19. Andi
Chapter 19
Andi
I n the last week since Griffin and I spent the night together in his bed, I’ve slept in my bed downstairs every night, but on the days he was home from work, we spent a few hours together kissing and laughing and getting naked. At least until we had to pretend we didn’t when it was time to pick up the kids from the bus stop.
I’d officially been their nanny and living in the Stone house for over a month. It’s been amazing—after that slightly bumpy start, of course. I’ve slotted so easily into life here, and while I never thought I’d enjoy childcare, Logan and Grace are awesome kids. They’re smart and funny and reveal things about myself that I didn’t know. Like my hatred of folding any laundry that isn’t my own and my reticence to relearn math skills but love of history. And how I’m more cut out for being a parental figure than I assumed.
It’s the twins’ birthday, and Logan has been begging his dad for a cell phone. Griffin has been resolute that they will not have cell phones until they’re fourteen. Grace doesn’t seem to mind since she has one best friend and that’s about it, but Logan is Mr. Popular. I know all his friends have cell phones because he’s told me. Multiple times.
After dinner and cake, when the twins received their gifts—from me, sunglasses for Logan and a Taylor Swift shirt for Grace, from Griffin, fifty-dollar gift certificates to their favorite food places—Logan brings it up again, pointing out, “Aunt Taryn got Maddie a phone in fourth grade.”
I thought the gift certificates were more than enough. While it wasn’t the most personal gift, they’re useful and perfectly Griffin, but Logan’s still upset, unable to understand his father’s side.
After a quiet moment, Griffin says, “Your cousin needed a cell phone. You’re not in the same situation as her.”
Logan throws his arms out to his sides. “But I can’t Snap with Valentina!”
I can see Griffin holding his temper in check, ever careful not to raise his voice to his kids, even if they shout at him. “I don’t know who Valentina is, but I swear to God, if you bring up the damn cell phones one more time, you won’t see one until you’re out of this house.”
Grace tosses me a nervous look and scurries out of the kitchen just as Logan opens his mouth to argue again. Griffin lifts his hand, which silences his son immediately. “You wanna talk shit?” Griffins says quietly. Too quietly. Like the calm before a storm. “You’ll go clean shit.”
I don’t know what that means, but I guess Logan does from the way he shakes his head.
“Go do your homework and chores,” Griffin orders, and Logan stomps off, mumbling curse words I know Griffin pretends not to hear because there’s no way he didn’t.
Once we’re alone in the kitchen, I move closer to him. “You wanna talk shit, you’ll go clean shit?”
He answers without looking at me. “Scrubbing the toilet with a toothbrush. The consequence of talking back.”
Tough but effective, and clearly a takeaway from his past life in the military. I would also assume the kids hate it and that it might make them resent him a little.
After a minute, Griffin’s jaw slackens. “Was I too hard on him?”
I consider the question, wagging my head side to side. “I imagine it’s not easy to be a kid in school without the thing everyone else has. I remember how that feels.”
He grunts and spins around, glaring out of the window over the sink. I don’t let him fume long, rubbing my palm over his back. “I also imagine it’s hard to be a single parent and have to carry the weight of every decision alone, bear the brunt of the kids’ emotions alone. Especially for someone who doesn’t like feelings.”
At that, he turns to me, his frustration melting, face softening. “Have to call me out like that, huh?”
“You were the one who said it first. That day you came home from work all cut up. We were in the bathroom, and you said you don’t do feelings.”
He squints. “I did, didn’t I?”
“Not so true anymore?” I guess, and he bends, rolling his forehead against mine.
“Not true anymore.”
I bunch his T-shirt in my fists and close my eyes. “It’ll be hard for you and for them to figure out how to navigate this time. I don’t think it’ll get any easier. Logan wants to push boundaries and flirt and go out with friends. I predict Gracie will cry a lot, feel insecure and left out. You’ll have to learn to be more open with them.” I lean back to meet his gaze. “Like you are with me.”
He blows out a long breath. Agrees with a scowl. “You’re right.”
I curl my lips over my teeth so I don’t let my laugh escape, and he shakes his head like I’m naughty. When I do give in to a grin, he traces my lips before blinking as if a thought just occurred to him. “What the fuck is a Snap? And who the hell is Valentina?” I pat his shoulder patronizingly, and he grumbles. “Don’t you fucking start with me too.”
I pivot to put away the leftover cake, pushing my butt out. “Or what?”
When I glance over my shoulder, he’s staring. “Or we’ll see how much you like my hand making your ass red.”
I bite my lip at the idea because I think I might like that. He raises his brows, reading my mind, and pulls me to him when I’ve got everything put away. “Tell me.”
“Snap meaning Snapchat. It’s social media. Kinda like texting.”
He’s legit angry about this. “Then why don’t they just text?”
“Because…it’s more fun,” I say, but it sounds more like a question. How do you explain Snapchat to someone who doesn’t use it? “You can send pictures and videos.”
“Like you can with a text.”
I roll my eyes. “I don’t know, Griff. It’s fun, okay? And a lot of people, especially kids, use it to talk to each other.”
“Do you use it?”
I show him the app on my phone. “Yeah, but not a whole lot. See?”
I let him skim through it, but he’s not impressed and places it back into my hand. “What about Valentina? Who’s that?”
“A girl Logan likes. And if she’s on Snapchat and he’s not…”
Griffin sighs. “He’s going to hate me.”
“No, but you can talk to him about it. Explain your reasons for not giving them cell phones, for not wanting them on social media.” With his focus somewhere over my shoulder, I make a suggestion. “How about we go to an amusement park tomorrow?”
He quirks his eyebrow, slowly bringing his attention back to me. “A what?”
“An amusement park,” I repeat slowly, as if he’s never heard the words before. “You can go on rides and play games. Usually there is ice cream and cotton candy. People go there for fun. Fun is a feeling people can have when they do activities they like.”
He slaps my ass, and I gasp. “Griffin!”
“I warned you.”
I fold my arms over my chest, but I’m no match for him. He hauls me up onto the counter, stepping between my knees, his hands gliding up and down my bare legs, fingers dipping under the hem of my cotton shorts.
“We’re not really an amusement park family,” he says, and I poke him in the chest.
“Well, you are now, because we’re going. My treat.”
“You’re not treating.”
“It’s my idea. And you don’t even like amusement parks.”
“I never said that. I said we weren’t an amusement park family.”
I wave my hands between us. “Either way, you’re getting me off topic. I think it would be really fun for all of us to go, and it would make really great core memories for the kids. You can go talk to Logan about the cell phone and tell him.” When Griffin doesn’t move, I nudge him. “Now, I mean. Go now.”
He huffs with a squeeze to my calves. “You’re awfully bossy when you want to be.”
I sit up tall, my hands on my hips. “I am the nanny after all.”
He shoots me a look of pure lust before backing away, waiting until the last moment to turn around and head to Logan’s room, and I don’t see anyone for the rest of the night because Griffin spends the next few hours alone with his kids. Which is pretty amazing, considering it’s a Friday night and the newly anointed eleven-year-olds might want to hang out with their friends.
But at about ten o’clock, I receive a text from Griffin. One single word: Thanks .
The next morning, I’m woken up bright and early by Logan and Grace stampeding down the steps to the basement, shouting about how we’re going to Hershey Park. According to their excited tail wags, it’s going to take about an hour and a half to get there, and I have to hurry up and get dressed so we can be there when it opens.
“Dad already made a plan how to hit all the roller coasters!” Grace practically screeches.
Logan picks up Cat so I don’t step on him. “My friends have gone and said it’s so fun! There’s a waterpark, too!”
“All right. All right. Let me get ready, and I’ll meet you upstairs in twenty minutes.”
They rush back up, both of them still going on and on about all the things they want to do and see, and I smile as I step into the shower, and I continue to as I brush my teeth and plait my hair into two braids.
When I make it upstairs in sneakers, denim shorts, a tank top, and a purse looped across my body, Griffin freezes mid-stride. His gaze roves over me, multiple times, and while I’m not wearing anything super revealing—maybe the shorts are a little short, but my Janis Joplin tank top isn’t, especially with my sports bra under it—he can’t seem to take his eyes off me.
“Something wrong?” I ask after a while, and he shakes his head as he rinses out his coffee cup. I would guess he’s the only homo sapiens male to always put his dishes in the dishwasher instead of near it.
“You’re hot,” he tells me like it’s a problem.
“I…thank you?”
“I’m old.”
I swat at him. “We’ve been over this already. I don’t care.”
“Well, I do,” he snaps then quiets because he obviously didn’t mean to. “I… You could have anybody. Somebody closer to your age. I’m…” He’s slow to meet my eyes, dragging them over the length of me like it pains him. “I’m going to be forty-three at the end of the year. I have two kids. You…” He starts to gesture toward the door but drops his hand. “Never mind.”
“No.” I leap at him, forcing him to keep going, linking my fingers with his. “Tell me. I want to know.”
“I want you to stay. I want to be with you, but you shouldn’t. You should go figure out what you want.”
I have a hard time fighting my smile and press his hands to my heart. “I don’t know what my future looks like, but I know I want you. I like that you’re a dad, that you’re going to be forty-three. I like that you take care of me and that you are a secure and thoughtful man. I know you think I should go out and have more experiences, but I don’t need them to know how I feel about you.”
He’s hopeful. His eyes are bright and wide open, almost like he’s allowing me to see everything he hides in himself. All his trepidation and worry. But I don’t want him to fear what he feels for me, and I definitely don’t want him to doubt what I feel about him.
He sucks in a breath, and when I think he’s going to speak, he doesn’t. Though, he does give me something just as good. Maybe better. Because he grins.
“I—”
Grace and Logan run into the kitchen, stopping me from telling him that I think I might be falling in love with him, and if they notice how close Griffin and I are standing or how we’re holding hands, they don’t mention it. All they do is yell about how they’ll be in the truck.
I laugh and tug him toward the garage. “Come on!”
He grabs his keys and wallet, and we head out the door.
The conversation on the ride is lively, the tension between Griffin and Logan evidently squashed, which makes me really happy. Even happier when Grace picks me as the person she wants to sit with on the first ride. Logan calls me for the second. Griffin tips his head to me then and deadpans, “Third.”
I giggle uncontrollably, my heart too full to contain it.
Hershey Park is bigger than I expected, with costumed candy people wandering around for pictures. The kids and I head right over to Kiss for a photo, which Griffin dutifully takes. For an uptight SEAL and fire captain, the guy can let loose when he wants to. He, of course, keeps us on a tight schedule, making sure we fit in as many rides as possible, constantly checking his watch and how far away the next attraction is, but he laughs and screams like the rest of us when we crest the top of every coaster. We don’t go to the water park, but we do ride the log flume then stand on the bridge to get soaked by the even bigger boat ride. We dry off at a table in the sun while eating a lunch that consists of chicken fingers, fries, pizza, popcorn, and blue cotton candy, at my request.
After, Logan challenges his dad to a basketball shootout that Griffin lets him win, and then we all lose a water gun race. But it’s a huge panda bear Griffin wins when he tosses a ball into a milk jug. He hands it right to Grace, who jumps up and down, barely able to hold on to the thing.
Without thinking, I curl my arm around Griffin’s waist, happiness flooding my veins, and lean my head against his chest. In response, he slings his arm around my shoulders in full view of the kids, who stare at us with matching head tilts.
“Is this okay?” Griffin asks, and Logan merely shrugs. Grace squints behind her glasses, making the same face her father does when he is seriously debating something. After a few moments, she nods and tries to hug me, but the panda gets in the way.
“Yeah. I’m okay with it.”
I kiss the top of her head. Griffin kisses the top of mine.
And it’s the best feeling I’ve ever had. Like being on top of the world.
Which I might as well be when we sit on the Ferris wheel at sunset, admiring the park below us, the neon lights shining around us. Next to me, Grace points out a direction she wants to go in to ride something else. Logan demands to go in the other direction. Across from me, Griffin watches his children bicker with a smile, looking like he has not a care in the entire universe.
Then he faces me, the breeze ruffling his hair, the corners of his mouth kicked up. He lifts his sunglasses off and tucks them in the collar of his shirt before leaning forward to kiss me. Since we have the kids’ blessing, I don’t feel bad about dragging my fingers over the scruff of his jaw and snaking my hand around the back of his neck, although we do keep it PG.
Once we part, he tugs on the end of one of my braids. “Thanks for making us do this.”
“Thanks for letting me tag along.”
“You’re not tagging along. You’re one of us now.”
And almost as if the kids heard it and agree, they both shift over, Gracie leaning into my side, and Logan absently sticking his feet out to bracket mine. It reminds me of something a child might do with their mother, mindlessly wanting to touch her.
That could be my own desire talking, but it’s the first time since leaving Dahlia that I’ve felt part of a family. One I think I might want to stay in forever.