by Kim Law
“Hello to you, too.” He’d intended to offer her a hand up, but a natural sense of preservation held him back. He’d never seen her in such a foul mood. “You weren’t at the viewing party,” he explained. He watched as she scrambled to her feet. “And it’s Tuesday.”
“I’m aware of what day it is.” Moving both the trowel and flower into one hand, she used her teeth to yank off the glove of her other. “And I wasn’t in the mood for a crowd tonight.”
He’d been disappointed to discover she wasn’t at the bar. He’d enjoyed mingling with everyone the week before, and had been looking forward to doing it again tonight. As well as seeing Heather, of course. But there’d been no way he could stay there and wonder what her absence meant.
Was she not there because she was pregnant?
Because she wasn’t?
“You knew I’d want to talk,” he pointed out, and she rolled her eyes as if bored.
“Of course I knew you’d want to talk.” She tossed the trowel to the ground. “And I’d planned to call you tonight.”
Surprise hit him. “I didn’t know you had my number.”
“Yeah,” she grumbled. “I’m resourceful like that.” She inspected the bush she’d landed in, stooping to assess the damage, while at the same time returning the flower to the half-empty flat. “I got your number from your dad today.” She spoke as she worked. “He came down to check out the job we’re doing out there.”
She’d talked to his dad? His dad hadn’t mentioned it. “So you and Charlie hung out?”
She eyed him over her shoulder.
“What did you think of him?” Other than the few minutes before Waylon had suggested they leave his dad and Blu to their own devices on Saturday, he hadn’t thought Heather had been around him.
She gave up on the shrub and pushed back to her feet. “What I think is that if he hurts my foster mother, he’d better hope the three of us never find him.”
Waylon loved her protective streak.
But he also found himself defending his dad. “He’s not a bad guy.”
“I never said he was. But from what I can tell, he’s not the settling type, either.”
Sounded as if she’d pegged his father right. Waylon didn’t know a lot about the man’s love life, he just knew that Charlie Peterson did as he pleased. He’d never remarried, he’d taken several jobs throughout the years, seemingly wherever the urge struck, and Waylon had only ever seen him with a handful of women. And none had registered as anything lasting.
“I’d say that’s fairly accurate.” He studied her, thinking about her look of shock when she’d first realized that Blu and his dad had been flirting. “But let me ask you this . . . would you actually be okay with Blu hooking up with anyone?”
Disgust marred her face. “Seriously?” She cringed. “Just stop. Don’t say ‘hooking up’ when referring to Aunt Blu. Ever. That’s just so . . . wrong.”
“Yet she is a grown woman.”
“And she’s been doing just fine for twenty years without ‘hooking up’.” She held her hand up to stop any more discussion of the subject, her expression remaining as irritated as when he’d first arrived, so Waylon decided to push another button.
“How about bad moods, then?” At her confusion, he added, “Does Blu have bad moods? Is she where you learned to do them so well?”
“Oh, for crying out—” She bit off her words and scowled. “It’s cramps, Waylon. You’ve heard of them, right? And bloating.”
Her eyes suddenly blinked too rapidly to be natural, and he thought she might cry.
He wasn’t sure how to fix it.
“I feel like crap, okay?” She spoke more evenly, but she still wore the look of a woman with one foot already dangling off the edge. “I always do the first twenty-four hours, so I’m sorry about the mood. But this is why I didn’t go to the party. Because all I want to do is growl at people and”—she literally growled—“chocolate. Good Lord, I want chocolate.” She peered over his shoulder to where he’d parked. “You don’t happen to have any stashed away in your truck, do you? Because I’d do about anything for some chocolate right now.”
Waylon ignored her backhanded offer of “anything” and sorted through their reality. She wasn’t pregnant. Which he’d already guessed from her current mood. But strangely, her words settled uncomfortably inside him.
“So you’re not . . .” His gaze dropped to her stomach, and Heather barked out a laugh.
“No, Waylon. I’m not.” She stared down at herself. “Like I told you. Clockwork.”
He nodded. “That’s good.”
Wasn’t it?
Yes. It was good. He gave another nod. His life was too crazy. Kids and marriage weren’t on his radar.
“Yes.” Heather eyed him suspiciously. “It is good.”
“But you do want kids someday?”
Her brow furrowed. “What?”
“Never mind.” Why had he asked that? She’d already admitted she did. It’s why she’d originally taken a job as a kindergarten teacher.
He turned for his truck, ignoring her when footsteps followed behind him.
“Where are you going?” She hurried to keep up. “Are you just going to leave now?”
He opened his truck door and reached in. “You don’t want me to leave?”
He had not been going to leave. No way. He was finally seeing her again, and he intended to stay until she forced him out.
But he did like knowing that she didn’t want him to go.
“I don’t know,” she denied. “It just seemed . . .” Her words slowed as he turned back, and when he held out a wrapped, flat box she finished with, “kind of odd.”
She lifted her gaze, and he gave her a closed-mouth smile.
“You brought me a present?”
He forced it into her hands without answering, and she immediately tugged at the yellow paper. He’d seen the wrapping paper in the drugstore the day before, and it had reminded him of her. Very sunshiny. Today notwithstanding.
With only two strips removed, Heather looked up again. And damn, but this time there were tears in her eyes.
“You did have chocolate.” She stared down at the box he’d picked up after taking Rose home. “Why would you bring me chocolates?”
“Cramps, bloating . . . cravings.” He twisted his mouth and waited for her response.
And her response was to rip the remainder of the paper from the box.
Waylon held back his laughter, but the lightness of the moment and the gusto with which she tore into the box were comical. Apparently unneeded calories were not a concern at that moment.
After picking out one of the heart-shaped, dark-chocolate pieces, she lifted it to her mouth and shoved it in. A groan rolled out of her. “What kind of guy are you to know that?”
Relief washed through Waylon. The Heather he’d come to know was back. “I’m a dad who lived with Rose’s mom for a long time. Even before the dad part came into play.”
“Yeah?” She chewed on the chocolate, moaning in sync with the movement of her jaw. “Tell me about that,” she mumbled as she plucked out another piece. “About Rose’s mom.”
Waylon thought fondly of Nikki. As he always did. She’d had her negatives, but he wouldn’t trade having had her in his life for anything. “We were best friends since birth,” he said simply. “We lived our whole lives together.”
Heather paused before selecting a third piece, recognition lighting her eyes. “Your dad said you were born on her grandfather’s ranch.”
“Right. Dad worked there at that point. Nikki was born two days after me—though in a hospital—and we lived there for another seven years on her grandparents’ ranch. The friendship that started in those early years, though”—he almost choked up as he thought about how he’d been unable to help his friend in the last months of her life—“it remained solid until the end.”
Even with all their mistakes.
“That’s really special,” Heather said softl
y. She’d slowed her intake and now watched him more carefully.
“She was special,” he admitted. “We did everything together.”
“You must have loved her a lot.”
He wished it could’ve been as easy as Heather made it sound. “Nikki’s the only person I’ve ever truly loved. But if you’re thinking we were ‘in love’ . . .” He shook his head. Nikki hadn’t wanted that. No matter how much he had. “No.”
Heather moved to the swing hanging from a tree in her front yard, and when she motioned for him to join her, he did. Then he shared more about Rose’s mother.
“Nikki was a shining star,” he told her. He wasn’t sure how else to explain it. “She loved living. She loved experiencing things. After we graduated high school, she couldn’t wait to get out of town. She wanted faster, better, bigger. She wanted more. She’d dreamed of moving to Vegas for years, so I went with her.”
“At eighteen?”
He plucked out a piece of the chocolate. “We were legal adults, so yeah.” He didn’t point out that he’d have been living on his own even if he hadn’t moved to Vegas. “At eighteen.”
“And you said you dealt cards?”
“I did. I had to pick up odd jobs for the first couple of years. I couldn’t get hired in a casino for a while. But Nikki immediately became a showgirl.” He smiled at the memory of her coming home telling him they’d offered her the job. That had been the reason she’d wanted Vegas in the first place. She’d been athletic her entire life, and she’d always longed to play sports. Volleyball, softball, track. She’d even have tried out for football if anyone had let her.
Her parents had insisted she take dance, though. And only dance. They’d put her in classes before she’d started elementary school, but as soon as she’d gotten the chance, she’d “shown them.” She’d moved to Vegas . . . and she’d danced. Just as they’d always wanted her to do.
Of course, she’d also gotten involved in some bad situations. If she thought it, she tried it.
And Nikki had been open to plenty of ideas.
Waylon told Heather about all of it. He had no reason not to. “And though, as a child, Nikki had always done as her parents insisted,” he continued, “she’d resented their actions from day one. There was always animosity there.”
“Between Nikki and her parents?”
“Right.” He didn’t point out that they’d blamed him for that animosity. He’d always been around, so he’d been the scapegoat. Because it couldn’t possibly be the fault of the Jameses.
He wrapped an arm around Heather’s shoulders as he continued talking, the orange scent he’d forever associate with her drifting up, and she leaned into his chest. “Neither of us were angels, that’s for sure. Either before Vegas or after. We hung with the wrong crowds, we got into trouble here and there. And once we were on our own, we lived together to save on costs. That made us even closer.”
Heather only played with the chocolates now, moving them around in the box. “So that’s when you two . . .”
“It eventually turned to that, yes.” He and Nikki hadn’t slept together at first. Nor had they planned to. “We both went out with others regularly. Nothing but hookups, mostly. But if we weren’t with someone else, then sometimes . . .” He ended with a shrug. It may never have been a great love between them, but being with Nikki had often felt right.
“And you said the pregnancy hadn’t been planned?”
He let out a lone chuckle. “Definitely not planned. She’d been a full-on addict at that point.”
Heather’s shock was evident. “Drugs?”
He nodded. “That’s how she died. Accidental overdose. She did stop using during the pregnancy, though.” He’d insisted. “But only for the length of the pregnancy.”
Of course, her temporary abstinence had been a lot better than the alternative she’d first suggested. Thank goodness he still had Rose.
“What happened after she got pregnant?” Heather turned toward him, and his arm dropped from around her shoulders. She took his hand. “You didn’t marry her?”
“I asked her.” And he’d honestly wanted to. He’d wanted her to be the one.
It hurt that she’d never fully understood him. He hadn’t needed the partying, the wildness. He’d gotten into it because he’d felt “lost.” It had been his way of being seen. But inside, that had never been him. He’d have been truly happy settling down with Nikki. The two of them and Rose.
“So, she didn’t want to marry you?”
He looked down at the woman who held his hand in hers. “She didn’t want to marry anyone. She wanted to perform, to party.” He wished all that he wasn’t saying about Nikki could somehow come through. “She loved the Vegas lifestyle. I did talk her into moving off the strip after Rose was born, though. To try a ‘family’ thing.”
He’d done and offered every possible thing he could think of, but nothing had been enough. He and Rose hadn’t been what Nikki wanted.
“She did love Rose, though.” He didn’t want Heather to think differently. “And she wasn’t a bad mom. Drugs just have a way of getting in the way. But after a year of ‘playing house,’ as she put it, she couldn’t do it anymore. She’d already gone back to dancing months before, and she was beginning to resent me for keeping her from the life she desired. So, she moved out. Rose and I took care of each other from that point on, but Nikki still saw her on occasion. Only, she was never . . .”
He let his words trail off, uncertain how to explain it. Nikki had loved their daughter, but she’d simply never been able to be the mother Rose needed.
“That’s okay.” Heather cupped his cheek, her voice softening. “I get it. Not everyone is cut out to be a parent. I’ve met a lot of girls over the years, most of them while they were staying with Aunt Blu. And no matter how little it makes sense to some of us, there are simply some people in this world that seem to be missing”—she wore a perplexed expression—“a parenting gene, I suppose.”
It did seem like she got it. “Your parents were good ones?”
“Yes. They were.” Her smile was faint. “I was one of the lucky ones.”
Waylon found it ironic that she’d lost both parents in a fire at a young age, yet she considered herself one of the lucky ones.
He covered the hand on his cheek. “You’d make a good parent, too.”
“I’d like to think so.”
“Ever thought about it?” He pulled her fingers to his lips. “Trying to get pregnant for real?”
She stared at him, straight on and unblinking. “With whom, exactly?” Her tone matched her blank expression. “One of my exes? Or maybe from a sperm bank and do it on my own?”
He was pretty sure he’d just stepped onto a land mine. “So your exes were not Prince Charmings?”
“That’s putting it mildly.”
“Want to talk about it?” He’d like to talk about it. He’d been curious since she’d first brought them up.
She glanced around instead of answering, her eyes widening as if just realizing it had grown dark, then she checked her watch. “Maybe another time. I have Texas Dream Home recording, and I’d rather watch that right now than think about my past.” She nodded toward the house. “Want to watch it with me?”
“Absolutely.” There was little he wanted more.
He rose, keeping her hand in his and pulling her up behind him, and together, they moved to the house. Before they could step inside, however, she stopped and put her back to the door.
“You aren’t scared of ghosts, are you?”
At her question, he peered over her head and took in the cherry-red door that led into her home. “You’re not saying that you have a ghost in there?”
Her grin reached her eyes. “I am not saying that.” She tucked a hand behind her and pushed the door open. “But I do suspect you’re about to see one on TV.”
They’d ended up not only watching that week’s episode of Texas Dream Home, but also Sleepless in Seattle. They’d pulled u
p his streaming account on her TV, and he’d offered to let her choose. So she’d gone old school. And romantic.
Surprisingly, Waylon had admitted to having seen the movie before. Then he’d quoted several lines as they’d watched, impersonating each actor. He’d had her rolling with laughter a number of times, adding a level of fun to the evening that she hadn’t expected. Waylon was a fun date. If dating was what they were doing.
She hid a yawn behind her hand, and cringed when she caught him watching.
“Sorry,” she offered. “I don’t mean to be a wet blanket, but I’m going to have to call it a night.”
“No need to apologize.” He closed the photo album he’d been perusing. It was one from when her parents had still been alive. “I’m just glad you haven’t spent the last few hours biting my head off like when I first arrived.”
She smirked at his lame attempt at humor, then found herself smiling along with him. This had been a nice night.
“Take the rest of the cookies,” she offered as they both stood up from the couch. He’d found the remainder of the snickerdoodles from her Sunday morning bake-off, and though she’d refused to admit the truth, he’d correctly guessed that she’d been thinking of him when she’d made them.
“Given that you’ve sat here and almost polished off that whole box of chocolates yourself”—he shot his own smirk—“I think I will take the cookies. If only to save you from not fitting into your bridesmaid dress.”
“Ha, ha.” She gave him a flat look. “You’re a riot and a hoot.”
He reached for her hand. “I also look quite dapper in a suit.” He looked down at her, and the humor faded from his eyes. “Just a tidbit of info,” he told her, “in case you were considering taking a date to the wedding.”
No reply came. They hadn’t talked about what they’d done out at the ranch the Saturday before, and though they’d sat side by side for the last several hours—and had touched more than once—there’d been no implication this was anything more than a “checkup” to ensure she hadn’t gotten pregnant.
Yet he wanted to be her date to Jill’s wedding?
Instead of responding, she led the way to her door. Only, once there, she didn’t know what to do. Or say. So she just stood there.
