Chapter 19
KOLTON
“Daddy, do you think that man outside the McDonald’s lives there?”
I glance in the rearview mirror at Jackson’s puckered lips and scrunched face. Always the inquisitor. “Unfortunately, buddy, some people fall on hard times and can’t afford a house. If they have nowhere to go, they end up living on the street.”
“Does he get cold?”
“Yeah, I’m sure he gets cold.”
“Does he have friends to play with?”
“I don’t know, bud.”
“Does he have a dog? Or a hamster like the one Mrs. Cooper lets us sign outta class? And… And how does he watch TV? And what if no one’s there to read him a story? Or what if someone ac-ci-den-ta-lly steps on him?”
Stella adjusts a pin in her pink hair, then she angles her shoulders to face Jackson in the backseat of the Dodge Caravan the rental company gave me because they lost our reservation.
The midsize Lexus I drive at home may be a barely disguised family van, but there’s no hiding the emasculation going on here.
“Jackson,” she says, “those are all valid questions, and if we hadn’t been driving around for two hours picking up mysterious things for your dad, I’d have the energy to answer all fifty of them.
Maybe if you ask your cryptic father to stop dragging us around the city while listening to the Frozen soundtrack on repeat, we could sit by the pool at the rental house, and I could field your interrogation. ”
“You’re on a need-to-know basis,” I say, my eyes on the road.
She raises a perfectly sculpted eyebrow.
“This rental car smells like that chili you bring to work, masked with a god-awful pine air freshener. If you don’t at least give me something to do, like expertly advise you on whether the stunt you have planned for Shay will blow up in your face, I might quit and move in with the McDonald’s man. ”
“Me toooo!” Jackson shoots a hand in the air. “Daddy has to come, and we’ll all read the Gs in the Bri-ta-nni-ca book, ’kay? Or, oh”—he lowers his high-pitched voice into what he thinks is a whisper—“or the urban book, Aunt Stella. Right? Can we? I didn’t tell Daddy about the Banana Polish one.”
My foot jerks on the brake, and the car jumps. “Last I checked, Aunt Stella, I put that book down in the grocery store.” I flex my fingers around the wheel, keeping the car in control.
It’s bad enough Jackson is with us guys all the time, Sawyer and Nico treating my son like a locker-room buddy, but Stella is an island of her own.
A blunt, filterless island. Still, she knows Jackson only eats red apples and has to wear two different socks.
She knows how hard it is raising a kid on your own—her single mother deserved an award for weathering Stella’s wild teen years.
Most important, her defense of Jackson’s quirks is mother-bear ferocious.
When that little shit Evan started picking on him in school, she nearly got arrested.
She drums her fingers to “Let It Go” playing for the third time. “Kids are growing up fast these days, wonderful-secretive-boss-of-mine. I’m preparing him early, so when a scoundrel in his first-grade class asks if he wants his banana polished, he’ll have the sense to say no. Right, Jackson?”
I catch his fist pump through the rearview mirror. “Nooooo polish!”
She grins and says, “See? Trained and ready.”
“That book disappears tonight.” I try to sound severe, but my barely contained chuckle doesn’t reinforce the point.
“It disappears when you stop being all sneaky about these errands, boss.” Her emphasis on my title drips with sarcasm. And playfulness.
When Stella waltzed into Moondog for her interview three years ago, wearing a skintight dress and mile-high heels, and blatantly said it looked like a chimpanzee had organized my files, I hired her on the spot.
Her résumé was flawless, and my office was a chaotic mess.
Under that kaleidoscope skin is a smart woman.
A nosy, smart woman, who helps keep my head above water.
I glance into the rearview mirror as Jackson adjusts his glasses. “Should I tell Aunt Stella my plan to woo Shay?” I ask.
He twitches his nose. “What’s woo?”
I almost offer the proper answer—to make Shay fall for me—but that doesn’t fully apply to this scenario.
I need Shay to live in the moment, like I’m trying to do.
Relax and have fun. After seeing her in my dreams for months, being within biting distance of her soft curves lately has sent all synapses firing.
I get why she’s freaked out, why she panicked about her reputation and being taken seriously on her first big job, but I can’t quit pursuing her. Or being impressed by her.
It’s only been a week, and already the level of work she’s doing has proved hiring her was the right choice. Shay likely stays up all night working on her sketches, and Hilary pores over them each morning, her excitement evident with each approving nod.
And I’m blown away.
My first look at her rough designs in black and gray, bold splashes of deep purple and wine highlighting the assorted dragons and eagles flying through the space, took my breath away.
Dating me won’t impact her career. Nobody can deny what she’s creating.
She just has to see that in herself.
When my GPS announces our destination, I pull over, lucky to find a spot that can accommodate the boat I’m driving.
I swivel to face Jackson so I can answer his question. “Normally woo means to make someone like you.”
He frowns. “Like Evan? Do I need to woo Evan?”
Stella’s frosted pink lips flatten. “You need to shove that little—”
“No,” I cut in, shooting her a warning glare. “Sometimes it’s best to ignore people who aren’t nice. The Evans of the world need to make people feel small to feel better. They aren’t the ones you woo. But if, say, a girl…”
“Or a boy,” Stella says, her blue eyes pinning me with judgment.
I sigh. “If you’re interested in spending more time with a girl, or a boy,” I add, knowing I’ll support Jackson no matter what path he’s destined to walk, “then you sometimes have to show the person more about yourself. In Shay’s case, I need to show her I’m interested in her for her.
Not just because she’s pretty or good at her job. ”
I’ve given Shay as much space as I could handle the past week. After fantasizing about her for months, seeing her now and going home alone each night is my own personal hell.
“How do we woo her, Daddy?”
“Yeah, how?” Stella puts her chin in her hands like an eager schoolgirl.
I roll my eyes. “For starters, we bring her McDonald’s.”
Stella drops her hands. “Jackson, don’t take dating advice from your father. Ever. You have any questions, you come to me.”
Ignoring her, I flip off my seat belt. “It’s in the bag. If you knew Shay, you’d get it. And anyway, it’s stage one. She won’t say yes today. Or tomorrow. I’ll have to wear her down.”
Stella squints at me. “Okay, maybe you’re not completely clueless about the mysterious ways of women. But what’s with all the other stuff?”
I glance at the brown bags in the backseat and shrug. “Nothing. I can’t bring lunch for Shay and not the rest of the team. Unfortunately, that group’s not a one-stop-shop.”
“Daddy, what’s glu-ten?” Jackson leans forward to read the sign above the small store on our right. Goodbye Gluten.
With her hand on the door, Stella says, “It’s an evil monster that attacks pretentious people, killing their ability to have fun.”
The more time Jackson spends with Stella, the more likely it is I’ll find Child Services at my door.
I get out of the van as a truck whizzes by. When there’s a break in traffic, I slide open Jackson’s door and help him out. “Gluten is found in grain, the stuff that makes bread and pasta and those fish crackers you like. For some people, it hurts their tummy when they eat it.”
He puts his hand in mine and repeats, “Glu-ten,” cataloguing the word for future reference.
“By the way,” Stella says over her shoulder, “Caroline called to remind me that Jackson needs a new pencil sharpener for your library outings.” Her cocked eyebrow reinforces what I already know: these two months will be agonizing for Marina’s mother.
It’s the longest she’ll have been away from her grandson.
“Roger that,” I say, making a mental note to send her photos regularly. I don’t let my mind race forward, the future fallout of being with Shay having the potential to crush Caroline, if I decided to move. I promised myself I wouldn’t worry about what’s next.
Like Sawyer’s always saying: Seize the day. Carpe diem and all that crap.
We head inside to gather Maeve’s fat-gluten-dairy-taste-free lunch, our last stop before we hit the storefront to go over Shay’s revised sketches.
After she devours the fries in her lunch, she’ll find a note from me. The first of many. I haven’t been this excited since I used a syringe to squirt habanero pepper extract into every piece of fruit in my frat house. Hopefully, this time, I won’t get the piss kicked out of me.