Chapter 16 #2
He hums an amused sound then reaches into the community bowl of snacks to retrieve a handful of nuts, pretzels, and crackers. “And what kind of friends do you have?”
He tosses the whole handful of community snacks into his mouth at once.
“Ones who aren’t walking OSHA violations, for one.”
He laughs then brushes the crumbs from his hands and eyes my drink. “Not a drinker?”
After my pain-in-the-ass sisters and mother, I’m not in the mood to rehash the details of my pending pregnancy. And it’s none of his business. And, of course, he might not keep flirting with me if he knows I’m here on a mission to get knocked up after being told by my boss I have no life.
“Not tonight.” I take a sip. “What are you doing here? Hot date with some age-appropriate girl you met at recess today?”
He laughs. “I’m working on it.”
Our eyes hook and hold, and I’m whacked by the urge to ask about his love life.
Remy said he was single, and unless he’s playing a game, him asking me out—repeatedly—confirms this.
Even if he knows the bartender—even if they’ve slept together—they aren’t now.
She’s down the bar talking to other customers, not paying us any mind.
He hooks a thumb over his shoulder. “Darts,” he explains. “Every Friday.”
I straighten. “You’re here for the darts tournament?”
He brings his beer to his mouth, pausing before taking a sip. “You a darts fan?”
“Do you know Leland Cooper?”
He snorts a laugh. “Yeah.” This must be what an FBI agent feels like when they get a lead on a case. “Why?”
“Um.” I swallow. How do I explain this? “Well . . .”
And then there he is, Leland Cooper, stepping up to the bar and clapping Gavin on the back. They exchange hellos then Gavin says, “Leland, this is Reese—” He gives me a devious look. “Who I find very age appropriate.”
I give Gavin a flat look as I shake Leland’s hand—I will never tell my mother about this—and introduce myself while taking note of his neon orange jersey. A jersey. This man needs the fashion police called on him, stat.
“Nice to meet you,” he says.
And then he turns sideways, and I see it: his nose the size of a small country.
To Gavin, he says, “See you in a few?”
It’s rude, but I blatantly stare. At his nose.
When he faces me dead on, it camouflages into his face, but he turns again and there it is: A profile worthy of a punchline.
I can’t not see it. It’s huge. It’s the biggest nose I’ve ever seen.
If Gavin wasn’t sitting next to me, I’d pull up his profile picture to see how I missed it.
I can’t have a baby with a schnoz like that, which is why as soon as he’s out of earshot I say, “I can’t have a baby with a schnoz like that.”
Gavin’s brows pinch. “A baby . . . ?” He looks at Leland across the room like I’m talking about someone else. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“I can’t have a big-nosed baby,” I repeat. “That thing’s like Pinocchio went on a lying bender.”
Gavin chokes on his beer. “What?” He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. “He’s married.”
“Really?” Now that shocks me. How did I miss that? And what is the situation where someone’s husband has sperm bank deposits? “I wonder if she knows.”
“Knows?”
I bat the question away and bite my lip.
A big nose?
There are loads of talented plastic surgeons in the city, but I don’t want to bring a baby into this world with a beak like that if I can avoid it.
They’ll be teased relentlessly, which will result in me throwing down with some pint-sized playground punks and their parents.
I’ll go to prison, and then my child will end up in prison because that’s how the cycle of intergenerational criminality works.
I refuse to let that happen over a nose. I won’t do it.
My work for the night is done: Leland’s off the list. I can overlook his ridiculous fashion choices—but that nose? It’s cruel and unusual.
“Reese?” Gavin nudges my knee with his. “What are you talking about?”
I blow out a breath, debating. It makes sense Gavin would know him: They’re both in the prime sperm donor age range living in a small town surrounded by other small towns.
“Reese?” he repeats.
His blue eyes bounce—I can’t tell him the truth.
“Reese?” Gavin tosses another barbaric handful of trail mix into his mouth, chewing as he says, “You gonna tell me what’s going on?”
“Work.” Not a lie. “A work project. That’s why I’m here.”
He brushes his hands off—this time near the community bowl—and narrows his eyes. “A Chicago PE firm sent you to Fontain to see Leland?”
“Yes.” I fold my napkin and press the crease.
“Because I’m here, they want me to look at the viability of a variety of markets in small towns.
Leland Cooper is part of the study.” I clear my throat.
“There’s a physical therapist—Leland—a real estate agent, someone in tech, and a doctor, among others.
” I take a long sip of my drink. “Ten total, though three have already been eliminated.”
He eyes me skeptically. “Does he know?”
“Yes.” I’m assuming he willingly donated his sperm. “Sort of.” At Gavin’s confused look: “He signed up for the study. We call it . . .”
Think.
“Business fertility.”
Wow.
“But he doesn’t know when we’re conducting the research. We—the firm I work with—do it that way so there’s no misrepresenting things during our due diligence phase.”
His eyes narrow. “What does his nose have to do with anything?”
Shit.
“People with pleasantly symmetrical faces usually have better profit margins.” I pull that out of my ass and run with it. “It’s an economics law . . . known as . . . Law of Aesthetically Driven Consumerism.”
Gavin’s jaw shifts as he watches me drink my club soda through the too-tiny straw until it’s empty. “Huh.”
“So,” I say, redirecting the conversation. “What do you do besides mow grass and play darts and raise nieces?”
Any confusion or doubt he has about my asinine story vanishes with his smirk. “You asking me out, Miss Reese?”
“No, Gavin, I’m not asking you out. I’m figuring you out.”
He chuckles. “What’s there to figure out?”
I recross my legs as he takes another handful of trail mix. “Why anyone would eat from a community bowl of snacks for one.”
He sticks out his tongue covered in half-chewed pretzels and melba toasts.
“Ah.” I roll my eyes. “That’s right, because you’re a child. I also don’t understand why someone would do all that work at the vineyard and be okay with not getting paid while a house he wants to build goes unfinished.”
He stills but doesn’t say anything; he doesn’t have to.
Over a year of him doing all the work at his parent’s vineyard and his name wasn’t on a single college-ruled line in that spiral notebook except for the record of him paying them for the three acres his shop sits on.
According to my calculations, he’s owed at least $75,000 for the hours he’s put in.
“You love your mom and your niece and live in the same town you grew up in.” I toss my straw on the bar and bring my glass to my lips.
“Despite your best efforts to look like a Sasquatch, you’re attractive.
” I shrug. “Guys like you fall head over heels for sweet girls and get married right out of high school. Yet here you are. Not married. Or getting paid.”
His lips twitch as he throws another fistful of trail mix into his mouth, arch of his brows almost cocky.
“What?” I pause my glass midair. “Did I get any of that wrong?”
“Didn’t get it all right.”
I take a peanut out of the bowl and throw it at him. “Elaborate.”
“Why do you care about figuring me out?”
“Maybe I don’t. Maybe you’re part of my work research.” I lean back in my stool. “Viability of the lawn care industry.”
Or potential sperm donation.
The notion makes me choke.
This man eats community snacks, drinks beer from a can, but there’s something about him I can’t shake.
Like the flu. He doesn’t have huge aspirations—or any aspirations—yet he steps up when needed.
He helps my mom. His mom. Addie. And those eyes .
. . they would be good eyes to pass on to a kid.
He’s of the right age, but he’s also not educated or driven. Deal breakers.
He wiggles his eyebrows. “You thinking dirty things about me, Miss Reese?”
If he only knew.
“I don’t think you could handle my dirty thoughts, Davy Crockett.”
His brows lift. “Oh really?” He sets down his can of beer and gives me his full attention. “Sounds like you’re challenging me to find out.”
I sigh, bored. “A challenge you’ll never win.”
“We’ll never know because you’re too scared to go out with me.”
I laugh fully. “I’m not scared. Or going out with you.”
His eyes convey an unspoken we’ll see about that.
I fold my hands on the bar in front of me and study him as he chews and drinks and comfortably exists on the barstool next to me.
Ever since I was a kid, I’ve been able to read people well. I’ve read books on it, took a few psychology classes in college, and it’s a skill that’s served me well throughout my career.
But with Gavin, I’m less sure. He’s both exactly who I think he is yet nothing like I imagine. “What’s your superpower?”
Between bites and sips: “Superpower?”
“Sure. Everyone has one. Mine are numbers. Spotting unmet potential. Reading people to near perfection.”
“Can my superpower be that you’re attracted to me?”
I scoff. “Who said I was attracted to you?”
“You did.” His tongue darts out and swipes across his bottom lip. “Just a minute ago when you were reading me to near perfection.”
“I—” Damn him. “Said you were attractive. There’s a difference.
” His blue eyes dance, amused, catching the neon lights from a nearby Budweiser sign.
Flustering me. “It’s called objectivity.
You can be attractive without anyone being attracted to you.
” That might be bullshit. “And it’s not a superpower. ”
His mouth makes a knowing shape before he takes another sip of his beer followed by a satisfied ahh!