Chapter 15 Hutch
Hutch
“Where to?” Ginger asks the second she shuts the door behind her.
I glance in her direction, the taste of her last night still on my mind.
Ginger’s always been a little hot and cold with me, something I like more than I probably should, but last night felt different.
She’d seemed sad after talking to her son.
She hasn’t brought it up, and after she sort of iced me out after that phone call, barely looking at me when she climbed back in the van, I wasn’t sure if I should bring it up.
Which was weird, because I wasn’t in the habit of sugar coating anything or beating around the bush. If I’m curious about something, I’ll usually ask. But for some reason, I didn’t. Instead, I roll out of the parking lot and head in the direction of the highway.
Ginger says her feet are okay for hiking, but she’s stubborn enough for me to bet she’s probably in more pain than she’s letting on.
She isn’t limping like she was last night, but thirty minutes in those shitty excuse for hiking shoes and she’ll be uncomfortable as all hell.
It’s been years since I hiked the area we’ll be passing through today, but I won’t miss anything if we skip it.
We can absolutely skip it and get more driving time in.
I pick up my phone and hand it to her so she can see the route I’ve mapped out. “Figured we’d drive through here on our way out. You ever been?”
She nods. “A couple of years back.”
“We can skip it if your feet are bothering you. Get on the road sooner.”
“It’s okay. I kind of like the idea of being a tourist in my own state,” she says, covering her lap with that fuzzy checkered blanket.
I tip my chin up at her. “You perpetually cold or something?”
She laughs softly before shaking her head. “No, it’s a security thing, I think,” she tells me. “Even when it’s not cold, I always have a blanket nearby. By the way, thanks for all the blankets last night. I was worried I’d be cold, but it was so comfortable.”
I chuckle. “And there I was sweating my ass off with a sheet and boxers.”
She glances at me, a slight blush tinting her cheeks. “Must be a Hayes thing, Wren says the same about your brother.”
I nod. “Yeah, Pop and Hudson run hot, too. Hales and Norah as well. I think the only ones that don’t are Nat and Mom.”
“So, where do you fall in the order? I know Hank is the oldest, and then Hudson,” she says. Again, I wonder if we’ll forget about last night, but it does beat arguing.
“Right after Hudson. Then the twins, then Hayley,” I say, forcing my thoughts away from thoughts of her pussy on my tongue.
She shoots me a wide grin and the sight hits me in the chest. “Why am I not surprised? You clearly give off middle child vibes.”
I feign hurt with a hand to my chest and a wounded stare. “That’s cold, California.”
“Hey, if the loner-recluse-living-in-the woods-in-a-crusty-old-van shoe fits.” She laughs.
“You forgot town fuckboy,” I toss out, and she gives me a teasing half-smile.
We sit in comfortable silence for a couple of beats before curiosity gets the better of me.
“What about you? Any siblings?”
She nods, turning slightly toward me. “Yeah, I have a sister, Lexie. She’s two years younger than me. She’s married, has two kids, one boy and one girl, with another on the way.”
“They live near you and the boys?”
“They live in Florida. My sister’s husband, Levi, works on drones; something to do with military bases. He’s overseas right now, so Lex and the kids are staying with my parents.”
I nod, settling into my seat for the drive. “You close with your folks?”
“My dad, I guess. My mom is…a lot.” She pauses, and I glance at her. “As you heard.”
“I know the feeling. My entire family is a lot.”
“But you’re all close, right?” she asks, moving to tuck her feet up underneath her so she’s sitting crisscross on the bucket seat.
I scratch the back of my neck. “I guess. I’m closer to my brothers. Hales and I get along pretty well when she’s not busting my balls.”
Her smile is warm as she gazes over at me. “I haven’t spent much time with her, but I guess that will change since she offered her place to me and the boys while we’re there. That was nice of her.”
“I was surprised to hear you’re not staying with Hank and Wren and the girls.” They have plenty of room. I should know, I built their house.
She glances out the window. “I didn’t want to impose on their honeymoon phase. And with the girls and my two…again, it’s kind of a lot.”
Something like satisfaction coils in my belly knowing she’s staying with Hales. I’ll be working right next door, and seeing more of her makes me feel optimistic. And…slightly puzzled. But I don’t let myself dwell on it.
“Well, Hales loves kids, and her place is small but cozy. I’m sure you’ll be comfortable there.”
“Probably more comfortable than I would have been spending my vacation with my parents, my sister, and her kids.”
“Was that the original plan for the summer?”
“Hell, no.” Her laugh is sardonic. “Although my mother would have loved that.”
I stay quiet, knowing with most people, less is more, and I’m kind of enjoying the easy way she’s talking to me.
She chuckles and goes on, surprising me with her candor. “You should have heard my mother when she found out I was spending the summer in Timber Forge.”
I chuckle, because although I live there, and love it, I can see why someone might not. It’s barely a map dot. “Yeah, I gathered she wasn’t too happy about it.”
“This road trip is exactly the kind of thing twenty-year-old Ginger would have done. Which drives my mother insane. I mean, she would have expected something like this back then. But at thirty-eight, it’s…
different. And way out of character. Wrenley would tell me I’m being melodramatic. I tend to do that.”
I flick a glance in her direction and a smirk curls my lips.
“Fuck off,” she says, but there’s humor in it. “I think it comes from constantly having to be ‘on’ all the time growing up, you know?”
I don’t, but I nod anyway. Being sandwiched in between my brothers and my twin sisters, I sort of got lost in the shuffle most of the time.
Especially by the time Hales came along.
But there wasn’t ever a time when I felt like I had to be anything other than who I was.
My parents are great, but I’ve always been the lone wolf.
“Anyway,” she says, “I was raised by a minimalist mother with a penchant for trying to control my life at every turn, and a father who, while he loves my sister and me, would rather spend his time on the golf course than be home with his high-maintenance wife and daughters. I grew up a straight-A student, a member of the honor society, and even had a formal introduction in society.” She says that last part with air quotes, and I raise my eyebrows.
“People actually still do that shit?” Her mother sounded like a nightmare, and Ginger was starting to make a whole lot more sense. It couldn’t have been easy living with a parent that constantly picked at you or pushed their fucked up ideas of what they thought your life should be like on you.
She shrugs and goes on. “Everything was a competition between which of my mother’s friends' daughters would marry first, and who would snag the richest husband.”
“Sounds fucking excruciating,” I say.
“Yeah,” she nods, then winces, “God, that was a lot.”
“You’re good,” I tell her, surprised how little her chatter bothers me.
“I learned pretty quickly to do what I was told. So, now you know. All up to speed on everything you never wanted to know about me.”
She blushes a bit, and I get the impression she’s embarrassed by the overshare.
“How is your relationship with your ex?” I don’t know why I ask it, other than I’m finding I like talking to her. Almost as much as messing around with her.
“It’s good.” She nods. “We’re good. He’s a great dad. But even he’s worried about me.” She pauses like maybe she’s said too much, and I glance over at her. “When I got divorced, I sort of threw my life into my boys.”
“I can see that,” I say, nodding. I’m completely blown away by how much she’s sharing and even more by the fact that I care.
Interesting.
“Peter, my ex, he’s getting remarried, having a baby.” She sighs. “Moved to Seattle, of all places.”
“Wow. Big step,” I say.
Her answering chuckle is mirthless. “Yeah, you could say that.”
She folds her arms across her chest, rubbing them absently before seeming to remember the blanket on her lap.
She pulls it over her shoulders and leans her head back against the headrest, eyes fixed on the scenery outside the passenger window.
The shift in her posture—from poised and on edge to quiet and defeated—hits me harder than I expect.
I rub a spot on my chest. The idea of a father willingly putting distance between himself and his kids doesn’t sit right.
I don’t have kids, and I’m not as close with my parents as some of my siblings are, but my pop was everything.
He taught me to work hard, chase what matters, and live every day with purpose.
For him, that was ranching and raising a family.
For me, it’s my work and the freedom of the road.
“That’s gotta be hard on Tate and Jordan.”
She turns to me, a curious look on her face.
“What?” I ask.
“Nothing, I’m just surprised you remember the boys’ names.”
My eyebrows knit together. What could she possibly think of me—that I wouldn’t remember her boys’ names?
I spent all afternoon with them at the lake last summer and spent a bit of time with them again at Hank and Wren’s wedding in January.
Tate wasn’t exactly my biggest fan, but Jordan warmed up to me quickly.
“Anyway, my lease is up in December, and the crazy part?” she says, rolling her head to look at me. “Peter asked me to go with them.”
I snap my eyes in her direction. “With him and his new family?”
She wobbles her head back and forth. “Well, not with them exactly, but he mentioned me moving there too; he doesn’t want to miss time with the boys.”
That admission makes my jaw clench, and my fist tighten on the steering wheel. What kind of man asks his ex-wife to uproot her own life because of a choice he’s made? Then again, what the hell do I know about relationships, ex-wives, and raising kids? Fuck all, that’s what.
Shaking off the tight feeling in my chest, I ask, “And what do you want?”
She sighs, and it seems bone-deep and weary. Her eyes are tired, and she purses her lips when she meets my gaze. “Ideally? I’d like to not make any more decisions. Just for a little while. Especially ones of the life-changing variety.”
Something in her eyes hits me square in the chest, my heart thudding hard with the sudden urge to make her life easier.
It’s always the selfless ones who need looking after the most—like they can’t help but carry everyone else’s weight, even when it breaks them down.
And right now, I want to carry some of it for Ginger.
I want to ease the load. But why? The thought shakes me, and I have to clear my throat and look away.
“You do realize not making a decision is still making a decision, right?” I say, a little amusement in my tone, hoping to lighten things up.
“You’re a lot of help,” she says, and I can immediately sense her walls sliding back into place. And for some fucked up reason, I really hate that.
It’s my turn to sigh. “Hey, I’m messing around. I know this isn’t a funny situation and that it’s a big decision.”
When she doesn’t answer and turns back to the window, I realize I’ll do pretty much anything to keep her talking. I hate the hot and cold she’s suddenly giving me.
“So, no decisions?”
She looks over at me, fatigue clear in her tone. “What?”
“You said you don’t want to make any more decisions,” I say. “So let me make them for you.”
She rolls those gorgeous blue eyes and chuckles. “Yeah, that sounds like a horrible idea.”
“Give me a little credit,” I reply, a small smile playing across my lips. “I might be a recluse fuckboy who lives in his van, but I’m a pretty great judge of character, and I can tell you, if Wren wanted you to come on this trip, she trusts me. Why can’t you? Live a little, California.”
She watches me from the passenger seat, eyes narrowed. Something seems to change in her eyes, and she finally nods. “Okay, fuckboy,” she says with a teasing snark that I love, “but nothing weird. And I get veto privileges. I can tell you no anytime, for any reason.”
I wiggle my eyebrows and flash her a toothy grin. “Can you?”
A small laugh bubbles up out of her as she leans back. “You’re a child.”