by Shayla Black
After securing that box shut, I stack it with the others. “One shelving unit down. Five to go.”
Britta glances my way, trying not to look panicked. I can almost hear her thoughts. I have to spend hours trapped in a small room with my half-naked ex I have the hots for? Well, she didn’t think the last part, I’m sure. But it’s true.
“Maybe we should call it a day,” she suggests.
I shake my head. “I have to be productive first thing tomorrow, so we’ve got to finish now. In fact, we might have to stay late. Want to order in some Chinese tonight?”
She looks horrified by the notion. “No. I’m not a naive twenty-year-old anymore. That trick won’t work on me.”
What? “That was never a trick, and we genuinely have work to do before I can set up an office in here.”
“I have to pick Jamie up by five thirty.”
“Oh. Right.” Feeling stupid for not realizing that, I lift the storage unit and maneuver it to the corner so it’s not impeding windows or the door.
I feel Britta watching every flex of my shoulders, arms, and back. “Yeah. H-he has a…um, playdate. At the park, ah… A boy. F-from our…”
She can’t finish a sentence. Since my back is to her and she can’t tell…well, I admit I’m preening.
Once I release the bookcase, I turn to her and brush my hands together. “Neighborhood?”
She swallows and jerks her gaze away. “Yeah. H-he’s been looking forward to this. I can’t miss it.”
A million thoughts circle my brain, but the most cogent is that I want to see Jamie. And this may be my opportunity.
I learned to be a ruthless bastard from the best—my father is an absolute artisan at getting his way. So I consider how I can coax more information out of her about where they’ll be and use the knowledge to my advantage. “Won’t it be dark by the time you get back to Kihei? It’ll be tough to play outdoors. Unless the facility is inside?”
“No. The park is well lit. I’ll watch him.” She frowns. “If you’re thinking that’s dangerous, I’d never let anything happen to him.”
“Hey, I have no doubt you’re a great mom.” I’m in no way accusing her of endangering or neglecting him. Hell, that’s the last thing I’m thinking.
“I really have tried.”
“Some years might separate us, angel. But I know you always give your all to the people you love.”
Why the fuck couldn’t I remember that when it counted most?
“I take good care of him, Griff. I always will.”
“I’m sure.” I brace my forearm across the top of an empty box and sidle closer. “Let me go with you tonight, meet Jamie. We don’t have to tell him who I am yet. We can—”
She’s already shaking her head. “He’s not ready.”
“You’re not ready,” I accuse, then bite back my frustration and a whole bunch of words I’ll regret.
“It’s been less than twenty-four hours since you crashed back into my life. I haven’t had time to decide what’s best for my son or figure out who you are now. I…” She frowns at me like she’s grappling to cope. “I’m not convinced you’re ready to be a father or that you wouldn’t walk out again. Or try to take Jamie from me.”
I shake my head. “You’re his mother. He needs you.”
“He does,” she agrees. “But you should understand that trust, once broken, is never easy to mend.”
Yes, of all people, I know that.
She turns away. I can’t argue with her when she’s right.
But that’s not going to stop me.
CHAPTER FOUR
Britta spends the rest of the afternoon trying to ignore me. I lay off teasing her because she obviously has a lot on her mind. Watching her eat me up with her hungry little stare was fun and informational. But I’ve given her a reminder of the crazy-strong pull between us. Now I have to focus on Jamie and finagling a way to meet him. Then I’ll work on a future with his mother.
By four, we manage to clear out all the binders and box them up. Maxon only puts up a small fight when I tell him I’ve arranged for a document imaging and management company to haul the paperwork away in the morning. With his grudging consent, I also post the shelving on Craigslist and I’m not surprised to start getting inquiries within minutes.
As I’m organizing the long table like a desk, Maxon strolls in and shuts the door behind him. “Looking good. Wow, I’d forgotten how much light comes through these windows.”
“Yeah, caveman. The chiseling on stone tablets is so two millennia ago.”
“Ha ha.” He sends me a sour glare. “When it comes to record keeping, I’m particular.”
“Dude, you were one binder short of starring in an episode of Hoarders.”
“At least I had my documentation at my fingertips and I didn’t have to call someone else to look up a file.”
“Which works out great…unless there’s a fire or a flood.”
Maxon doesn’t have a comeback for that. “Thanks for your analysis, Chicken Little. Looks like you’re all settled in. Would you rather have your own desk?”
“Eventually. There’s no rush. This works for now.”
“Except Britta might want her dining room table back. When we turned this into our ‘war room’ a couple of weeks ago, she let us borrow it.”
I glance at her across the office. She’s gathering her things at her desk, her profile tense. She’s trying not to look my way, even though I’m wearing my shirt again…mostly.
“She didn’t tell me it belonged to her.” But the wheels in my head are already turning. She’ll get her table back. In fact, I’ll be more than happy to deliver it to her house myself.
My brother sends me a suspicious stare. “That smile scares me.”
“What?” I ask as innocently as I’m capable of sounding. “I’m just thinking of ways to be helpful.”
“And you have no other motive. Right…” Maxon grunts. “Did the time alone with her this afternoon help you two?”
I shrug. “I think. We’ll see. Thanks for being there during Jamie’s birth.”
He nods. “I was happy to. And don’t change the subject. What’s the plan running around in your head? Don’t insult me by saying you don’t have one.”
Britta turns off her computer and yanks one of her desk drawers open, retrieving her red purse. After gathering up her bridal magazines and tape flags, she approaches Rob and says something that makes him smile. Then she sends a wave in my brother’s general direction and doesn’t acknowledge me.
I look at my phone. It’s five fifteen.
“Bye, angel,” I yank the door open and call across the office to her.
She shuts the door behind her without replying.
Through the window, I watch her pull out of the lot in her white family sedan and onto the street. “Jamie has a playdate with a kid in their neighborhood. Tell me everything you know about where she might take him.”
“You going to crash and see Jamie?”
Smart question. “I have to. Even if I don’t get to meet him, the fact that I’ve never clapped eyes on my own son is killing me.”
Maxon groans. “I know that sucks, but you’ve got to stop trying to make me a Judas.”
“Think of it as completing your nephew’s—and your brother’s—family. I won’t be able to share my life with them if I don’t have your help, man.”
He lets loose a sound that’s somewhere between a scoff and a grunt. “You owe me so big, and I expect you to grovel to Keeley on my behalf so you can help complete your brother’s family in return.”
“Done.” My last conversation with Keeley seemed as if her earlier leaning toward staying in Phoenix was beginning to lean back the other way. A few assurances that my brother is very seriously in love with her might help make up her mind.
Maxon smiles like he thinks he’s won. I let him believe that. I love them both and would have done everything possible to make them happy anyway.
“You didn’t hear t
his from me…” he mutters in low tones. “But Britta keeps a calendar of appointments in her desk and usually jots down addresses.”
I clap my brother on the shoulder. “You’re my hero.”
It takes me less than two minutes of prowling through her workspace to find what I’m looking for. Rob is too wrapped up in whatever he’s doing to care. Maxon pretends to look the other way. It’s perfect.
With a dash back into my office, I sweep up my keys and phone, then nod in my brother’s direction. “Talk to you later, man.”
“Play nice,” he calls to my retreating back.
I wave without committing to that. Maxon knows me well, so knows I’m not playing at all.
The Hawaiian sunshine is bright but waning as I fight the island’s version of rush-hour traffic south. A glance at the song titles on the case Keeley left me warns me that I should avoid more musical selections designed to rip my guts out—at least for now. I don’t need that messing with my head just before I see Jamie.
By six twenty, I reach the park not far from Britta’s house and catch a glimpse of the playground. The sun has nearly set when I pull my Porsche into a spot on the far side of the lot, hiding between a big truck and a giant SUV.
After locking up, I hang out against the fence in the shade beneath a few palms. With a view of both the road and the parking area, I kick back.
Two minutes later, Britta pulls up. She hustles out of the car, slinging the handles of a woven beach bag over one shoulder, and shoves a giant bottle of water inside it. She’s wearing tight black workout pants and a flowing shirt that matches her eyes. It’s a V-neck with embroidery down the front and along the sides. It hugs her body and ends at her hips. And I can’t stop staring.
Jesus… She is still the sexiest woman on the planet to me.
Finally, she opens the back door of her car and leans in. She must be unbuckling the car seat. I find myself tensing, holding my breath.
I’m going to lay eyes on my son.
She emerges from the back of the vehicle, holding the boy against her. He lays his mop of dark hair on her shoulder, body limp, eyes closed. I scan him up and down, wishing I was closer, that I could see him more clearly, hold him myself. From the bit I can discern, he’s… I don’t even have words. Beautiful. Amazing. Everything I didn’t know I wanted.
My heart melts. Taking in this moment is like trying to absorb a shock, understand an illusion, and decipher a miracle all at once.
He’s bigger than I thought a kid a few months shy of three would be. But I was a big kid, too. Tall and strapping, especially in adolescence. Blue flip-flops shield big feet that dangle beside Britta’s thighs. They’re obviously long, too, as are his legs and arms. The picture Maxon showed me the night we met up didn’t reveal him wearing a cast, but Jamie has a blue one covering most of his left hand and forearm. I’ll be sure to find out about that ASAP. He’s also wearing blue shorts and a tan shirt with some print I can’t discern at this distance.
She kisses Jamie’s forehead and strokes his hair as she makes their way toward a nearby bench. On one side of the area is an empty playground. On the other is a vendor closing up shop after a day of selling sno-cones. At a distance, I follow a path along the far side of the lot, thankful for the shadow. Britta is too distracted to see me anyway as she sits on a bench perched outside the sandy area and waits, gently rocking our son.
I’m itching to interact with Jamie. I’ve known about him for twenty hours and I feel as if I should have met him at least nineteen ago. But if I push Britta, she’ll get stubborn, like that time she refused to toss out the houseplant I inadvertently killed. She waited for me to take responsibility for the greenery, dig it up, and replace it. She asked me to take care of it more than once. I didn’t have time. No, I didn’t make time.
I took her for granted. A lot.
That truth smacks me between the eyes. With a curse under my breath, I examine my year with Britta through the lens of more mature eyes. Deep down, I knew I hadn’t been great to her. But back then, I hadn’t realized what a steaming asshole my dad is or that the way he treats people isn’t something I should emulate if I want to keep others in my life. But I was raised to believe that I’d eventually live a life like him and the world would revolve around me.
And what a prick I was.
Jamie’s birth aside, I think specifically about the times I didn’t come through for Britta—the dinners I worked through, the birthday I nearly forgot, the Valentine’s Day I half-assed because I didn’t see myself as the romantic sort.
Where does that leave me now? Staring at my kid across a park and wishing I had the right to hug him tight and play with him just to see him smile while I hold Britta’s hand and we laugh at his antics.
For now, I have to be satisfied with watching from afar. I feel like a stalker, but that doesn’t matter. At least I’ve seen my son.
Behind me, I hear a car pulling into the lot. Britta turns toward the sound. I slouch behind a tree and watch a woman emerge from her minivan with a boy who’s smaller than Jamie. Once he peels out of his car seat, his mother, who looks harried, has to grab his arm to prevent him from darting across the blacktop to reach the playground.
With a huff, the brunette picks up her son. Britta approaches, a still-sleepy Jamie in tow. At the edge of the sand, the women start chatting. I can’t hear what they’re saying, but the brunette ruffles my son’s hair. The other boy hugs Britta’s thigh, then seemingly ecstatic they have the playground to themselves, he runs to the slide. Suddenly, Jamie wriggles out of Britta’s grip and dashes off after the little guy as if he wasn’t dead-ass asleep three minutes ago.
As they reach the first rung of the ladder, the park’s overhead lights turn on, illuminating the area with a megawatt LED glow. Suddenly, I can see every expression on my son’s face—his smile and little white teeth, the small blade of a nose that will someday look more like mine. And my chin, square and prominent and stubborn.
It hits me that Jamie is the most amazing blend of me and Britta.
I hug the tree to stay upright as his giggle fills the evening while he stands at the top of the slide, pumping his little fists in the air like he’s a champion. Normally, I’m a cynical bastard, but I can’t stop the smile that creases my face. Britta barks something at him—probably a demand that he sit before he falls—and he scrambles to his butt and pushes off, gliding down the long, yellow slide with a howl of laughter.
I can’t remember ever being as happy as my son seems right now. I’m so fucking grateful to Britta for giving him the childhood I never had.
His friend follows him to the ground before they chase each other around the sand. When they body slam onto nearby swings, the moms spring into action and sit them down properly before pushing them gently. Soon it’s clear that Britta is holding Jamie back. He’s trying to soar in the air, shouting “higher!”
He’s a daredevil—something else he inherited from me.
I’m flabbergasted to see so much of myself in my son, given the fact we’ve never met. I’m also stunned by the incredible responsibility of being a parent. I’m sure I don’t know the half of it, but I’m acutely aware that if I intend to be around the boy in the future, I’ll influence him, whether I mean to or not. I want to show him only the best parts of me. I want to be the kind of father he can look up to, the kind I always wished for.
It may sound weird because Jamie is still a toddler, but I want my son to be proud of me.
I also better understand Britta’s resistance to letting me meet my son. She doesn’t know who I am today. She just remembers the guy who seduced her in the office, the jerk who fixated on fantasy football with my brother most of our one Christmas Day together, the asshole who didn’t take her out for New Year’s because I’d worked a crazy fucking week after tourists suddenly decided they wanted a Maui house right now and stayed glued to my side for twenty hours straight until they got one.
At the time, I’d never seen a man put his woman fir
st. It sounds like a lousy excuse now, but that’s the only reason I have for being such a douchebag to Britta. My dad wasn’t faithful or nice for a day of his marriage to my mother, not that she’s any saint. Probably the reason they’re getting divorced. Maxon was a butt to Tiffanii the whole two years they were together. Though, in fairness, his attitude was probably a defense mechanism because
