was still soaking up every second I got to spend with Gray. He’d been through so much.
“I know that expression,” he told me. “That’s how Mom still looks at me sometimes.”
“Can you blame us?” I didn’t want to put a damper on the mood, so I walked up to him and pinched his cheek. “And look at you, you’re growin’ a beard.”
He groaned through a laugh. “Do you see how Nattie treats Daddy, Justin? That’s how Nana and Grandma pinch your cheeks.”
Nattie, huh? Well, all right, that could be my nickname.
“Yeah, lots,” Justin snickered. “But then I get ice cream. Daddy, I want ice cream.”
The boy was determined.
“Goodness, go give him ice cream, Gray,” I urged.
“Okay, okay—” He stepped aside—we both did—as two guests came outside with firm grasps on their umbrellas and tourist maps.
“Thanks again for saving the day.” Gray dipped down and kissed my cheek.
“By the way, Mom said you’re thinking about joining a gym?
If you go to the place across the street from your apartment, avoid Ethan at all costs. ”
Whoa, wait, what?
“Wh-what?” I stammered like an idiot.
“Uncle Ethan!” Justin exclaimed.
So he was related to Darius.
Gray grinned ruefully. “Yes, Uncle Ethan, buddy. He works close to where Nattie lives.” He turned to me again.
“Let’s just say he’s easy to love but extremely difficult to like.
You’re just like Mom—zero filter—and if you discover how arrogant and vain that dude is, you won’t be able to keep your mouth shut.
And I would like to keep the peace in the family. ”
Oh my God, he couldn’t say that to me and expect me not to wanna hash it out. I had questions! Ethan was my PT!
“Anyway—it’s still a great gym,” Gray told me. “Cathy’s amazing. She helped Abel—you remember my best friend, right? She helped him with his knee injury a couple years ago.”
My head was officially fucked, and I had no time to ask my questions. Gray said he’d call me later, and then he excused himself to head back inside. I could tell he was a little stressed out. Summer was tourist season and whatever. But what about me? I hadn’t freaking chosen Cathy!
Avoid Ethan at all costs.
I cursed and went back to my car.
After killing the engine, I gripped the wheel with both hands and bit my lip.
I was ten minutes early.
The grocery store didn’t open till eight, when I was meeting Ethan.
Was I making a big mistake?
Last night, I’d gone back and forth for hours.
It made sense that Gray would recommend Cathy if she’d helped my nephew’s best friend with a sports injury.
I did remember Abel; he was an NHL player.
But he’d played in high school too, with Gray.
So they had that athlete mind-set, I’d rationalized.
And maybe what was best for a hockey player wasn’t a good fit for me. As for Ethan being arrogant and vain…?
I…I didn’t know what to think. Gray obviously knew the man better than I did—but that was the thing. I wasn’t planning on getting to know Ethan at all, and he’d been very nice in a professional setting.
Granted, if he was Darius’s brother, chances were I’d see Ethan at a dinner or birthday party eventually, though I wanted to drag that out. I’d been so hopeful yesterday, and I didn’t want to start over so soon.
No, I was gonna do what I’d decided last night. I was gonna keep quiet about the family members Ethan and I had in common, and I was going to take full advantage of our professional relationship so I could get my weight loss off the ground.
For all I knew, Ethan was doing the same thing. He knew my last name. He must know Gray’s last name too. Or maybe he hadn’t made the connection. I didn’t know. I was riddled with doubt all of a sudden, but my mind was still made up. I wanted to see this through.
A tap on the window made me jump in my seat, and I spotted Ethan outside wearing a QFC tee and a curious smile.
Shit. Okay, let’s do this.
I unbuckled my seat belt and opened the door.
“Good morning,” he said. “I’ll admit that’s not the car I thought you would drive.”
What was wrong with my car? It was my baby. A ’92 Jeep Wrangler, teal-colored, which was my favorite.
“What car did you think I would drive, then?” I asked.
He shrugged and glanced around the parking lot. It was slowly filling with the early shoppers.
“A Prius?” he guessed.
A Prius?!
Oh, my daddy would roll over in his grave.
I scrunched my nose and pretended to survey the parking lot too. “So where’s your red Porsche?”
“Ouch,” he laughed. “Well played.”
I thought so too.
On our way into the store, Ethan grabbed a cart and said I’d be in charge. He was here as my safety net, sounding board, and advice machine. His words. And I was buying food for one week, no more.
“Do you enjoy cooking?” he asked.
“I love it.” We arrived at the in-store bakery and bread section first, and I suppressed a sigh at the sight of white bread. “So this carb cycling you want me to try…I assume it’s not any type of carbs.”
“For the most part,” he confirmed. He stopped at a display with freshly baked loaves.
“The simple trick about foods you shouldn’t eat often is not to have it at home.
White bread is for when you meet up with a friend at a coffee shop or a weekend brunch with your family—cake is for birthdays, and so on.
I will never tell you to cut out anything altogether.
We’ve eaten sugar and white bread for generations, and everything has its advantages in small amounts.
Sometimes very small.” He smirked faintly and held up a loaf of whole grain bread with sunflower seeds and carrots.
“Let’s talk breakfast. What do you usually eat? ”
“Um, I wanna circle back to family brunch first,” I said. “I’m not trying to find loopholes or anything, just get a good idea of those small amounts. I’m fairly social, so I’d probably get nowhere if I indulged in white bread every time I met up with a friend.”
“Good point,” he replied with a nod. “Okay, so here’s the standard mind-set you wanna incorporate.
One, always see if there’s a healthier option on the menu.
Two, you can’t hate it. If you hate the food you eat, you’ll fall off the wagon.
Three, before your new lifestyle has become more of a habit, maybe restrict the intake of white bread to once a week. How’s that?”
Once a week was more generous than all the diets that forbade it completely. I struggled with those a lot, not just because I loved white bread but because life didn’t work that way. I had business dinners, events, and work travels. Healthy food wasn’t always available.
“That sounds good.”
I didn’t think I’d ever spent a full hour in a grocery store before, but time flew by surprisingly fast. Ethan was the advice machine he’d promised, and for every item we added to my cart, I gained a bit more understanding and clarity about how the rest of my everyday life was going to look.
I had the healthier fats, like olive oil, avocados, walnuts, olives, and fatty fish. The healthier carbs, like whole grain bread packed with seeds and whatnot, a few kinds of rice, including white, and a single serving of baby potatoes.
I had an epic amount of beans and lentils too.
Throughout the hour, Ethan texted me recipes I could use for inspiration, and he talked about the importance of never starving oneself, always making sure the body got all the nutrients it needed.
Most of this stuff, I’d heard before in various contexts with different diets, but I liked having it all put together for what Ethan was doing for me.
He signed me up to QFC’s automatic text service too, where I would receive occasional reminders, usually one or two texts a day, with prompts to drink more water and get up and move around.
When we were done and left the store together, my mind was swimming with unwritten lists, options for healthy snacks, terms that were new for me, like metabolic confusion. Basically, I needed to have a lot of variety, and I would alternate between days with more carbs and days with no carbs at all.
I was ready to give it a go.
After helping me load the groceries into my car, Ethan went to return the cart.
In the meantime, I scrolled down to the recipe I’d use for dinner tonight. I mean, I never followed a recipe religiously, but I liked the inspiration. And if someone told me I could eat grilled chicken with the crispy skin, they were my friend for life.
The skin is where you get your boost of collagen, he’d told me.
Ethan returned and stuck his hands in the pockets of his jeans. “Did you settle on a dinner?”
“Yes! The grilled chicken with lentil salad,” I said.
“That’s a good one.” He nodded. “So, remember—always eat when you’re hungry, stop eating when you’re not hungry, drink plenty of water, and call or text whenever you need help.
Especially in the beginning, we tend to need more support, and I’d rather you blow up my phone with texts than try to handle every craving or hesitation by yourself. ”
How could someone so supportive possibly be the man Gray had described? I just didn’t see it. In less than twenty-four hours, Ethan had removed most of my worries about this lifestyle change.
“I really appreciate this,” I said honestly. “I know it’s a service I’m paying for, but I didn’t think you’d go all in like you have. It makes a big difference.”
He smiled. “My big secret is that I genuinely care about people’s physical and mental health. But don’t tell anyone.”
I laughed softly. “Your secret is safe with me, Coach.”
His smile morphed into a wolfish little grin, and I could tell he liked his nickname.
He was awfully handsome and, yeah, sexy too. But there was something about him… I got the feeling he was trying to hide the things I was most drawn to. Such as his age and all the signs that showed he’d left his thirties behind.
“So I’ll see you Friday morning, yeah?”
I nodded. “I’ll be there at nine.” It’d been one of the few available time slots, though it suited me fine. Working primarily from home allowed me to be flexible with appointments.
“Perfect. Good job today. I’ll text you tonight,” he said.
I’d thought about that earlier, and I couldn’t help but ask, “Do you get any time off, or do you spend every evening talking to clients?”
He chuckled. “It’s not that much work. I only take on four or five full-time clients like you, and a few texts here and there don’t bother me one bit.
I like following their progress.” He shrugged.
“I had one client a few months ago who treated the evening texts like his private journal, and it gave me a good insight. It was easier for me to tailor his workout plan when I knew his mental state.”
Goddammit, he kept saying all the right things.
Could Gray be wrong?
I decided right then and there to snoop. Chloe had to know the man somewhat too.