Chapter 16 Evan
“Can we go swimming, Daddy?”
I look up from the jigsaw my son, Donkey, and I are currently working on to peer outside, the heavy rain thundering down, hitting the roof tiles. “Swimming? It’s raining, little lion.”
“Yeah, swimming in the puddles.” Leo’s innocent eyes lock with mine, and I can’t help but laugh.
“The puddles aren’t deep enough to swim in. Besides, they’ll be all dirty, kiddo.” I stand, observing the summer storm that has decided to pay Montana a visit. The sky rolls with thunder, the trees swaying from side to side as the wind cuts through them. Puddles accumulate across the grass.
“Flo said I could swim in a puddle.”
I narrow my eyes at the cabin, making a mental note to talk to her and tell her not to promise my son things that aren’t possible. “Well, if Flo can prove to me that swimming in a puddle is possible, then I’ll let you.”
I know exactly what she’ll come out with if I ask her to do just that, though.
She’ll tell me, “Lakes are just big puddles.” And she’ll have that smug look on her face when she says it, too, looking up at me with those big blue eyes that entice me far more than they should.
Cranberry lips that’ll be pouted and plump.
Nose upturned, like my scowl doesn’t affect her in the slightest.
I felt the way she melted against me in the closet the other day. The way her body froze and her breath hitched. How her muscles relaxed against my own. How right it felt.
I can’t lie and say I haven’t spent the hours in which I’m awake at night, wondering if she’s in the cabin pleasuring herself, and it’s taken all the self-control I can muster not to march my way down there to ask if she’ll show me what she uses, and how she uses it.
“Flo said I was handsome,” Leo says as he plays with the puzzle pieces, trying to force one into a position it doesn’t belong in, so I take it from him and help, showing him exactly where it’s supposed to go.
“You are.” I ruffle up his hair and wrap my arms around his torso, pulling him to me as I flop down on the couch. “The most handsome boy in the whole of Missarali. Nope, scratch that, the entire state of Montana, actually.”
Blowing on his belly, Leo squeals, pushing at me to try to get away, but I have a vice-like grip around him.
“No, the world!” Leo finally escapes me, and he breathes heavily as he tries to control his laughter. “Flo said you were handsome.”
That gets my attention. I cock my head at my son, leaning forward, straightening his shirt. “Oh, yeah? When did she say that?”
“She was doing my hair.” He picks up Donkey, fingers playing with his mane—or what’s left of it. “Said I was handsome like my Daddy.”
My stomach drops—in a good way—and warmth flourishes inside my chest. Flo is the perfect mix of soft, responsible and authoritative when it comes to taking care of my son, and I feel ashamed that I ever doubted her.
“What did she say after that?”
“Nothing. We played water guns. I won.”
“I think you’ll find I actually won, bud.” I remember that day. I’d returned home to find both of them soaking wet on the grass, watching the butterflies land on a nearby plant, and I snuck Flo’s water gun when they weren’t looking and blasted them until the gun was dry.
Hearing that Flo thinks I’m handsome, I like it. It wouldn’t mean anything from anyone else, and usually, I’d be praying for a nanny who finds me grotesque. But Flo’s different.
There’s a sudden knock at the door, and glancing at the time, seeing it’s late and the sun’s almost already set, confusion wracks me at who could be here at this hour.
Pulling it open, not all the way so the wind doesn’t blow the rain in, I’m met with a sopping wet Flo, her hair stuck to her neck in curled ribbons.
She looks slightly teary-eyed, but I can’t tell if the porch lights are playing tricks on me.
“Flo?” I immediately open the door as wide as it can go. “What the hell are you doing out in the rain? It’s freezing.”
Her green T-shirt is soaked through. She shifts her weight from one foot to the other, arms wrapping around herself as she glances back at the cabin. “I just got back from seeing my Mom, and um, I think… the roof is leaking in my cabin. It’s all… yeah.”
Protectiveness fills me seeing her so cold and vulnerable, so I swap places with her, encouraging her to grab a blanket and get warm. My palms find her biceps, rubbing up and down to create some friction and heat her icy skin. “I’ll go and have a look. Stay here.”
Jogging over to the cabin, I’m met with a slow, steady dripping sound. Flo has placed a bucket on the wet floorboards, trying to catch the leak, but it’s coming from multiple sources, and I curse the handyman I hired at the last minute to get this place fixed up.
“Fuck,” I grumble once I see what the leak has done. The clothes Flo has been working on for her niece are soaked through, her pastel-blue sewing machine shiny with water droplets, with spare needles and materials scattered all over the small table. All in a pool.
Grabbing Flo’s duct tape and standing on a chair to patch up the small holes in the roof to stop the leaking—I’ll check back later to see if the tape has held up—I gather up Flo’s work so they don’t marinate in the dirty water.
After grabbing a few of her essentials, too, like her toiletries and insulin, I exit the cabin.
The rain and wind assault me as I jog back to the main house.
Flo is standing in the middle of the living room, a towel from the bathroom wrapped around her, with Leo by her feet, trying to help dry her legs.
She looks sad, and I hate it.
“I taped the holes in the roof up, but it won’t hold for very long. We just have to hope the rain doesn’t get worse. I got the clothes you were working on. They’re wet, but I’ll hang them up in the bathroom for you.”
She offers me a sad smile, but shakes her head. “It’s fine. You can go ahead and throw them out. The dye has run, and the water would have stretched the seams. There’s no saving them.”
“Leo, why don’t you run upstairs and get ready for bed? I’ll be right there to help brush Donkey’s teeth, okay?”
Nodding, Leo rushes off, and I hold Flo’s creations out in front of me.
“I’m not going to throw them out. They may still be salvageable.
” Walking into the bathroom and hanging them over the towel rack, I continue talking.
“We should at least give them a chance. They’ll be dry by morning, and you can take a look at them then and decide what you want to do with them. ”
“Thank you.” She sits on the edge of the couch.
“I don’t know, maybe it’s a sign from the universe or something that she’s outgrowing being gifted the clothes I’m making.
I mean, she’s been absolutely obsessed with dolls lately.
Has been begging for this stupidly expensive Super Sparkle interactive dollhouse that my sister can’t afford, so I guess she’s growing up.
” She forces a laugh, but the hoarse sound coming from her throat hits me square in the chest because this isn’t the happy-go-lucky, sarcastic and witty Florence McKenna I know.
I frown, releasing a small sigh, studying her as she stares off into space. “Don’t stop making her clothes, trouble. They’re really beautiful.”
Her lips spread in a small smile, and I take a step closer until I’m within reaching distance.
I tighten the towel around her body. “What’s going on in that pretty head of yours?”
She scrubs at her face, body shivering. “I needed to send them off in a few days, so there’s no time to remake them, and now I don’t have a gift to send her.”
Pulling my eyebrows together, I nod, again, picking up on the way goosebumps pop up on her arms.
“Okay, we can fix that, but we need to get you out of these wet clothes before anything. You can borrow some of mine and stay here until I can get that roof fixed. We’ll go and collect everything from the cabin once the rain has stopped.”
“You want me to stay here?”
“Want is a strong word, Florence, but I don’t really have a choice, do I?” I say with heavy humour, and a smile breaks out on her face.
There she is.
“I’ll run you a bath. I’m afraid the only bubble baths we have are Spiderman Sherbet, or Dumbo donut .”
“I do like donuts.”
Flo has a hot bath upstairs after I’ve got Leo and Donkey all tucked into bed. I lay out some of my clothes for her and wait downstairs, glancing at the endless coffee cups I’ve gone through today as I wash them up since the dishwasher is already running.
Flo pads down the stairs, and my stomach twists at seeing her in my sweatpants and T-shirt, entering my kitchen.
It’s utter perfection, and it shouldn’t be.
I should feel uncomfortable with the idea of her touching my possessions—I did with the other nannies—but I enjoy the view, and my eyes map out all of her so the image is ingrained into my brain forever.
She’s tall, so the sweatpants don’t drag across the floor, but the T-shirt drowns her, and I think it’s because she’s more legs than torso.
“How many cups of coffee do you drink a day?”
I shrug as I finish washing the last mug, and she immediately grabs a dish towel to begin drying them. “I don’t count. You don’t have—”
“If you try to tell me that I don’t have to help you dry, I’ll gag you with this.” She holds up the yellow and white flowery towel, jutting out her hip.
Holding my hands up defensively, I take a step back.
“Alright, take it easy, Flor—” The look she gives me is enough to have me click my teeth together and stop talking, and with what she’s been through today, I decide to give in to her and let her have her way, just for today.
I offer to help her dry, but she refuses to let me, so like a good obedient boy, I lean against the counter and watch her.
“What would happen if you didn’t drink coffee? Would you combust?”
My shoulders rise in a shrug. “I don’t know, maybe. You can talk, though, with the amount of matcha you drink.”