Will
Chapter Nineteen
These women were trying to kill me. I swear they were.
“What are you doing here?” Ava asked, balancing on a chair for some goddamned reason.
I walked over to her, turned off the fire alarm, and glared at her.
“I came to give you a ride home. Figured I’d wait in my car until Tessa got home, but when I heard the fire alarm go off, I thought it best I come check out what the hell was happening in here.”
Then I spun to stare at Elsie, taking a step closer toward the last person in the world I’d expect to see standing there beside Ava.
“And what are you doing here?” I asked, staring down at her in barely restrained fury.
“Uh,” she lifted a shoulder, “helping?”
“Yeah,” I muttered, “looks like it.”
“I take offense to that.”
My voice rose. “Well, I take offense to the fact that the two of you almost burned Tessa Brooks’s house down with her child inside!”
Not to mention the two of them.
“Don’t be dramatic, Will.” Elsie scoffed infuriatingly. “There were no flames.”
“It was my fault,” Ava said from behind us. I turned to face her, but she could barely meet my eyes.
I thought it would be a cold day in hell before Ava admitted she was wrong about anything, but I guess that’s where we were now.
“Elsie didn’t do anything wrong,” she said, finally looking at me with a stubborn tilt to her chin. “She’s been saving my ass all night. I don’t know what I would’ve done if she wasn’t here, so you don’t you dare yell at her.”
I inhaled, trying to collect myself.
I didn’t want to be an asshole, but damn it, it pissed me off when people were careless. Accidents happened every day, the least people could do was try to avoid ones as easily preventable as this.
Of course Elsie was here. That girl was a walking accident magnet. I’d been more unnerved than I had a right to be at the sight of her, but ever since she’d shown up, she’d made a habit of catching me off guard.
And besides that, now a part of me worried Ava had been rude to her all night on my account, fabricated as her reasoning might be.
I tried to shake it off. I had no business being concerned about the emotional well-being of a stranger. I had plenty of other things to focus on in my life without adding her to the list.
But still, that didn’t stop me from giving her the once over, just to assure myself that there wasn’t any unseen damage from the cookie fiasco.
In my peripheral, I felt Ava’s gaze blaring a hole through my head, telling me I’d stared at Elsie a beat longer than I meant to.
I cleared my throat and looked away.
“Well,” Ava said, gathering the cookie tray and aggressively dumping its contents into the trash. “Thanks for stopping by, but I’m fine to walk home.”
I rolled my eyes, wishing she’d give up the stubborn routine for one night.
“Ava,” I said in a warning tone.
“Will,” she countered, just as fiercely.
“Elsie!” The redhead in question waved from where she stood by the door.
Ava and I turned to stare at her, wearing matching expressions of bafflement.
“Now that I have everyone’s attention.” Elsie threw a thumb behind her toward the door. “I’m going to be heading out.”
No way. I didn’t see her car parked here. And no way in hell was she walking home alone in the dark.
“Elsie,” I started, but she was already throwing open the kitchen door.
“God!” she shrieked at the sight of Tessa Brooks standing in the doorway. “Why is there always someone standing there when I open this door?”
Tessa, dressed in her scrubs and looking exhausted, blinked at the sight of us all conjured in her kitchen.
“Hi, Tessa,” Ava said weakly.
At least most of the smoke had cleared out.
Elsie moved out of the way to let her in.
“Oh, no.” Tessa’s face fell as she dropped her bag on the floor. “Three babysitters for one child? My kid can give someone a run for their money, can’t he?”
“I’m just here to give them a ride home,” I said quickly, wanting to ease some of the anxiety looming in Tessa’s eyes.
“And I just came to hang out,” Elsie added, “because I had nothing better to do tonight.”
She said it like it was nothing. Like, she hadn’t stepped into the role of Mary Poppins and saved Ava’s ass that night.
“Oh, good,” Tessa breathed in relief. “So, everything went okay? I know his nanny said you offered to come over, and I just wanted to tell you how much I appreciate it. She’s been covering a lot of extra nights since I started picking up doubles.”
“It was nothing.” Ava waved her off. “I’m happy it worked out.”
Tessa reached into the pocket of pants, pulling out a wad of cash and handing it to Ava.
“Oh, no.” She shook her head. “I don’t need that. I just wanted to help.”
Tessa frowned. “I know my kid, and you deserve the money for the night he probably put you through.”
“Then, give it to Elsie.” Ava looked to where she still lingered by the door. “She was the superstar of the night in Max’s eyes. He loves her.”
I could’ve sworn I heard the faintest trace of envy in her voice when she said it.
“Absolutely not.” Elsie held her hands up in defense, as if Tessa might fling the money at her. “We really just wanted to help out, that’s all.”
“Wow,” Tessa breathed, looking around at the three of us. “I’ve never met babysitters who refused to get paid for their work.”
“We’re just being neighborly.” Elsie grinned as if she were part of the town.
And I guess now, she sort of was.
When I showed up to give Ava a ride home, I wasn’t anticipating having to fight a stubborn woman to get her in my truck.
And I really wasn’t expecting two of them.
“I’d really rather walk,” Ava said, staring at me with obvious disdain. “I wouldn’t want to put you out or anything.”
Was she serious? When in the history of me knowing her had she ever turned down a ride?
I sighed, hating more than anything when I had to play these mind games with people. Why couldn’t we all save the time and energy and breath and just skip past it?
“You’re not putting me—” I paused, seeing Elsie out of the corner of my eye, starting off down the sidewalk. “And where do you think you’re going?”
“Uh?” She glanced around. “Home?”
“I already told you I’d give you a ride.”
“I don’t need one.” She shrugged.
“And neither do I,” Ava chimed in.
I pinched the bridge of my nose.
“How is this my life right now?”
When I opened my eyes, it was to see the back of Elsie’s head getting farther from view.
“Elsie, get back here or so help me—”
She laughed, pausing mid-step to look back at me. “Who uses that expression anymore?”
“Let her go,” Ava said, shocking me with her newfound solidarity with the girl we’d argued about that very night. “She’s perfectly capable of walking herself home if she wants to.”
“No,” I countered, “she’s not. One, it’s dark. Two, it’s cold, and three,” I held up a third finger as I listed off excuse after excuse of why I needed to put her in my car, “she doesn’t know the town and she’s going to get lost trying to find her way back.”
Elsie scoffed, apparently offended by the insinuation.
“I have GPS.” She pulled her phone out of her pocket and held it up as proof. Then, frowning down at the dark screen, let out a frustrated huff. “It’s dead.”
“Fantastic,” I muttered sarcastically.
Because why wouldn’t it be dead?
Reluctantly, she started making her way back to us.
“Get in the truck,” I told her, opening the door.
She looked inside skeptically.
“There’s only two seats.”
“The middle’s just as fine as anywhere else.” I stared her down.
“There’s no seatbelt in the middle.”
“I’ll go slow.”
“I could go through the windshield.” She scrunched her face up as if the idea mildly disagreed with her.
I rubbed a hand over my face. “Then, I’ll use my arm to hold you against the seat until we get to your house. Is that what you want?”
“I really don’t think that’s necessary.”
“Get in the car.”
She rolled her eyes, but to my utmost relief, climbed in.
“Has anyone ever told you that you have major control issues?” she said, sliding into the middle spot.
I shook my head, turning to face my second battle.
“So, what’s the deal, Ave?” I asked, leaning against the back of the truck. “Are you really hellbent on walking home in the cold?”
She stared into where Elsie was sitting, and I knew that whatever weird, competitive streak existed inside of her wouldn’t allow her to say no.
Not if Elsie was going with me.
Without a word, she climbed in beside her.