7. No Lunch Lost
CHAPTER 7
No Lunch Lost
P ride filled Heath as he drove to town with Addy and Nina in his car. He was the dad of an amazing girl. Well, he was probably just a father for the moment. The title of Dad had to be earned. And he was going to earn it.
The previous night, it had been hours before he’d been civilized enough to return to the house. But Levi’s hay bales had done the trick. He’d been able to vent out a ton of the hurt, anger, and pain.
He’d slept like the dead for enough hours that he felt mostly human today. He’d spent some time on the internet researching heart conditions in pregnancy. Preeclampsia was relatively common. High blood pressure in the latter stages of pregnancy. He hoped it was that, because that condition appeared to improve after the baby’s birth. Addy had said her heart had healed.
Another condition was cardiomyopathy. As far as he knew, Addy didn’t have many of the risk factors, although her youth may have contributed. And her finances. He’d bet she hadn’t had the money for doctor’s visits. He’d have ensured she had the best of everything. His parents had so much to answer for.
After his research, he’d written emails to anyone who needed to know that he was relocating to Phail. Which still sounded ridiculous.
His parents weren’t on the list of who needed to know. He wasn’t sure when or how he was going to deal with that, but he had to do it. He just didn’t want to lose any time with Nina and Addy to deal with them.
But he wasn’t going to think about that when he was taking his girls for lunch. He wondered if his girls was insulting or politically incorrect. Addy was a woman, not a girl. And she wasn’t his anymore. But his brain wanted to call them his girls, and he was going to let it. He just wouldn’t do it out loud.
Was there any chance for him to have Addy as his again? He’d harbored so much anger at her for years. Getting ghosted had been devastating. Now he knew she hadn’t ghosted him at all.
Could they rekindle that relationship? No other woman had ever attracted him like Addy. He’d never felt that shiver of awareness when other women walked into a room. When he’d first seen her over the roof of his car yesterday, he’d wanted to kiss the breath out of her. Well, he’d wanted to do a lot more than that, but kissing her would have been a good start.
He still wanted that. Wanted more than that. Every time they touched in the most innocent of ways, his body fired up. He wanted her.
But he wasn’t going to rush and screw it up. Nina had to be the priority now. The adults could wait. Probably.
He pulled into the same parking lot as the previous day and looked over at Addy’s car, which still sat there. Then he laughed. “The odds of both of us pulling into this parking lot at the same time have to be astronomical.”
She smiled back at him while Nina leaned into the front seat. “Is that what happened? I didn’t even ask. Must have been fate putting you both here.”
Then she popped out of the car. Heath couldn’t tear his gaze off of Addy. She smiled at him, with her gaze flickering between his mouth and his eyes. Good to know the attraction wasn’t all one-sided.
Nina knocked on the window. “Come on, it’s cold. We need to get you in there quickly.”
Addy rolled her eyes at her daughter, who stuck out her tongue. While they both laughed, Addy pulled her scarf over her mouth and sent him one more smile before she got out of the car.
Heath hurried to round the car. He wanted to tuck Addy under his arm and protect her against the chill, but that would be pushing it. Instead, he walked beside her and tried to block the wind.
When they arrived at the diner, he reached around them to open the door and usher them in. Nina grinned her thanks at him and bounced into the restaurant. He put his hand on Addy’s lower back as they walked inside. The rush of emotion from that simple touch nearly knocked his knees out.
The door had barely closed behind him when the decor of the diner had him laughing softly. A huge Phail family crest covered the wall above the side booths. The booths and the cushions on the stools were both covered in the Phail blue and green tartan. But the delicious scents filling the small space were Mexican.
He leaned forward to whisper to Addy. “Is everything in this town ridiculous?”
Her answering smile had him grinning.
They moved to where Nina stood at the counter talking to a woman who had to be Troy’s cousin, Ginny. Their coloring and faces were so similar they could have been twins.
Ginny turned her steady eyes on him. “Hello, Heath. Welcome to Phail. I’m Ginny Phail.”
He shook her hand. “That was my guess. You’re a much prettier version of Epic.”
She laughed and gestured. “Take any booth you like. Are you a coffee guy, Heath?”
His girls moved to a booth, and he stayed to answer her question with a resounding yes. Then he spoke quietly. “I’ve got a lot of catching up to do. But I want to thank you for everything you and Nimii have done for Addy and Nina. You’re a spectacular friend, and if either of you needs anything I can provide, all you need to do is ask.”
Ginny’s face softened, and she tilted her head. “Those two are a joy. And I think you’re going to fit right in.”
She turned to get the drinks, and he slid into the booth. Addy had sat first, and Nina bounced in the seat beside her. Addy was still apparently more comfortable in the corners and shadows.
He checked out the chalkboard menu. “What’s your favorite thing to eat here? It smells incredible.”
Nina grinned. “Everything is fantastic. Manuel can cook anything. Do you like Mexican food?”
Heath nodded. “Love it.”
“Slick!”
He turned to find Troy, Sean, and two women walking in. He raised his hand in greeting, not surprised his buddies had shown up. They’d seen how wrecked he’d been last night and would have wanted to check on him.
“You’re Slick?” Nina’s voice was incredulous.
He swung back around to find her staring at him, mouth open. Addy had the same look. “What?”
Nina laughed. “You’re Slick? We’ve heard stories about you.”
“You have?”
Nina leaned forward. “Lots of stories. You were the one who helped stop those thugs from cheating the villagers. And you stopped that group of insurgents from wiping out those families by distracting them with bird calls. And you always helped every village with their financial stuff. We’ve heard about you, but we didn’t know it was you.”
Tears filled Nina’s eyes as she repeated. “We didn’t know it was you.”
Unable to stop himself, he moved around the table to squat beside her. She flung her arms around his neck, and he buried his face in her hair. He felt Addy’s small hand stroke Nina’s hair and then his arm.
When Nina sat back up, she wiped her eyes and smiled. “We liked you before we knew it was you. That’s pretty cool.”
Heath squeezed her hand and moved back to his seat, overcome with emotion. Pretty cool, indeed.
Troy took over the conversation, giving him a moment to compose himself. Then he introduced his girlfriend, Piper, and Sean’s Branna.
The group took the booth behind Heath, and he shifted to lean his back against the window so he could keep involved with the conversations.
Nina kept grinning at him and saying things. I’m so glad I liked you before I got to meet you. Mom was right about you.
His heart was going to burst right in the middle of a Scottish diner serving tacos.
A ddy was glad that she didn’t need to contribute much to the conversation. Her mind was reeling.
Heath was the Slick she’d heard about for years. Years. And she’d never known it was him. It seemed impossible that she hadn’t seen a picture of the men’s army team. Impossible that no one had used his real name.
When Nina popped out of the booth to greet a friend, Heath turned in his seat and took her hand across the table. “You okay?”
She automatically nodded, but then she shook her head. “I don’t know. I’ve been hearing these stories for years. Why didn’t I ever ask what Slick’s real name was? How did I never see a photo of the whole group? We could have brought you into our lives years ago.”
His face reflected her sorrow. “Maybe it was meant to be this way. Maybe we wouldn’t have been ready to believe each other.”
Her eyes flooded, and she ducked her head. Heath knew because, of course he did. He held her hand and rubbed her fingers while she pulled herself together. No sobbing in public. Heath’s touch grounded her, and it didn’t take long for her to suck back the tears.
Her heart was warm. Nina was right. They’d liked him before they knew him. While Heath and Nina hadn’t had the chance to make memories together, her daughter still had some memories about her dad to cherish.
When Nina bounced back, the group moved the conversation to lighter topics, although his Army buddies made a point to talk Heath up at every turn. They were really great people.
Their paths had been overlapping in recent years and it was overwhelming her that if she’d only heard his name mentioned even once, it would have changed everything. But the guys used call signs when they talked about their Army days. Actually, they still used them enough that she knew the only one from their team who wasn’t in Phail was Scooby. He’d lost his K-9 partner overseas, and all the men were worried about him.
They’d been worried about Slick, too. Worried that his life in the financial world didn’t fulfill him. Concerned because they knew Slick’s family were racist snobs who he mostly ignored and who mostly ignored him because he didn’t follow in their footsteps. Which left him with no true family.
They’d also worried about his heart. Because they knew he’d been ghosted by a girl he’d loved when his parents had insisted he join the Army on his eighteenth birthday.
She’d known all of that about him. If she’d put the name and the background together, she might have reached out years earlier. He and Nina might have had more years together.
Guilt swamped her, but she tried to battle it down. They couldn’t change the past and she had enough regrets without adding more. Maybe it was time to branch out into writing for adults. She could pour a lot of this story into fiction, and perhaps that would help her deal with the pain.
She’d done that with her blog, A Kid Having A Kid . It had been a way of writing about her fears and hopes when she’d been alone. The response to it had blown her away. So many people who’d been living in the same situation. So many people who’d survived it.
The blog had grown quickly until she’d gained sponsors. Then, a book deal. Her world had changed. Not in a buy a mansion and travel the world way. It had been much better than that.
Those things had given her an income she enjoyed in addition to her serving jobs. It had also given her the nudge she’d needed to try her hand at writing for publication.
Her choices had been influenced by Nina. Baby board books for Ojibwe parents. Story books about brave girls exploring the world. A middle-grade series about an Indigenous girl, Bini, who solves mysteries with her friends. And now her new series aimed at teens based on Zigi, who lived in a future world.
None of those projects had made her rich, but they paid the bills and gave her joy at the same time. Not everyone was that lucky.
But she would have been luckier if she’d figured out Slick’s story earlier. She was a storyteller, and therein lay the guilt. She should have at least questioned the background. Although she wouldn’t have known Heath thought she’d ghosted him.
Below the diner table, Heath nudged her foot and brought her back to the conversation around her. Nina and the others were used to her being quiet. Heath knew, too.
But the soft smile he aimed her way proved he knew the direction of her thoughts. The regrets. He mouthed the words, it’s all good .
That had her smiling back. If he believed it, she would try to as well.
Nina turned to her. “Do you need to get more words in this afternoon, or do you think we could show Slick around the town?”
The slight emphasis on Slick had Addison smiling. Her bright daughter had figured out how to get around the Dad/Heath dilemma all on her own. That didn’t surprise her in the least.
“I got a lot done while you were working with Kimi, so I’m free for the rest of the day.” In reality, she wasn’t sure if she’d met her word count goal for the day, but it wouldn’t matter. She’d stay up later or get up early if she had to. Helping Heath and Nina build a relationship was the most important thing.
When the two of them grinned at her, she laughed. “Your smiles are exactly the same.”
They looked at each other, and happiness lit up both their faces. Then they started making goofy faces that the other one copied.
Addison laughed along with everyone while she tried to shove away the guilt for not having recognized that before. She’d been so hurt by Heath’s departure that she hadn’t looked for physical similarities beyond the obvious. Nina took after Addison physically, but there were lots of Heath tells now that she thought of it.
They both tilted their heads the same way before a particularly mischievous comment. They drummed their fingers on their thighs. Neither of them liked cereal, but both loved blueberry pancakes.
How many more things had she not noticed? She’d focus on that. And she’d tell them both what she spotted. Maybe, in a little way, she could give them back some of what they’d lost.
And repair all of their hearts just a little bit more.