Chapter 8
RACHEL
“Oh my gosh, this is amazing,” April announced, holding up the stainless-steel travel mug as though they were holding royal court. “Did he sprinkle these with some kind of special margarita man-candy dust that only hot guys have access to?”
Sometimes she’d bring yoga mats, but they definitely didn’t do yoga. No, they’d all sit on them while they drank mimosas. It was way more fun.
“He’s not a hot guy.” Rachel sprawled out on the blanket they’d laid on the grass, turning her head to focus on the clouds in the blue Colorado sky above.
Fine, he was a hot guy. But she was trying desperately not to fixate on the curl of his hair, the muscles in his arms, the way he filled out those cargo shorts…
“Uh.” April waved her hand in the air over Rachel’s face.
Rachel turned her head to her friend.
“He pretty much is,” April said slyly. “Don’t tell Kent I said that. Actually, you can. We’re secure in our relationship.”
“I have to agree with the hot thing.” The newest member of their mom brigade, Sadie, was not actually a mom, but she was awesome enough to join the brigade nonetheless.
With a tawny complexion from her mother’s Venezuelan roots, black hair, and a seemingly unflappable warmth in her eyes, Sadie had become a regular at their Sunday morning mom meetings.
“You can tell Roman I said that, too. He’ll probably agree if you show him a pic of Travis. ”
“Gahhhh!” Rachel tossed her arm over her eyes. “Travis is just Travis. He’s not allowed to be hot Travis.”
Rachel flopped her arm back to the side, staring up at the clouds again.
Sadie appeared in the view above her. “It’s okay if you find a man attractive. You know that, right?”
“Travis is not a man. He’s Travis,” Rachel muttered.
This got her a Sadie smile. “Whatever you need to tell yourself.”
The other moms all allowed a bending of the rules of their Sunday mom group to accommodate Sadie’s attendance because, first of all, they never wrote down any rules. They were all pretty flexible about the whole thing. And second, Sadie was a ton of fun and an attorney.
Everyone knew a mom group needed at least one attorney and one medical professional. They were still on the hunt for the medical professional.
Not to be left out, Sadie brought her nephew on Sunday mornings so his parents could have a bit of a break and sleep in, which every mom in the group knew meant Sunday was their morning for a booty call.
Some people went to church, some people…
“Hey ladies.” Kaiya hurried toward their meeting on the blanket. “I brought samples.” Kaiya gave each of them a small gift bag with samples.
“I freaking love your samples.” Molly dove right in to her bag.
Well, if it was sample Sunday, Rachel hoped she’d hit the jackpot with the lavender-scented facial cleanser. She loved that stuff, and the squat purple bottles were so stinkin’ cute.
April gestured to their circle. “Rachel brought margaritas.”
“Oh, I’m so in.” Kaiya looked to where her daughter dangled from the monkey bars, then settled on the blanket next to April.
“We need to get together for momtinis soon. Cory’s heading to her dad’s for a few weeks this summer.
I’m going to need serious distraction from the quiet that’s about to hit when she leaves. ”
Like Molly’s ex, Kaiya’s was not in the picture. Unlike Molly, Rachel had never even seen Kaiya show interest in anyone as a relationship possibility. She seemed more interested in all-natural skincare products.
“It’ll have to be after Rachel gets back from her big summer trip,” Sadie said.
“Shhh,” Rachel said, savoring the unwrapping of her sample. She rarely got gifts that came with wrapping and bows, so she took her time with it. Then she hit pay dirt. “Lavender.” Rachel held up the bottle like she was on a game show with Pat Sajak.
“Woot.” April gave Rachel a high five.
“Is that Gavin?” Molly asked, shielding her eyes from the sun.
Rachel turned and the excitement from lavender samples disintegrated as a weight seemed to be placed squarely on her shoulders. Yes, that was Gavin. Gavin with their two boys, the two dogs, and a couple duffel bags of stuff.
He was heading straight toward her.
Her limbs seemed to get heavier with each step he took in her direction. Still, Rachel stood. But she didn’t move forward.
“Do you want to take him some moisturizer samples?” Kaiya asked.
Rachel shook her head. “Don’t waste them on him. He doesn’t know how to moisturize.”
“That freaking guy,” Molly said, under her breath. “I don’t like him.”
“I’m reserving judgment.” Sadie had secured her lawyer mask of neutrality in place.
She nodded, doing that attorney thing where she focused her entire attention on a situation.
She’d make an excellent mom someday, if she decided to have kids.
Her children would be just the right amount of terrified when she used that expression on them.
Rachel started toward her kids. They paused only briefly, each letting out an individual, “Hi, Mom,” before letting out a whoop and bolting toward Ollie and the other kids playing on the playground.
A drippy, oozy feeling settled inside Rachel at the expression on Gavin’s face. The boys weren’t due back until the afternoon, but that wasn’t the part that made her feel icky. He looked like he had something to tell her, and that something was not going to be enjoyable.
“Gavin?” Rachel asked as he wrangled with the two leashes holding the pups.
“I know. I’m early.” The guy looked beat. Like he’d not had Travis bring him evening margaritas.
He held out the leashes for the dogs and Rachel took them.
“I…” He shoved his hands through his hair. He had dark hair like Travis, but Gavin’s was a bit longer around the ears. The kind of haircut that took extra maintenance to make it seem like it didn’t.
“Are you okay?” she asked, because he didn’t really look okay.
“Last night was…” He studied the grass.
“Two-kids-and-two-puppies hard?” she responded.
He glanced up then. “I fucked up with the whole puppy thing.”
No kidding.
“It is what it is, Gav.” She held the leashes so the dogs couldn’t run off, and they settled at her feet.
A long pause descended over them. He had something he wanted to say, she could feel it. For some reason, he wasn’t spilling it. And, since she had no idea what he wanted to share, she didn’t speak either.
“How are we going to tell them?” he asked finally.
She shifted the leashes so they rested more comfortably in her hands. “Tell who what?”
“Tell the boys that the dogs have to go back to the breeder,” he said.
Um, that was not happening. No takesie backsies when you give puppies to a couple of eight-year-old boys.
“Gavin, that’s not how this works. You gave the boys a gift. It was a ridiculous gift. Now we have to make it work.”
Gavin stared at the grass surrounding his feet as though he were holding the conversation with the individual blades instead of Rachel. “Dakota asked that the dogs not come back to the house.”
Say, what? Rachel didn’t say anything because she couldn’t get her mouth to move, such was the shock running through her bloodstream.
Her mind made several suggestions as to what she could say to him…
She should’ve made that call before you both purchased the dogs.
Yes, I totally agree, what’s the number for the breeder? That’s not her call to make.
The boys love them and we’re not messing that up.
“I’m sorry, I think I misunderstood you.” She settled on those words, since they seemed the least confrontational and, presently, she wasn’t trying to be a jerk.
The pups were done holding still, and they started to pull on the leashes toward the mommy picnic ten feet away.
Rachel held tight.
To be honest, holding on tight when things were falling apart was what she did best.
“They peed on the rug.” Gavin looked torn between good intentions and the bad outcomes of making not-so-good choices. “Ten times. They peed more inside than they did outside.”
“Did you contain them to a small area?” Rachel asked. They had been doing better at her house once she sequestered them in the dining room.
“Dakota said they can’t come back.”
Dakota did not get to take this away from her kids. They had something they loved, and Rachel would fight for their right to hang on to it. Even if the thing they loved was actually two things that enjoyed peeing on the carpet.
“I didn’t know Dakota paid your mortgage.” Rachel happened to know that she didn’t. Even since their engagement, Dakota kept her separate apartment on Speer Boulevard downtown.
“Rach.”
“Gavin.”
Yep, that was a touch of snark coming out in Rachel’s tone, which wasn’t the usual, since she normally liked Dakota.
Sometimes she had to say it over and over again to convince herself, but there were all kinds of people and all types of friends.
She and Dakota weren’t the kind of friends who would hang out at the neighborhood park on Sundays drinking margaritas together, but they’d say hello and swap stories if they saw each other at the grocery store.
Unless it was the produce department. Rachel probably didn’t want to watch how Dakota picked out vegetables, so she’d definitely have to hightail it to the dairy aisle.
Dakota didn’t eat dairy.
“Rach, I’m in need of a little help here.” Gavin adjusted his stance, and she waited not-so-patiently to see which direction he’d be taking this.
Her guess was that he’d either go with a giant heaping of the Gavin magnetism, also known occasionally as the Frank charm because all the brothers employed this technique, or he’d go with the sad, puppy dog eyes.
Which, she would be remiss not to note, would be total bullshit, given he was trying to convince her they needed to re-home the puppies that he’d saddled their family with.
“Okay, look, here’s how it’s going to go, because I’m not bending on this,” Rachel announced because Gavin was seriously eating into her Sunday morning girl time.
“I didn’t want the dogs to begin with, but they’re here.
The kids love them, they’ve already had enough instability in their lives, and so we’re not taking them away.
I’m not taking them away. And I still stand by my previous assertion that where the boys go, the dogs go.
If Dakota has a problem with that, she’s going to have to sort that out with you. ”
“Hey, guys.” Molly bounced up beside Rachel. Deftly, she snatched the leashes and, somehow, simultaneously slipped Rachel’s travel mug into her hand. “I’ll grab these two so you guys can chat without getting peed on.” Molly continued under her breath, “Like Gavin’s carpet.”
Normally, Rachel would’ve told her to be nice. But today wasn’t a normal day.
“Thanks,” Rachel said, disentangling her feet from where the dogs had gone this way and that, thus creating a medley of leash tangle around her legs.
Molly hauled the mini-mutts away. Gavin said nothing.
Rachel toyed with the lid of her margarita mug, flipping open the top, then snapping it closed. Open. Closed. Open. Closed. Click. Click. Click.
Gavin still said nothing. He stood there looking perplexed and staring at the dogs.
“Okay, good chat,” Rachel finally said, because whatever was going on between Gavin and Dakota was seriously interfering with her morning. “See you later this week?”
“What?” he asked, pulled from whatever trance he’d fallen into while watching their boys round up the entire playground for some kind of game on the grass.
“At the baseball field,” Rachel said. “I’ll see you later this week. You said you’re coming.”
It seemed pertinent to remind him of this promise he’d made.
“Right. Yes.” He nodded. Looked at the boys, then at Rachel, finally turned and walked back toward his car.
Rachel didn’t know a lot of things. But given that her reality never went as planned and she’d very much like to have a break from chaos, she felt confident in asserting that something was up with Gavin. Something that, if she had to place a bet, would wreck her plans.
The question now was, which ones were coming up on the chopping block?