by Pippa Grant
I grab a baseball and flip it in the air a few times. “Playboy bunny. I’m bringing her to Thanksgiving. With her pole.”
“You’re taking a poll? About what?” Beck sticks his head in the door too, followed by Cash Rivers.
“Dude!” I stand and give him a man-hug. “Welcome home.”
He thumps me on the back. “Had to come here since someone stood me up twice in a week.”
Beck’s grinning. “Are we taking a poll on how serious Levi is about this chick if he’s skipping bro time for her?”
“We’re taking a poll about how we’re going to torture you to get Mom’s boyfriend’s name.”
“Won’t work. My lips are sealed.”
I eyeball Cash.
He grins and shakes his head, making his shaggy light brown hair shake with it. “I know nothing. But I wouldn’t mind knowing more about this chick who has you running home with your balls tucked between your legs.”
As if I’m saying a word about Ingrid to any of these guys. Cash isn’t into settling down either, but that doesn’t mean he won’t rib me as hard as Tripp and Beck will. “Not a chick. A chicken. I heard there’s a specialty store nearby with two-foot chickens that squeak extra long.”
Tripp flips his pen onto his desk and gives me the exact death look I’d expect, especially after getting Ingrid’s opinion on the squeaky chicken. “Why are you all here? Because not a single one of you have said anything worthwhile yet.”
“Got bored,” I say.
“Expecting a hero’s welcome,” Cash replies.
Beck spreads his arms. “I just missed you and wanted to see your face.”
“I have to get through scouting reports if the Fireballs have any chance at staying good.” Tripp points to the door. “Out.”
“But you need lunch too,” I tell him.
“It’s ten-thirty, and the only reason I want to see any of you is if you have information to share about my mother’s new boyfriend.”
He glares at Beck, who looks at his watch. ‘Ten-thirty. You’re right. It’s first lunch time. Don’t you want to know about Levi’s lady love?”
Tripp’s eye starts twitching. “Do any of you work?”
The rest of us trade glances. “No,” we reply in unison.
“I do want to know about Levi’s lady love though,” Cash says.
The fucker.
I roll my eyes. “I don’t have a new lady love.”
Wow. Those words tasted way more sour than they should’ve.
“So you really were at that bookstore across the park because you’re reading vampire novels?” Cash nudges Beck. “You see the pictures of the owner? She’s hot.”
Forget the floor is lava. My lungs are filling with lava and I’m about to spew it in his direction.
Think about your blue balls, Levi. Think about your blue balls.
I squeeze my hand into a fist. “I didn’t know you knew what bookstores were.”
Cash laughs. “Weak sauce.”
“I like books with pictures,” Beck says. “Do you think she has any of those?”
“One day,” a female voice says from out in the hall. Every one of us brightens as Sarah sticks her head in the doorway too. “One day, I ask for two hours to get some work done, and you disappear to disrupt everyone else to keep them from working.”
Beck grins at her. “I just got here.”
“After stopping at six other offices on the lower floors. I’ve been getting text messages since nine.”
“Had to say hello to my friends.”
“So invite them over for arcade night. Cash. Levi. Time to go.”
“How long have you been in the building?” Tripp asks Beck.
He and Cash share a look. “Five, six hours?”
“It’s ten-thirty.”
“How are you not all over social media right now?” I ask Cash.
“Bribery.”
“Who the hell are you bribing at five o’clock in the morning?” Tripp’s making the same face he makes when someone asks how long James has had a pet gopher hiding in his room.
“Night cleaning crew, and only to not tell people I was here.” Cash crosses his heart with a finger. “Swear on my sister’s favorite baby doll.”
“Whatever you did, please undo it before I either have to explain it to Lila or the cops, whichever shows up first.”
“Tripp. Dude.” Beck shakes his head. “Don’t you know by now that no publicity is bad publicity?”
I flip one of the couch cushions up and use it like it’s my Captain America shield. “Take cover, Sarah,” I whisper. “Tripp’s about to blow.”
“I am not about to blow, but I don’t have time for making sure none of the mascot costumes are missing, that everyone in marketing won’t be sitting on whoopie cushions all day, or for looking into all of your social media accounts to make sure you didn’t record yourselves using foul language while touring the building wearing the Ash costume.”
Cash grins. “Tripp. How long have you known us? Would we show up in your office and let you know we were here if we were just here to cause trouble?”
“Yes.”
Beck nods. “We really would.”
Sarah’s stifling a smile. “There’s a new Thai restaurant two blocks over. They open for lunch at ten-thirty.”
“You’re a genius,” I tell her.
“I’m starting to get hungry every time Beck does too. This is totally self-serving.”
“Speaking of self-serving, what do you know about my mom’s boyfriend?”
She ruffles my hair. “Nice try. Ask her yourself.”
“I have season tickets behind home plate open,” Tripp says. “They’re yours and Mackenzie’s if you spill the beans. I won’t even ask you to find out what these two yahoos have been doing in my offices all morning.”
“And this is why Mackenzie knows nothing about your mother’s boyfriend either. I even blocked Beck’s number on her phone so he can’t accidentally spill the beans.” She slips one hand into Beck’s, then grabs Cash by the collar with the other. “Levi. C’mon. You too. Leave the man alone.”
Tripp spins back to his computer. “He doesn’t need lunch. He needs sleep.”
“I—”
“Haven’t slept since you left Australia,” Mr. Know-It-All interrupts.
I flip him off behind the couch cushion I’m still using as a shield.
He smirks. “I’m telling Mom.”
“I don’t think either one of us are at the top of Mom’s list right now. But if you want to be the one tattling and making me look better, be my guest.”
“Leave your mother alone unless you want to just go have lunch or dinner with her or take her out for mother-son pedicures,” Sarah says. “She raised you. She let you both go off and tour the world. She’s earned some of her own happiness without judgment from either of you.”
And this is why I like Ingrid so much.
She tells me the same thing, but nicer.
“Dibs on the pedicure,” I tell Tripp.
“C’mon, Levi. Out.”
I look at my big brother one last time, and I know Sarah hit a nerve.
Mom would tell us about her boyfriend if she didn’t think we’d be assholes about it.
Tripp knows it too.
“Text me which nights you can get away for dinner, and I’ll coordinate with Mom,” I tell him as I head to the door.
His brows go up, and so does my guilt factor. He’s usually the one asking me for my schedule when Mom needs something or when I’ve been gone too long.
Time to quit taking them both for granted.
Seventeen
Ingrid
I’m asleep by the time Levi texts that he’s done with his charity event, and when he doesn’t respond to my text in the morning, I assume he’s sleeping now. Night owl, plus jet lag on top of it. I get it.
I’m still disappointed, but I also have a bookstore to run and kids to wrangle.
When he texts back and we
try to coordinate schedules to fit something in, it turns out he has a family dinner, then a bachelor party, then business meetings in New York and a commercial to shoot in Germany early next week—and yes, I’m incredibly jealous that he gets to visit Germany, even though he insists his sightseeing time is limited.
But it’s a good reminder to concentrate on the friend part of our arrangement.
My ex traveled all the time too.
So much so that when he left, he barely knew his kids. When he was home, he wanted me to keep them quiet so he could recover from the stress of being gone.
Girl, what are you doing? Portia asked me when I told her I was pregnant with Hudson.
Guilt and shame had washed over me.
I wasn’t taking care of my marriage. I was barely hanging on to taking care of the two kids I already had, and now we had a third on the way.
Daniel was in Ukraine on assignment, and I hadn’t told him yet.
I didn’t want him to know.
I wanted this baby to only know people who loved him and were there for him.
Portia talked me out of the guilt and shame—don’t you ever apologize for loving other people, but you need to start taking care of you too, she’d said.
So when she shows up at Piper’s hockey practice Saturday morning with that no-nonsense, we’re having a talk look, I know what I’m in for.
“Zoe, watch Hudson.” I slip her my phone. “Text Aunt Portia if you need me.”
She takes the phone without looking up from her book.
I just got her started on the Aru Shah series, which means I also look to another mom, who nods and smiles to me.
Universal symbol for if your kid gets distracted from drawing scribble squirrels and his sister doesn’t notice because her head’s buried in a book, I’ll let you know.
“Everything okay?” I ask Portia as I join her in the hallway outside the practice rink.
“Shawn had a birthday party at that game place down the way, and I haven’t seen you much this week.” She pulls a mini-Heath bar from her purse. “Figured I’d bribe you to find out what’s going on.”
“Zoe told Eric I’ve had company?”
“That she did.”
“It’s casual. No strings. I don’t have it in me to take on strings.”
“Plus, he’s Le—”
“Shh.”
“Oh, Ingrid.” Portia clucks her tongue, points me to a small, round café table with blue plastic chairs outside the concession stand, and dumps half a bag of baby Heath bars on the Formica. “Spill.”
I give her the shorthand version of the phone flirting and making out on the roof and in my hallway while we both dive into the candy pile, plus the top secret part. I know Portia gets it—she doesn’t have the years of military operational security training that I did, but she has a cousin who went viral on Facebook for trying to make a homemade angel food cake while slightly inebriated and couldn’t go a single day for weeks without strangers asking about her floof cake and if her boyfriend liked the way she whipped him good too—don’t ask, you really don’t want to know—but I still emphasize the secret part multiple times.
When I’m done whispering, my friend nods. “One, good for you. Two, are you out of your mind?”
This is why I love Portia. She doesn’t pull punches, and she sees all the sides. “It’s just a little fling.”
“Did you set an end date?”
“No, but come on. He’ll find someone young and smart and worldly who can stay up past eight-thirty at night, and he’ll gradually quit trying to make out with me, and then he’ll gradually quit calling, and that’ll be that.”
“I will have absolutely zero respect for the man if he does that to you.”
“Or maybe I’ll go get the girls from school and run into a new single dad of one kid who’s attractive and attentive and whose kid needs siblings and we’ll hit it off and I’ll be the one gradually letting go of my fling.”
The seven wrappers now in front of me suggest I’m dealing with my delusions by eating them.
I lean in closer and drop my voice even more. “You know that thing where nothing goes as planned when you have three kids and a job?”
She squeezes her eyes shut. “I’m terrified of where this is going, Ing.”
“Every time he’s been around in a disaster, he’s helped out.”
“You need to drop this man before you get attached.”
I probably do. “I’ve never had a partner. I don’t need a partner. But having a friend who sometimes washes my dishes and happens to be really good at making me remember I’m also a woman with needs is making me feel…alive isn’t the right word, but…”
“More?” she asks softly.
“Yes! More. Like I’m re-discovering a part of myself. And I’m never alone—ever—but I feel less lonely now.”
She tilts her chin down.
“Ah-ah, don’t take offense. You know I love you. You know I’d jump in front of a train for you. But your boys keep you as busy as my life keeps me, and there are certain things you cannot do for me.”
Her lips twitch in amusement. “If he hurts you—”
“Portia, it’s inevitable. And I’m okay with that. We’re all works in progress, and I can either hide and never hurt, or I can experience life, hurt sometimes, grow, and move on.”
“You’ve been going through your self-help shelves, haven’t you?”
“There are so many good books right now. I was just listening to this new one I heard about in my small bookstore owners group on social media.”
“Hey, Ingrid?” Brittany calls from the doorway. “Hudson has a crayon in his ear. I don’t think it’s hurting anything, but you should probably come look just in case you need to tell a doctor about it later.”
I sigh.
Portia shakes her head, but she’s smiling. “He’ll grow out of it.”
“I know. It’s all a phase.”
We spend the rest of the day running errands and hitting the local rec center for Zoe’s gymnastics class and Hudson’s little ninjas class, which seems like a terrible idea for an already rambunctious little boy, but it gets his energy out.
Some.
All three kids need new shoes, and Piper needs bigger skates, and Hudson needs a new lunch box since he taught Skippy that his always has peanut butter smears in it.
Let’s just say I declared the lunchbox a federal disaster zone.
When we get home, we go in through the bookstore. My feet are tired, my ears are worn out, and I’m dragging six bags from our shopping trip.
I spot Holly grabbing a box of mugs in back, which means the coffee bar must’ve been popular today. Foot traffic’s up, and I’m glad we have extra holiday help starting Monday. And Yasmin seems flustered by the customer at the register.
“Go see if there are any new books you want to put on your wish lists,” I tell Zoe and Piper when Yasmin waves me over.
I keep a tight grip on Hudson’s hand through one of my bags and paste a smile on my face.
The customer is tall and lanky with a thick brown beard and a manbun, and I can’t tell if he’s closer to twenty-five or forty-five, though the lack of gray suggests he’s closer to twenty-five. Or possibly in the middle.
Yasmin’s shifting from foot to foot. “Ingrid, do we have any books on wave mechanics?”
“The surfing kind, or the science kind?”
“Both,” the customer answers.
There’s something unnerving about his brown eyes. They’re both kind and probing at the same time, which is a special skill to have in a gaze, and I find myself tightening my grip on Hudson’s hand.
“Unfortunately, no, but we can special order anything.” I step behind the counter, drop my bags, grab my emergency tablet for when I need Hudson occupied, and point my son to a small bean bag chair I keep back here for him.
“Thank you,” Yasmin whispers.
She’s blushing.
I glance between her and the custom
er. He keeps a straight face, but I see Yasmin fanning herself as she ducks toward the hot mess merchandise section.
We don’t get a lot of male customers as a general rule. We carry a little bit of everything, but sell more mysteries, women’s fiction, kids’ books, and popular self-help than anything else—all books bought more by women than men. We don’t stock games and puzzles and toys because we’re trying to compensate for low book sales. We keep them because women make impulse purchases for their families. And the coffee shop in the reading loft, the weekly book club, the twice-weekly storytime for the little kids, the Hot Mess Moms Club shirts, mugs, and bags, and even the way we identify the different sections of the store—that’s all about girl, I have been there, and I will take care of you when you need a break.
It’s worked well. So well, in fact, that we’re picking up more male clients who want to escape the same way the neighborhood moms do, though this one today is unique.
“Were you flirting with my sales associate?” I ask him.
“Only if do you know calculus is a pick-up line.” He leans his elbows on the counter, the sleeves of his dark denim jacket hitching up just enough for the ink on his wrists to peek out. “Do you know calculus?”
He has presence, I’ll give him that. “Are you a student?”
“No.” He grins—not a full grin, mind you, but just enough to let you know he’s amused—and he suddenly looks weirdly familiar, though I can’t place him.
“Professor?” I probe.
“Professional geek.”
“Have you been in here before?”
“Nope.”
“Then welcome to Penny for Your Thoughts. Is there a particular book on wave mechanics you’re looking for?”
“One I haven’t read yet.” He accompanies his answer with a sly smirk.
No wonder Yasmin was flustered. “Do you have a list of books you have read?”
“No.”
“Great. If we’re special-ordering, which we’ll have to, that opens the doors to a lot more books. Let’s see what we can do. I’m Ingrid. And you are…?”
“That’s classified.”
“A handful, then. Got it.”
I pull up my supplier’s database and settle in for the challenge, peeking at Hudson and listening for the girls. We’re fourteen books deep before I find one that Mr. Mystery hasn’t read, but he takes one look at the author, snorts in derision, and suggests I go back to looking again.
