Текст книги "The Will"

Автор книги: Kristen Ashley

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Текущая страница: 14 (всего у книги 35 страниц)

Noah Young was blinking at me but I was far from done.

“As for your assertion that Amber is a tease, she isn’t. She just isn’t that into you.”

This was, of course, an outright lie and I heard a gurgling noise come from Taylor behind me perhaps exposing my perfidy.

Nevertheless, I persevered.

“Although she recognizes you’re quite good-looking, she also doesn’t feel you respect her very much and is having issues with that, wondering if you will eventually toe the line. But alas, from your comments tonight, it seems you won’t.”

I held his eyes and lowered my voice.

“You see, a woman who knows herself and her worth knows that her time is valuable and her heart is precious. She doesn’t give either to a man who can’t respect the gifts he’s being offered.”

Noah kept blinking and I raised my voice slightly as I finished.

“And anyway, she’s been Skypeing Julian. I introduced them online. He’s French Canadian and I believe he’s doing a fashion shoot in Fiji at the moment but he’ll be back in New York next week. He’s quite the outdoors type, even if he’s a model, and he’s keen to come and meet Amber as well as see Maine. I’m sure Amber will enjoy showing her home state to him when he arrives.”

This was all a lie too, of course, but that didn’t stop me from lowering the boom as a finale.

“He’s nineteen and her father quite likes him even though Julian’s a bit older than her. This is because Julian spends a fair amount of time around very beautiful women and thus he knows how to treat them but more, he knows a quality individual when he meets one. Even if only online. So please do totally look through Amber,” I invited. “It will only save you frustration and perhaps heartbreak when she eventually understands how shallow you are, finds you tedious and cuts you loose.”

“Holy shit,” one of his compatriots muttered and that reminded me I wasn’t done.

“Just one final thing,” I began. “There are men who can carry off foul language. But they are men. When you use it, you sound absurd, like you’re desperately trying to be something you’re not. Furthermore, badmouthing a young woman when all and sundry can hear is just bad manners. Extremely bad manners. It says nothing about the young woman you’re referring to and everything about your own character. And just to say, none of that everything is good.”

On that, I turned my back to him and looked to Taylor.

“You may wish to move forward, young Taylor,” I stated. “The line has advanced.”

He tore his incredulous eyes from me and shuffled forward the twelve centimeters the line had moved.

“C’mon, let’s get out of here.” I heard mumbled from behind me and I felt the boys’ presence leave as the line behind them closed in and Taylor again caught my eye.

“That…was…epic,” he breathed.

Although I found “epic” an overdramatized word, I was still pleased he thought so. But now that the deed was done, I was beginning to get anxious.

For Taylor might think so but I had grave concerns Amber would not.

“Do you have your phone?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he answered.

“Hurry and text Amber. Tell her to come here straight away. We need to warn her that event just occurred.”

“You got it,” he muttered and dug his phone out of his back pocket.

I continued, “After you get in touch with her, you may wish to get in touch with your parents and ask them if you can attend the Bounce concert with me. Please assure them I’ll provide transport and accommodation and act as your chaperone.”

His thumbs stopped flying over the screen of his phone and he looked up at me like I was an angel fallen to earth.

He went back to his phone as I tried to breathe normally, becoming more and more worried that my intervention in Amber’s romantic life would not be well received. I continued worrying even as the line shuffled forward.

Amber finally joined us as Taylor stood beside me and I took the two hot cocoas in one hand that were in a brown cardboard holder.

Amber also had a young woman with her and I momentarily forgot my fears as I took her in.

She was very tall, at least two inches taller than Amber and I, putting her to my expert eye at five ten. She was also very slender. Her hair was a shining black sheath. Her clothing, like Taylor’s, was not suited to Magdalene High but instead suited to waltzing along the sidewalk in Manhattan on her way to meet friends for a salad even if she was in a pair of jeans, boots and an extremely well-cut leather jacket.

Her features were mixed race, Caucasian and more than likely Korean with high, rounded cheekbones, elegantly formed dark brown eyes and absolutely flawless porcelain skin.

She was stunning.

“Hey, Josie,” Amber greeted. “What’s up?”

At Amber’s voice, my fears returned and I tore my eyes away from the girl at her side and looked to her.

“We need to find some privacy, lovely girl. I need a word,” I told her.

Her face went guarded but Taylor came to my rescue.

“Totally, Amber. You gotta hear what just happened.”

Amber looked to her friend, her expression even more wary and we moved away from the concession stand to the open grassy area between it and the bleachers. We found a large patch of grass where no one was standing close and we huddled together.

“What’s going on?” Amber asked immediately.

I opened my mouth to answer but her friend spoke before me.

“By the way, I’m Taylor or, uh…the other Taylor. Amber and Taylor’s bestest bestie,” she introduced herself.

“Lovely to meet you, Taylor. I’m Josephine.”

“I know.” She smiled, her features rearranging subtly into another extraordinary view. “Amber’s makeup tonight is sick. Everyone is checking her out. It’s awesome.”

I was pleased she thought so and I smiled but I said no more as I had more pressing things on my mind.

Before I could share these, boy Taylor stated, “Girl, Noah got behind us in line at the concession stand and I don’t think he saw me because he and his posse trash talked you extreme.”

Amber’s face lost all its color as she stared at her friend.

“Don’t worry though. Josie totally laid him out,” boy Taylor went on to assure her.

Her pale face turned my way and it was clear from the look on it she was not assured.

I got closer, feeling my heart beating harder. “I’m so sorry, my lovely girl,” I said gently. “He was saying some awful things and I simply couldn’t help myself.”

“What’d he say?” she whispered.

Boy Taylor (and girl Taylor) huddled closer and boy Taylor shared quietly, “He called you a tease and said if you like your cherry so much, you can keep it.”

Pink tinged her cheeks at that even as she winced.

“What a dick,” girl Taylor decreed at this point and I looked to her to see her looking at Amber. “I so totally told you, Amber. He’s completely up his own ass.”

“He is, girlfriend,” boy Taylor agreed. “He thinks he’s all that when you’re all that and tonight with your face like it is you’re even more all that. And anyway no guy should trash talk a girl for anyone to hear or…freaking…ever. But he did and he’s so not worth putting up with this. Even if he was, he still wouldn’t be.”

“I believe this is true,” I told her, still going gently and she looked to me. “And I’m afraid I shared this with him and, perhaps, fibbed a bit,” I finished on an admission.

“You fibbed?” she asked, her voice weak as she accepted these rather vicious-to-a-teenaged-girl blows.

“Yes.”

“About what?”

I took a deep breath and on the exhale explained, “Well, I told him I was taking you and the Taylors to Bounce, which I didn’t know that was the concert you wanted to see in Boston. Since I know Lavon, I’ll be happy to do that if we can talk your father into letting you go.”

Her mouth dropped open and I looked to the girl Taylor.

“You may wish to share this with your parents. Lavon will gladly give me backstage passes should I ask, something I’ll be doing first thing tomorrow. Please assure your parents all travel arrangements and accommodation will be covered by me and I’ll be with you at all times.”

Her striking eyes were big and she asked, “You know Lavon Burkett?”

“Of course,” I murmured, but felt it imperative we return to the matter at hand.

To do so, I looked back to Amber.

“I must share that I also fibbed about the fact that you’re talking with Julian online. Julian is a model that Henry often works with. Of course, I can introduce you to Julian and make that fib true too, but I’m uncertain how your father will react to that so let’s get the concert issue dealt with first and then we’ll move on to Julian.”

Amber was now blinking up at me, clearly unable to process all that was coming her way, but before I could even attempt to reassure her, boy Taylor exclaimed, “Oh my gawd!”

“What?” girl Taylor asked.

We all looked to him to see he had his phone screen turned our way. On it was a picture of Julian emerging from the surf, fully wet, his well-defined body alluringly bronzed, wearing rather skimpy black bathing trunks, water dripping from a dark lock dangling from his forehead, an arresting yet mischievous smile on his face.

“Please tell me he’s really gay,” boy Taylor breathed.

“Alas, I can’t tell you that young Taylor, for he very much is not,” I replied.

“I’m in love,” girl Taylor whispered.

“You can introduce me to him?” Amber asked breathily.

My eyes moved to her and I saw my mistake so I moved instantly to control the situation.

“Let’s stay focused,” I urged. “First, your friends need to get permission to go to the concert and I need to discuss that with your father to make certain you can go. Second, you need to handle yourself tonight very carefully. I’ve no idea how Noah will react to my set down but he might take that out on you.”

I got closer and spoke quieter.

“You, my lovely girl, must act like you don’t care. You can take him or leave him. If he ignores you, bury any reaction you may have to it. You can talk to your friends about it or even…” I hesitated before offering, “me, if you would trust me enough to share your feelings. If he doesn’t ignore you, give him your time but not much of it. His words and behavior tonight proved he’s not worth it.”

Amber proved she had a one-track mind—that being the boy track—when to this she repeated with a jerk of her head in the direction of boy Taylor’s phone, “You can introduce me to him?”

“Amber, did you hear what I said?” I asked.

I watched her swallow, her eyes get bright and her words were trembling when she asked back, “He called me a tease?”

At the look on her face and the sound of her words, I felt my heart get heavy.

My poor girl.

I leaned into her and lifted a hand to her jaw.

Stroking her soft cheek with my thumb, I whispered, “Yes, my lovely girl. He was most ungentlemanly.”

“He acted like he liked me,” she whispered back.

“He likely does,” I told her. “He also has to show a certain face to his friends and feels he has to play his role as big man in a way that he can keep that role but has the mistaken and rather juvenile impression that doing that means gathering conquests and behaving very badly.”

She was still whispering when she told me, “But Josie, I’ve liked him since…forever.”

I pulled in another deep breath, long since gone from my high school years but remembering quite acutely what it was like to crush on a boy and have him show me the attention I so craved.

Thus, I stroked her cheek again and replied, “I think now you’re experiencing a lot of things, my lovely. And one of them is simply the fact that he does not live up to what you thought he would be. But he doesn’t. It may take some time for you to come to terms with this but the fact of the matter is it’s true. And perhaps my words tonight will penetrate in some way and he’ll look at you with different eyes. But if he does and his attention returns to you, you must not accept anything but that which is grounded not only in attraction but also respect, kindness and affection.”

“He’s the cutest guy in school,” she informed me.

“This may be true but I assure you, if you heard his words tonight, he would appear far less attractive to you, even if those words hadn’t been spoken about you,” I shared.

“That’s totally true, Amber,” boy Taylor put in at this juncture and I dropped my hand as we both looked to him. “He was totally a douche.”

“He’s always been a douche,” girl Taylor murmured.

“It’s extremely improper for me to call a young teenaged boy a douche,” I stated and everyone looked at me. “That said, Taylor is right. He was definitely a douche.”

I saw Amber’s eyes widen to extremes as both Taylors burst out laughing.

Then to my relief, I saw Amber’s eyes light as she joined them but grabbed my hand, held it and forced through her amusement, “Josie, you saying the word douche is the funniest thing I think I’ve heard in my life.”

I liked it that she was holding my hand. I liked it that she didn’t dissolve into tears at hearing what had occurred with Noah Young. I liked it that she didn’t get angry with me and cause a scene by throwing a tantrum that it was arguable, but having been a teenaged girl at one point in my life, I would weigh in that it was deserved.

Last and most important, I liked it that now she was laughing.

I stopped liking it or thinking anything when we heard a shrieked, “Seriously Conner! You think you can scrape me off?”

“Uh-oh,” Amber mumbled, her hand squeezing mine as our eyes darted to where I’d seen Conner with his girlfriend before.

He was still there, as was she. They were still standing close. But now Conner had moved the blonde girl behind him in a protective manner as a rather voluptuous (for a high school girl), relatively petite and definitely angry girl faced off against them.

“You, yeah you!” she kept shrieking and now was pointing at who I assumed was Ellie. “You think I can’t take you?”

Conner’s face was a frozen mask of anger and he took a step toward the brunette even as he shoved the blonde further behind him and it was at this that I found my feet moving without my brain telling them to do so.

They did this, taking me straight to Conner.

I felt Amber and the Taylors trailing me.

I stopped wide to the side (and Amber and the Taylors stopped with me) and looked to Conner who was looking at me.

He started, “Josie—”

“I think you need privacy with this young lady,” I said quietly and pointedly. I then turned my eyes to the blonde as well as reached a hand out to her. “Come,” I encouraged.

“Ellie,” Amber whispered close to my back.

So I was correct.

I nodded and pushed my hand further toward Ellie. “Come, Ellie. Let’s go sit, watch the game and await Conner.”

Ellie looked to Conner who was looking over his shoulder at her.

“Go,” he said gently. “Josie’ll take care of you.”

She pressed her lips together, hesitated but a moment and finally moved toward me.

“Watch your back,” the brunette hissed as she got close to me.

Ellie scuttled closer and I took her hand. Hers clasped mine surprisingly tight even though she had to have no idea who I was (outside of the fact that I was with her boyfriend’s sister).

I took her hand and moved her away, my gaze going back to Conner.

His eyes were on me. “I’ve got this, Josie.”

“Yeah, you think you do,” the brunette was still hissing. “But you don’t.”

Oh dear.

It appeared Conner had his hands full.

I moved Ellie clear of the burgeoning fray and did it quickly, Amber and the Taylors trailing.

We got well away, moved in close to the side of the bleachers, and I found us another pocket of privacy. I could tell the game had started but I could also see Ellie’s face was pale and stricken and her hand had not loosened even a smidgeon in mine.

I turned to her when we stopped and Amber and the Taylors huddled close.

“I’m Josephine,” I introduced myself.

“Yeah,” she said quietly, her voice timid, her eyes not exactly meeting mine. “Con told me about you. His dad’s new girlfriend.”

At her words, I felt shafts of fire burn through me like spears were drilling from top to toe. This feeling was painful because this feeling was hope in the face of hopelessness. It took everything I had not to focus on that feeling and instead focus on this frightened shy girl.

“I think Conner would like it if you would sit with myself and Conner’s dad. He’ll find us when he’s done with that young lady,” I told her.

She shook her head. “It won’t matter. She’ll get to me. She’s been saying at school for days she’s going to take me out.”

“Then you shouldn’t be alone,” boy Taylor stated, getting close.

“We’ll stick by you, Ellie,” Amber assured, also getting close.

“Mia’s just ticked she knows she’s not going to make the cut and you are. She’ll burn out,” girl Taylor told her, also getting close.

When she did, I sighed.

Make the cut, indeed.

Conner had weaved this tangled web. I certainly hoped he had it in him to unravel it without too much heartache.

“I think I need to sit down,” Ellie said softly.

“Let’s get her to the bleachers,” I urged and immediately moved my charges to do just that.

I found the set of stairs that were closest to our seats. I also saw Jake sitting amongst the crowd, a seat open on either side of him on the blanket, one for the absent Ethan, one for the absent me.

I let Ellie go but curled my fingers around Amber’s arm and dipped down to say in her ear, “Can you take Ellie up and ask your father to come down?”

When I pulled away, she caught my eyes and nodded.

Boy Taylor grabbed the forgotten cocoas from my other hand and they all scrambled up. They then pushed in front of the four spectators to get to Jake. I saw Amber bend down and talk to him then I saw his eyes come to me. He stood, his eyes never leaving me as he and the children shuffled around. He eased in front of the spectators then I watched as he jogged down the stairs to me.

When he got to me, I took his hand without a word and tugged him to the spot the youngsters and I had vacated earlier.

I stopped us and got close.

Thereupon, I got up on my toes to get closer and launched in.

“I have much to say and not much time,” I announced.

His brows shot up.

I sallied forth.

“I’ll explain later so you can get angry without an audience as to what prompted me to make a number of rash decisions but right now I’ll break it down. With your permission, I’ll be taking Amber and the Taylors to see Bounce in Boston whenever it is they’re playing there. I know the band and am relatively close to the front man so I can get backstage passes. I’ll chaperone them. But I want very much for Amber and her friends to have this as I’ve met Noah Young, it was not a pleasant meeting, I dislike him greatly and I wish for Amber and the Taylors to be able to rub his nose in their not only attending the concert but meeting the performers.”

Jake blinked.

I carried on.

“Conner is currently calming down a rather irate young lady who has threatened bodily harm to Ellie. Amber, the Taylors and I forged to the rescue and thus Ellie is with us awaiting Conner’s return. I would think that he may need you to intervene at some point as, for reasons unknown to me, it would seem the girls may start turning on each other rather than aiming their ire at Conner, who I imagine could take it and who arguably deserves it. It isn’t my place to say but he may need a mature guiding hand as he maneuvers the minefield toward monogamy.”

Jake said nothing. He simply stared at me.

“And, just to say,” I continued. “Amber and Noah, if they were ever officially together, have broken up. I played an, um…rather substantial hand in that, alas. It’s likely there will be some teenaged girl moods in your house for the foreseeable future. Or, uh…more of them. I’d like to apologize for that in advance.”

I stopped speaking and Jake continued to stare at me for a moment before he asked, “Jesus, Slick, how long were you gone?”

It seemed like a year.

I didn’t share this. In fact, I decided not to speak at all.

“Does Con need me now?” Jake asked into my silence.

“He says he has it,” I shared.

“Then he has it,” he muttered, looking down to his boots.

I got closer and realized I was still holding his hand. I drew back on mine but couldn’t release his because when I did this, his fingers tightened.

“I’m sorry, Jake. I may have made a bit of a mess.”

His eyes cut to mine. “What went down with Noah?”

Oh dear.

“Perhaps I can tell you later,” I suggested.

“What went down with Noah, Josie?”

I stared into his eyes and noted he was not going to back down.

So it was me who held his hand tighter and I again got closer before I shared, “Obviously, he has no idea who I am and thus I overheard him—as boy Taylor put it—trashtalking Amber.”

Jake’s mouth got tight in a way I found vaguely frightening but I persevered.

“I’m afraid I lost my temper and gave him a talking to,” I admitted.

“You gave him a talking to,” he repeated.

“Indeed,” I confirmed.

He said nothing to that and asked, “I need to have a word with Noah’s parents?”

I shook my head quickly.

Jake studied me.

Then he asked quietly, “He was trash talking Amber?”

I nodded my head slowly.

His big man energy started expanding all around.

“What’d he say?”

It was then I got even closer, lifted my free hand and put it on his chest, trying to find the words I needed.

I found them from memory of what boy Taylor had said and stated, “It doesn’t matter, Jake. I laid him out.”

He again studied me before asking, “Amber know what he said?”

“Some of it, yes. But I think the Taylors have that in hand. They’re quite supportive in a way it’s most gratifying. Further, neither of them likes Noah very much.”

“Was she there?”

I shook my head.

He took in a big breath and exhaled.

Then he shocked me by grinning, turning into me so he could sling his arm around my shoulders and tuck me into his side as he moved us toward the bleachers, stating, “Then I guess we’re goin’ to a concert in a couple weeks, Slick.”

We?

I didn’t ask this.

And I didn’t because I was noting that it was awkward walking with him with his arm around my shoulders and mine hanging down at my sides, so I slid one of mine around his waist.

Jake kept us connected until we hit the steps that led to our seats in the bleachers. He bid me to go before him and did this by putting a hand in the small of my back and gently pushing me toward the stairs.

I ascended, noting that children had appropriated more seating for us and Ethan had returned.

Though there was no sign of Conner and Ellie didn’t look any less anxious.

Jake maneuvered the seating arrangements so he was sitting between me and his daughter. Although extra seating had been procured, it was close and my side was plastered to Jake’s, including hip and thigh.

But he didn’t curve an arm around me again.

Instead, he curved one around his daughter and pulled her close to his other side, bending to kiss the top of her head.

When he lifted away, she tipped her face back to gaze at him, her eyes soft and partly lost, partly loving, and seeing that I thought she never looked lovelier.

And seeing Jake silently give his daughter his loving care, I thought he’d never been more wonderful.

And he was normally quite wonderful.

Clearly father/daughter affection was acceptable only for short periods of time at high school events for Jake released Amber a short time later and turned his attention to me, again curling an arm around my back and pulling me even tighter to his side.

It was then it occurred to me why Conner would think I was his father’s new girlfriend. Jake’s easy, and frequent, affection could undoubtedly be misconstrued in this manner.

I wondered if I should talk to him about this for I felt it might be confusing to the children and if he should (regrettably, but very probably) find another woman, they might not understand.

I was thinking this when Conner returned and Jake didn’t budge from my side even as his sharp eyes locked on his son.

But Conner saw no one but Ellie. He went directly to her and claimed her from boy Taylor who was sticking close.

Upon witnessing this, it became clear that Ellie was the one who was going to make “the cut.” Watching them after he returned, I noted that Conner seemed very attentive of her, also very protective and, as they said these days, very “into” her.

Our seating became even tighter when Conner joined us but the other spectators were involved in the game so they didn’t appear to notice.

Needless to say, our cocoas were lost in the shuffle and eventually got kicked under the bleachers without even being sipped. This was done by an excited Ethan, who did it when the Magdalene Tritons made one of their many touchdowns. This situation was rectified at halftime when Jake sent Ethan (who was accompanied on this errand by Conner and Ellie) to procure all of us warming beverages.

Except for the fact that it was a rather exciting game and even though I had not watched one in some time, I saw the Tritons were very talented, it seemed our drama for the evening was thankfully at an end.

The only thing earth shattering that happened (and this was only my perception) was that when we were seated (in other words, when Jake wasn’t clapping or cupping his hands around his mouth and shouting encouragement at the team I was relatively certain they couldn’t hear or jumping to his feet like all of those around us, applauding and shouting), Jake held me to him the whole time. And some of that time, I even felt the tips of his fingers stroking my hip (yes! stroking my hip!) through my jeans.

It was a lovely feeling (very lovely) but it was another display that more than likely, if caught by his children, could be confusing.

When the Tritons emerged victorious, after the raucous applause ended, Jake commanded to our brood to, “Roll out.”

We all moved.

Once on the graveled lane in front of the bleachers, Ethan leading the way followed by Amber and the Taylors, their heads together, looking like they were plotting, followed by Conner and Ellie with their arms around each other, heads also together, looking like they were doing something vastly different, Jake again claimed me. He did this like his son claimed his girlfriend except without our heads together.

No, when I slid my arm around his waist, I looked up and saw his head was held high and regardless of the drama that began our foray into high school athletic spectatorship, his expression seemed most content.

Perhaps his most handsome look.

Then again, that would be hard to judge as they all were.

I started to look to my feet in order to best negotiate the gravel in my high-heeled boots but my eyes caught on Ellie’s thumb hooked in the belt loop of Conner’s jeans.

When it did, I had another overwhelming urge—an urge so overwhelming, it was a yearning to do the same to Jake.

More accurately, to be to Jake the person in his life who could stake that kind of claim of his jeans (an inappropriately heated thought).

But more, his person.

I sighed as I realized my pretending needed to be well and truly done for even if Jake was holding me close, I knew it was simply Jake doing with me what he would do with his daughter if she would allow him to do so in front of her peers.

On this thought, I spied Noah standing with his companions to the side of the end of the bleachers. In spying him, I saw he was studying Amber and doing it closely.

His friends were as well, and if I was not mistaken, a couple of them were doing it not with speculation or indignation but admiration.

I looked to Amber and saw her resolutely avoiding eye contact with Noah and I knew, as a woman but also someone who was once a teenaged girl, she knew he was there.

Her slight of Noah didn’t go unnoticed. I saw his jaw get hard and then I saw his gaze turn to me.

I held his eyes momentarily before I looked away, fought back my grin but didn’t fight back my murmur of, “That’s my girl.”

I knew Jake heard this when his arm around me got tighter. I also knew Jake saw it when Amber looked over her shoulder and leaned to the side to catch my eyes.

I winked at her. She grinned at me. My entire frame warmed delightfully and it warmed even more when Jake pulled me so tight to his side, I had to twist slightly into him to accommodate the embrace.

“You take care of my girl,” he said softly.

I looked up at him. “Yes, Jake. But I believe I get more out of it than she does.”

His gentle gaze held mine captive when he replied, “Then you believe wrong, Slick.”

I pressed my lips together and looked away for the warmth I was feeling was so acute, so lovely, even precious, I needed to concentrate on walking so I didn’t get overcome by the feeling and fall flat on my face.

It was within five more feet of our advance when it happened.

And what happened was that a remarkably attractive, tall, buxom redhead approached our parade, crying out, “My babies!”

“Fuck,” Jake muttered.

I quickly glanced up at him as he stopped us.

He no longer looked content.

And I saw when I looked in the direction his eyes were aimed that he stopped us because the advance of our party was halted by the woman bearing down on Amber to give her a tight hug that Amber markedly didn’t return.

The woman didn’t seem to notice as she let Amber go and moved promptly to wrest Conner away from Ellie and do the same.

Unlike his sister, Conner hugged the woman, though it appeared to me that he did this more out of consideration than fondness, and I knew in that instant the woman was Donna, Conner and Amber’s mother.

It was then my study of her heightened and I noted she looked very like her daughter except for the fact she was far more curvaceous. And this last wasn’t lost on me in any way that Donna, Jake’s ex-wife, had big hair and big…other stuff.

Precisely the reason that Donna was Jake’s ex-wife and I would never be Jake’s anything.

She turned to Amber, pouting disingenuously, “You never call.”

Before Amber could reply, her eyes went to her son.

“And if I didn’t see you at Wayfarer’s, I’d never see you.”

“Mom—” Conner started but it was then, two things happened.

One, I noticed a man hovering a bit away, watching these proceedings.

He was very good-looking. He was also quite young. I would place Donna at around my age, no younger, perhaps older. The man hovering in a way that made me think he belonged to her couldn’t be older than thirty, but he could be younger.