by Erin Wright
Jaxson turned back to the rapidly boiling water on the stove, listening to his boys and Sugar chat as he finished up.
“So why did you get Scooby-Doo?” Frankie asked. “Do you like him?”
Sugar’s laughter tinkled out. “Well, his name isn’t actually Scooby-Doo,” she informed them, to a chorus of, “Why not?”
“His name is Hamlet. But I do like Scooby-Doo. I grew up watching that show too.”
“Really?” Aiden asked, surprised. “I thought you were old.”
“Aiden!” Jaxson shouted from the stove, frantically trying to keep the mac ‘n cheese from burning while also shouting sternly over his shoulder. “That is not polite!”
“It’s okay,” Sugar said with a laugh. “I am old, compared to you. But Scooby-Doo has been on TV for a long time.”
“Ohhhh…” the boys said in unison, clearly surprised by this information. Jaxson grinned to himself. It was a lot of fun seeing his boys’ minds blown.
“So you got Hamlet because you like Scooby-Doo?” Frankie persisted, clearly wanting to figure out why an adult would pick such a large dog. Kendra had always put the kibosh on getting any kind of dog, but was especially adamant about not getting a dog larger than a rat. Which was why they could never agree on which dog to adopt, and thus never got one. A small, yappy, obnoxious ankle biter? No thank you.
“Uhhhh…” Sugar stammered, clearly trying to buy herself some time to put her thoughts together. “Truthfully, I got Hamlet because my ex-husband is allergic to dogs, and I figured that after our divorce, if I was going to get a dog, I’d get the biggest one I could find. I figured it was only fitting. He used to come by my house a lot, but after I got Hamlet, he stopped by one time, couldn’t breathe, and had to leave. He hasn’t been back since.”
“Are you Daddy’s girlfriend?” Aiden asked. Inquisitive little buggers. For the first time – but probably not the last – Jaxson cursed having such smart, inquisitive children.
“Oh no!” Sugar exclaimed, a little too loudly. Jaxson was setting the table, and looked up to see that her face had flushed a brilliant red. He grinned to himself. There was something about watching her squirm that was greatly entertaining. “No, we’re just friends,” she assured the boys.
“Friends with benefits,” Jaxson said under his breath. They should definitely get around to the “benefits” part of this equation, and soon.
“What does it mean to be friends with benefits, Daddy?” Aiden asked. Jaxson’s eyes shot up and he saw his son standing directly in front of him. He’d just been over by Hamlet! How’d he moved so damn fast?!
“Uh, just that we go on walks together with Hamlet,” Jaxson said quickly. “That’s a big benefit to both of us. Sugar gets to have someone to walk with and Hamlet gets to have two people who will throw a ball for him.”
He heard Sugar’s laughter pour out of her, and decided to ignore it. There were some things just not worth dignifying.
“Oh,” Aiden said, clearly confused. “Does that mean that I can be your friend with benefits too?” His eyes lit up as he looked at Sugar, doing everything but clasping his hands together in his begging efforts. Sugar was busy trying to decide whether she wanted to die from laughing, or die from embarrassment. “You’ll let us take Hamlet for a walk, right?” Aiden persisted. He was not one to get sidetracked easily, which was both a blessing and a curse.
It was more on the curse end of things tonight.
“I’m okay with it if your dad is,” Sugar said hesitantly, after her giggles finally subsided, looking up at Jaxson from her place on the floor.
“Dinner first,” Jaxson decreed, “and then we can go for a walk with Hamlet.”
The boys shot over to the table and threw themselves into their chairs, clearly determined to eat their dinner in the quickest time possible. “Don’t make yourself sick,” Jaxson scolded, as Frankie began shoveling the orange-and-red conglomeration into his mouth. A four-year-old boy chewing with his mouth open was not something Jaxson could see and still have an appetite afterwards. Frankie slowed down just the tiniest bit, which made Jaxson want to sigh and laugh at the same time.
He caught Sugar’s eye and they smiled together, and his stomach did flips at the sight of Sugar and his boys all sitting at the dinner table together, like they all belonged there.
No, he’d describe this terrifyingly wonderful situation with a lot of different adjectives, but okay was definitely not one of them.
Chapter 17
Sugar
Once the last of the noodles were gone from the plates, Frankie and Aiden shot out of their chairs and down to their bedroom to put on their warmest winter clothes. “It’s going to be cold out there!” Jaxson called down after them. “Put on your scarves and hats!”
He began clearing off the table. “Here, why don’t I do that?” Sugar said. “I’m already all bundled up and ready to go.” Truthfully, she was a little too warm, which had to be a first for her. She was almost always freezing, so being hot was a feeling she wasn’t exactly used to. Her thermal underwear clung to her sweaty skin and she tried to discreetly pull it away from her thighs. This had to be the least sexy move on the face of the planet, but Jaxson thankfully didn’t seem to notice.
“Oh, sure!” he said, surprised. “I’m so used to doing everything by myself. Thanks!” He shot her a heart-stopping grin and then headed to his bedroom to change. Sugar loaded up the tiny dishwasher, trying to pretend that it was totally normal for her to be doing dishes at Jaxson’s house.
Totally normal.
This was totally not normal.
She turned around to find Frankie had grabbed his plate from the table and was placing it on the floor in front of Hamlet, who was eagerly licking it clean. “No, no!” Sugar yelped, hurrying over and snatching the plate off the floor. “Hamlet gets…gassy if he eats human food.” Hamlet’s massive head was following the arc of the plate as she tried to take it away – now that he’d had a taste, he wasn’t about to let it go easily.
“Gassy?” Frankie repeated, confused. Hamlet sank down in despair when Sugar held the plate up over her head. He gave her a mournful look. She ignored him.
“Yeah. Ummm…” She searched for a delicate way of saying it. “You know…”
“She means that Hamlet farts a lot,” Aiden announced as he came back from the bedroom, bundled up like an Eskimo, clearly having overheard the conversation. The boys broke down into giggles and Sugar rolled her eyes as she turned back to the sink to finish up. Turns out, boys were exactly the same, no matter the decade.
“You guys ready?” Jaxson asked as Sugar loaded the last of the dishes. She searched underneath the sink and found a box of dishwasher detergent, starting it before beginning the process of getting bundled up herself. She’d shed her hat, scarf, jacket, and gloves when she’d gotten there, but her Carhartt overalls had stayed on. She was so warm from the hot water, she was almost painfully thrilled to go outside. Anything to cool her flushed skin.
Jaxson smiled at her and she felt herself flush even warmer. Being around Jaxson wasn’t good for her sanity, she decided. She should just go home and hide far, far away from this addicting man.
Before she could force herself to do it, though, she realized that if she left, the boys wouldn’t be able to walk Hamlet. She knew they’d be horribly disappointed by that, so she decided for their sakes, she’d stay.
No other reason, of course.
After Frankie and Aiden argued over who got to hold onto Hamlet’s leash – which Aiden won, by virtue of being the oldest – they set off down the street, Frankie hurrying to keep up with his older brother. “I really am sorry,” Sugar said softly under her breath to Jaxson, her words puffing out into the bitter cold, sending clouds upwards. “I didn’t mean—”
“It’s fine, really,” he reassured her. “After Kendra pulled her stunt last weekend, she felt guilty enough that she let me have them this weekend instead. She’s right – I do need to get better about checking the custo
dy calendar. I shouldn’t have gotten frustrated with her for doing exactly what the courts said for her to do. I just got busy with everything happening here.”
“Do you have kids, Sugar?” Frankie asked, slipping his hand into hers. She looked down at him, startled, but he was clomping through the snow, stomping every little pile of white stuff into poofs of white stuff. He’d obviously given up on being given a chance to hold Hamlet’s leash. Sugar made a mental note to let Frankie do it on the way back. Hamlet had slowed down once he’d realized it was Aiden carrying his leash, matching his pace to Aiden’s, and so the usually brisk walk to the park was taking a lot longer. Sugar was happy to see it, though; she hadn’t been sure how Hamlet would react to children since he wasn’t normally around them.
Which led her back to Frankie’s question. “No, no kids,” she said softly after a long pause. She felt, rather than saw, Jaxson stiffen beside her, and she knew he’d caught her hesitation. She knew he’d want answers.
She knew she wouldn’t want to give them to him.
Finally, thankfully, they’d made it to the park, where throwing the ball for Hamlet could distract Jaxson from asking any questions. With any luck, he’d forget he ever had any to ask.
Chapter 18
Jaxson
Jaxson frowned at a form the state was wanting him to fill out. Did they want the total training hours for each man on the firefighting team, or just the hours completed in the last year? He sighed. This was going to require yet another phone call to the Idaho State Fire Commissioners' Association. At this rate, he might as well put them on speed dial. As fire chief, firefighting seemed to involve more paperwork and less flames, which yeah, that was the whole point of moving up here – so he could tell the judge he had a more stable, less stressful job – but that didn’t mean he had to like it.
The man door to the station opened and Jaxson looked up through the office window out into the bay, happy to have something to take his mind off the paperwork spread out in front of him. It was Moose, and he looked…upset.
Dammit. Maybe Jaxson wasn’t happy to be distracted from the paperwork after all. Whatever was going on, it didn’t look good.
“Hey, boss,” Moose called out as he neared Jaxson’s office door. He popped his head around the doorframe. “Can I come in?”
“Yeah, sure. Of course. Anything to save me from more paperwork.” He pushed the papers away and settled back in his chair as Moose sank down into a chair across from him.
“Well…ummmm…Listen. I have something to tell you that you aren’t gonna like.”
Jaxson nodded slowly, his eyebrows creasing as he stared at Moose. The pit of dread in his stomach was growing by the moment.
“It’s…well, it’s James. James and Robert, of course, but since Robert doesn’t eat breakfast in the morning without James’ say-so, I think we can safely pin this just on James.” They both grimaced at that all-too-true statement.
Jaxson hadn’t told anyone this, but he’d started calling the pair JimBob in his head. He’d never once seen one without the other, and had never seen Robert speak without James’ permission. He was fairly sure that medically, Robert was in possession of a spine – mostly because he was capable of walking – but emotionally, he wasn’t quite so sure.
“What’s JimBob doing?” The question slipped out before he’d realized it, and Jaxson bolted upright in his chair. “Shit!” he hissed. “I didn’t mean to say that.”
“JimBob, eh?” Moose sat back in his chair with a laugh. “Damn, I have to say that I’m jealous I didn’t think of that myself!”
“I shouldn’t be talking about the men on the force that way. Please forget I said anything.” No matter how true it is.
Moose’s smile slipped from his face. “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about, Chief. I don’t think you want James or Robert on the force any longer. They’re…they’ve gone around to all of the guys and told them to stop carrying their radios with them. That way, if a fire happens, you’d be the only one to respond. They said that this would make you just look like an even bigger ass in front of everyone after the mill fire, and that it ought to get you fired, since you’re not capable of fighting fires or even convincing other men to show up to fight fires with you.”
“Oh damn,” Jaxson said softly, as his mind whirled through the possibilities. People could get seriously hurt or even killed from a stunt like this, and the fact that JimBob seemed to think that it was okay to do this was disturbing, to say the least. Shit. There was no way Jaxson could continue to ignore the situation. He’d hoped that by giving JimBob the space and time necessary to get used to the idea of Jaxson being the chief, he could head off any problems. He thought they’d eventually work through this.
Instead, he was going to have to fire the pair. Dammit, dammit, dammit.
He looked back up at Moose. “Thanks for telling me,” he said softly. “I appreciate it.”
Moose jerked his head. “Sure thing. Good luck.” He headed back out of the fire station, leaving Jaxson alone with his thoughts.
This could be laid squarely at the feet of James, no question about it. He could call them both in at the same time, but what was the point? It was a volunteer position. If James were forced to quit, Robert would too. It’d be better to just confront James without a sycophant nearby to egg him on. That’d only make a tough situation even tougher.
He’d start with James and go from there. He could always call Robert in tomorrow and talk to him. Alone. If such a thing were possible.
But for now, he’d better call James in tonight. It was better to just rip the bandaid off and be done with it. If he left it alone for the night, he wouldn’t be able to sleep as he just laid in bed and worried about the coming confrontation. It wasn’t going to be pretty, he was damn sure of that. He picked up the phone, hit 9 and then dialed the phone number for Frank’s Farm and Feed. He got ahold of the secretary, who informed him that James was still out making deliveries.
“Tell him that he needs to come by the fire station tonight, before he goes home.”
“Well, I’m supposed to be going home soon—” the woman protested.
“Then clip the note to his damn timecard!” Jaxson barked. He tried hard never to lose his temper – not after that night – but this whole situation was pushing him dangerously close to the edge. “And tell him that this is an order, not a request.” He slammed the phone back down into the cradle before the woman could protest further. He stared at the stack of paperwork in front of him, forgotten now. Dammit all, he wished that his biggest worry was over how to count training hours for his men. Although it’d been just 30 minutes earlier when he’d been working on that problem, it seemed like a lifetime ago.
This was his first time in a leadership position like this. An insurrection…he’d never imagined his new job, his ticket to getting his sons back, would end up like this. Were all small towns this backwards? This stubborn? This difficult? Or had he just picked an extra special one that truly hated outsiders with a passion?
James showed up at 8:42 that night. Jaxson knew this because he glanced up at the clock on the wall just as the man door opened. There was exactly zero chance that James had actually been out delivering propane this late into the evening, and sure enough, he more stumbled than walked towards Jaxson’s office. Jaxson watched the progress, his back teeth grinding together with every step. James must’ve hit the local bar before coming over, maybe hoping that a bit of liquid courage would help him out.
Shit. The last thing Jaxson wanted was a drunk-as-a-skunk employee in his office, especially a drunk-as-a-skunk employee who Jaxson then had to fire. This was shaping up to be epic, in a truly horrific way. The first time Jaxson had ever fired someone, let alone fired someone from a volunteer position, and the guy had to show up wasted.
He silently began questioning all of his life choices, beginning with his choice to be born.
He stood back and let James stumble into his office, shutting the door
behind him. James didn’t bother sitting down, and Jaxson didn’t bother offering him a chair. They both knew what was coming, society’s niceties be damned.
“Tell me about the radios, James,” Jaxson said quietly, the ticking of the clock and James’ labored breathing the only sound in the small office. James’ eyes were bloodshot and half-lidded, as if he were barely able to keep them open as he glared at Jaxson from beneath his bushy eyebrows.
“This was supposed to be my job!” James slurred in return, completely ignoring Jaxson’s question. He jabbed his finger into his chest. “Mine! I worked for 22 years for this damn department, and then you come along and steal the job, just like that!” He tried to snap his fingers for emphasis, but he couldn’t get them to work right and after a moment of staring at them in confusion, he forgot all about it and looked back up at Jaxson. “Do you know what the money would’ve done for me and my family? And I would’ve been able to retire in style in five years! Instead, I’m gonna be stuck delivering goddamn propane until the day I die, and it’s all—” he poked Jaxson in the chest, “your,” poke, “fault!” poke.
Jaxson felt himself slipping back into it – that same haze that’d come over him the night of the fight with Kendra. The night. That same red film slipped over his eyes as he stared at James, anger pouring out of every cell. Before he could swing a punch and knock some teeth out, though, James began wandering away.
Jaxson took the space to remember what he’d been taught in his anger management classes. Deep breathing. They only have the power over you that you give to them.
He felt his overwhelming anger begin to subside. Just a bit.
“This! All of it! S’posed to be mine. Chief Horvath told me so when he retired. He said I was a shoo-in. And then the city council worried about some damn training hours through the state, as if what really matters is how many hours you pretend to be a firefighter, versus the number of hours that you actually are a firefighter! Stupidest damn thing I’ve ever heard!” He turned back towards Jaxson, stumbling a bit in the rotation. He steadied himself, staring at Jaxson through bleary eyes. “I’m gonna kill you, you son-of-a-bitch!” he roared, charging across the small office.
