Hold On

by Kristen Ashley

  On these thoughts, Garrett felt a burn that he could only extinguish knowing they had a reservation for Swank’s and he had an envelope on his bar at home with three Colts tickets in it.

  He flipped a pancake, calling, “You gonna want more, bud?”

  “Yeah,” Ethan answered. “One, maybe two. Thanks, Merry.”

  “Whatever you want, kid,” he muttered to the pancakes.

  He said those words and felt it again. Ethan’s eyes on his back. Maybe even Cher’s too.

  He didn’t turn.

  He made his woman and her son pancakes.

  * * * * *

  Wednesday Evening

  “I thought he was full of it,” Ethan declared before he lifted his eyes from his plate. “But Brendon did not lie.” He raised his fork, which had a chunk of steak skewered on its tips. “You can cut these steaks with your fork.”

  “It’s a miracle,” Grace muttered, all dolled up, looking nearly as pretty as her daughter in part because of the happy smile she was aiming right then at her grandson.

  But she was wrong.

  It wasn’t a miracle.

  It was a prime cut of beef that cost fifty-three dollars.

  It was also worth every penny. And Garrett knew that to be true as he watched Ethan shove the chunk of steak into his mouth, his eyes going round with marvel.

  He felt something slink up the leg of his trousers and looked to his woman at his side.

  Now he was wrong.

  Grace looked pretty.

  But all done up for their night out, Cher was fucking dazzling.

  She was also looking at him.

  And her look told him she loved him. It also told him she loved what he was giving to her son.

  So yeah.

  Absolutely.

  A fifty-three-dollar steak was a damned expensive steak.

  But it was worth every fucking penny.

  * * * * *

  Thursday Afternoon

  Garrett stood on the porch, looking out to the water.

  He’d finally had time to schedule the viewing.

  And there he was.

  The bathrooms were in worse shape than he’d thought.

  The rest of it was better than he could’ve imagined.

  Especially the view.

  His real estate agent stood with him.

  “I’m not sure they’re going to accept that offer, Garrett,” she remarked.

  “The place needs work,” he told her, something she knew.

  “They’re aware of that, which is why they’ve dropped the price seventy-five K.”

  “Comps show my offer is not an insult,” he returned.

  “Maybe so, but the market is reviving.”

  He turned to look at her. “Make the offer. Be cool about it so they don’t shut us out. There’s room to move.”

  “You might need a lot of room. They give the impression they’re entrenched.”

  He looked back to the water.

  I like water.

  “I gotta get back to work,” he murmured, then turned again to his agent, leveling his eyes on hers. “Make the offer. I don’t care you gotta make magic, Diane. Get me this house.”

  “Okay, Garrett,” she replied.

  He nodded.

  He then took another look inside the opened door at the big great room, its fantastic kitchen, its phenomenal hearth, all the warm and welcoming space.

  He turned the other way and took a last look at the water, which could be seen from the kitchen. The living room. The study. The room that could be Ethan’s. The master suite, which was all the way on the other side of the house from the study and other two bedrooms.

  And with one last glance at his agent, he went to his truck and got back to work.

  * * * * *

  Saturday Morning

  Garrett was on his way out the door to head to Cher’s to help her with Ethan’s party when his phone rang.

  After glancing at the screen, he took the call.

  “Hey,” he greeted.

  “I made magic,” Diane said.

  Garrett smiled.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  On Top

  Cher

  “I’m sorry, we don’t have more tiki torches.”

  “How can you not have more tiki torches? This is a party place. We’re having a luau. A luau is a party. Which is why I’m shoppin’ at a party place. And you can’t have a luau without tiki torches.”

  “Sir, it’s October in Indiana.”

  “So?”

  “We sell down stock of tiki torches after summer in order to make room for Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas items.”

  “You should be ready for every occasion.”

  “We pride ourselves in being that. That’s why you currently have twelve tiki torches here. But I’m afraid we don’t have more right now. And just a suggestion, next time, should you want something in high quantities, if you give us a call beforehand, we’ll be happy to order it for you.”

  “Twelve isn’t a high quantity. It’s a perfectly reasonable quantity unless you need twenty, and I need twenty.”

  “Again, I apologize. We just don’t have twenty.”

  “I barely have enough leis and grass skirts. And, just to say, neither are very high quality.”

  “I’m sorry you think that as well, sir. But—”

  “Yo!” Merry barked.

  I jumped at the sound, pulled from my focus on my extreme annoyance at being an audience to this sheer ridiculousness when Merry and me had a ton of Star Wars and other party shit in four collective baskets, a cake to pick up, decorating to do, and later, merrymaking to achieve for my son.

  Plus, my mother was at my house with my kid, helping me get ready by doing what she called “light cleaning.” This meant she was going to move shit around to where she thought it should be, which was what she always did when she jumped at the chance to do some “light cleaning” before some event I had at my house. This also meant it’d take weeks to find the shit she moved, something which was nearly more annoying than the selfish, thoughtless, in-a-hurry human population you encountered when you were out running errands (but just nearly).

  Needless to say, I didn’t have time for an asshole on a tiki torch mission in Indiana for a luau he was giving in fucking October.

  I looked up at Merry to see he agreed.

  He’d also shoved his jacket back on both sides and had his hands on his hips.

  There was no badge on his belt, seeing as he was off-duty.

  Thus, I wondered how this would go.

  That said, Merry was tall and lean and badass. The guy with the torches was not tall and was kinda doughy, so I had high hopes it would go well…and, hopefully, fast.

  “You wanna move this along?” Merry suggested, though it didn’t come close to sounding like a suggestion.

  “It’s my turn at the register,” the man in front of us sniped. “You’ll get your turn.”

  “I’ll get it a lot faster, you give it up about tiki torches you aren’t gonna get, seein’ as this guy can’t conjure them from thin air,” Merry returned, shifting his torso to the side only slightly to indicate the line that had formed behind us, which had at least three other customers waiting to check out. “You do that, you can get on your way so the rest of us can get on our way.”

  This was a faulty strategy.

  He’d called out to the man’s civility.

  Since the man had none, that was totally not going to work.

  “I hardly need your attitude on a day where I’m looking forward to hosting a luau,” the man retorted.

  There it was. I was right.

  He didn’t give a shit that he was affecting all our days with his attitude about fucking tiki torches.

  “Ditto, turkey,” the woman behind us snapped.

  Surprised, I looked back at her to see a blue-haired, sharp-eyed lady with a basket filled with Frozen-themed party plates, cups, like-colored streamers and balloons, and a second basket f
illed almost to overflowing with bags of fake snow.

  “My granddaughter got one year older today and I obviously am not getting any younger, especially waiting in this line,” she declared irately. “I’m not really looking forward to watching Princess Anna’s demonstration of sisterly love for the seven millionth time. But I’d rather do that than expire, waiting at the cash register of a party store, watching a grown man pitch a fit over tiki torches.”

  “Yeah,” agreed the lumbersexual guy at the back of the line who had shaggy hair, a long, scruffy beard, was wearing a plaid shirt, and holding an enormous bouquet of pink and silver balloons with some Mylar ones mixed in that said, Sweet Sixteen. “Buy your tiki torches and go.”

  The guy in front of us got red in the face, shoved the torches and baskets filled with leis and grass skirts toward the clerk, and snapped, “I’ll get them elsewhere.”

  “Good luck with that,” Merry muttered.

  The guy shot him a filthy look before he stormed out.

  “Next,” the clerk said, dumping the unwanted luau items behind him to clear the register area, doing this with practiced nonchalance, gazing expectantly at Merry and me like all that hadn’t happened.

  Then again, he probably had twelve situations like that every day.

  This made me glad I was a bartender. People tended to kiss bartender ass to get what they wanted. You didn’t, your ass got ignored and your glass stayed empty.

  On these pleasant thoughts, we got our Star Wars stuff. We took it out to Merry’s car. Then Merry headed us toward Marsh to pick up the R2-D2-shaped chocolate cake.

  “Just to say, you totally get a blowjob for even going to a party store with me,” I declared as Merry pulled out of the parking lot. “You get another one for gettin’ in that dude’s face. But you didn’t flash your badge and scare the bejeezus out of him, so the month of ‘any time, anywhere head’ is yet to be earned.”

  “Baby, can’t flash my badge at a party store to get some guy to stop bein’ an asshole.”

  I looked to him. “You did it with the BMW bitch.”

  He glanced at me before he looked back at the road. “That was good timing. My badge was already on my belt. Today, I’m off duty.”

  I turned to face front again. “I need to take you grocery shopping with me when you’re on duty.”

  “They kinda frown on that too, sweetheart, the me-on-duty part being operative, seein’ as they actually want me to work when I’m on duty, not go grocery shopping.”

  “Whatever,” I muttered, but I did it grinning because he was funny when he was being rational.

  “Gotta say, it’s good to know I got two blowjobs in store, so I probably shouldn’t point this out and give you ideas, but you don’t seem to hesitate goin’ down on me, even if I haven’t done something to earn your mouth.”

  “Good point,” I kept muttering (and grinning).

  “Though, the promise, brown eyes? Sweet.” Now Merry was muttering.

  “Glad you think so.”

  He drove.

  I sat in his truck, grinning.

  “Cher?”

  “Yeah?”

  “You’re an overachiever too.”

  I felt my chest depress.

  I turned my eyes to him.

  He was also grinning.

  “Fuck,” I groused.

  “What?” he asked.

  “Making you happy makes me even happier.”

  “You say that like it’s bad.”

  “It is.”

  He glanced again at me then back at the road, his brows drawn, his face dark. “How is that bad?”

  “Because it means you’re always one-upping me on the happy. I can’t make you happy without you making me happier because I’m making you happy. It’s a vicious cycle where you’re always on top. And that’s bad.”

  “I know some times when you’re on top that make me a fuckuva lot happier than you are.”

  His words and the memories they invoked gave me a nice shiver.

  And experiencing that, I shared, “I’m not sure that’s true.”

  “Trust me, baby. When you ride me, I watch you come, but I feel what you give to me.”

  “I feel what you give to me too.”

  “You come harder on your back. That’s when I’m givin’ it to you. When you’re on top, you’re givin’ it to me.”

  This was definitely true.

  “So there are times when you’re on top with the happy in more ways than one,” he finished.

  I faced forward again, mumbling, “That makes me feel better.”

  Merry reached out and nabbed my hand, holding it.

  And more happy.

  “Glad I could be of service,” he murmured.

  “Stop being perfect,” I ordered.

  He chuckled.

  “And awesome,” I went on.

  He kept chucking.

  “And funny, smart, sweet, and hot,” I finished.

  His hand squeezed mine hard as he burst out laughing.

  And there it was.

  I was on top.

  * * * * *

  “Is there something I can do, Cher?”

  A bunch of people were stuffed in my kitchen with me, one of them being Rocky, who’d just asked that question.

  It was time for cake.

  But it was also a birthday party with fifteen kids and twice that many adults paying homage to my boy for being awesome (and turning eleven), so there was always something to do.

  “Yeah, babe. Can you grab the ice cream?” I asked, unearthing R2-D2 from his flat, white box.

  “Absolutely,” she murmured, pushing her way to the fridge.

  I felt a hand warm on the small of my back as I saw another hand offering me two boxes of candles, one box of blue, one black.

  “Need a light?” Merry’s voice rumbled into my ear.

  I twisted to look up to him. “Yeah, gorgeous. And can you grab the plates and forks and get everyone in the living room?”

  His hand slid down to the top of my ass, fingers curved around my hip, and gave a squeeze. “You got it.”

  He dropped the candles on the counter by the cake, dug in his jeans pocket, pulled out a lighter, and tossed that on the counter too. Then he bent and kissed my neck briefly before he took off.

  “Everyone in the living room,” he announced as he went. “Time for cake.”

  “My big brother…domesticated,” Rocky remarked.

  I looked to her to see she had a tub of ice cream in her hand and her eyes aimed where Merry was herding people out of the kitchen.

  She turned to me and her smile was big.

  “Looks good on him,” she declared.

  “Your brother always looks good,” I replied.

  Her big grin got bigger.

  I dipped my head to her middle. “Congrats, by the way. Merry told me.”

  She balanced the tub of ice cream in one hand in order to put her other to her belly. “Thanks.”

  I turned to the cake and snatched up the candles.

  Rocky got close.

  “You want some?” she asked.

  “Want some what?” I asked back, shoving candles in the cake and feeling weird doing it. R2-D2 was also my favorite Star Wars character and shoving candles in his middle (even if that middle was pure frosting) felt like stabbing my favorite teddy bear.

  She put the ice cream on the counter and took some candles from me, starting to help.

  “Some kids,” she explained.

  Rocky and I weren’t tight like Vi and I, Feb and I, Frankie and I, or even Dusty and I were. We knew each other. We liked each other. But I was closer to Tanner.

  But she was my man’s sister.

  It was time.

  “Yeah,” I said softly.

  “Cute baby girls with your brown eyes,” she replied softly.

  I looked to her. “Cute baby boys with his blue ones.”

  She smiled again.

  This one wasn’t huge, but it said a whole lot mo
re than both the others had and all it said was good.

  “We need help in here?”

  Rocky and I turned to the door to see Dave walking in.

  “Yeah, Dad, go in the living room and pull the curtains so we have dark for the candles,” Rocky ordered.

  “Gotcha,” Dave said. He gave me a grin and turned right back around.

  “And make sure people have their cameras ready!” Rocky bossed right before he disappeared through the doorway.

  He lifted a hand to indicate he’d heard and was gone.

  “I’ll get a knife,” she muttered. “Ice cream scoop?”

  “That drawer there,” I said, jerking my head.

  I finished with the candles and grabbed the lighter to start lighting.

  “Baby, ready?”

  I twisted again and saw Merry had six packages of Star Wars plates held sandwiched in one of his big hands, a package of plastic forks in the other. The living room beyond him was dimmed. All was ready.

  “Ethan in place?” I asked.

  “Yeah,” Merry answered.

  I smiled. “Then yeah, honey. All ready.”

  He smiled back, turned, and stopped dead.

  I stopped dead too.

  This was because there was a loud banging on the door.

  Very loud.

  And from that loud, you could definitely read angry.

  Very angry.

  What the fuck?

  Merry glanced my way, then tossed the plates and plastic silverware aside and prowled out.

  With a quick look at a perplexed Rocky, I tossed the lighter aside and hurried after him.

  I hit the kitchen doorway to see forty-seven people crammed into my not-very-big living room, a room draped in black-and-blue streamers; black, blue, and silver balloons bunched and stuck in corners and around the ceiling light; and black plastic Darth Vader head-shaped trays and white plastic Stormtrooper head-shaped trays filled with Chex Mix, M&M’s, honey-roasted peanuts, or Fritos littering every surface available.

  And all of those people were silent as the angry knocks kept coming.

  I also saw my son’s confused face turned to the door. Merry was struggling his way through bodies to get to it, but Colt was already there.

  Colt opened it.

  “Stop knocking,” he bit out when the knocking didn’t stop because whoever was doing it was doing it on the storm door.