Welcome to Forever

by Annie Rains

  “See those flowers, bud? I planted those a few days ago,” Micah said.

  Ben didn’t break his concentration. He knew exactly where he was going. Micah had taken him to the school last week to get adjusted to the layout. Each wing of the building was named after sea life. Ben’s classroom was down the Sand Fiddler’s hall, first door on the left.

  Micah stopped just short of the school’s front entrance and gave him a quick salute. “I’ll see you this afternoon, okay?” Ben was too old for the hugs and kisses he used to give. That’d only fuel the other kids’ teasing. But maybe this school would be different, he thought.

  “See you later, Dad.” Ben returned his salute and continued forward, not looking back. Micah knew if he did, he’d lose control of his body and the wheelchair.

  Good boy.

  Micah recognized the young principal from this morning greeting the children at the school’s entrance.

  “Walk,” she warned in a sweet voice that did little to slow the excited feet as they stampeded toward her. Her beautiful smile grew larger as she looked at Ben. He usually had that effect on people. Then she waved and—ah, damn it—Ben lifted his arm to wave back.

  His excitement jerked his body around like a marionette and the lunchbox on his lap toppled to the ground and opened with a loud crash that made Micah flinch. Watching as the scene unfolded in slow motion, he did his best not to run up to his son and grab the falling items as they rolled toward the other students. That’s what he wanted to do, but it wouldn’t help anything.

  His jaw tightened as he watched Principal Chandler kneel down in those ridiculous heels that made her legs, and other assets, look delicious. She began reaching for Ben’s sandwich and apple, tossing them quickly in his box and closing it. She didn’t hand it back to him, which is exactly what Micah would’ve done. Instead, she carried Ben’s lunchbox, grabbed the books he’d also had in his lap, and walked with him inside.

  Seeing that she didn’t reappear, Micah guessed she then proceeded to walk with him to class.

  He ran a quick hand through his hair. How the hell was Ben supposed to make his own way at this school with his principal escorting him around the building? If only she hadn’t waved, not that he could blame her for the friendly gesture. Ignoring Ben would have been worse.

  Realizing he was still standing at the edge of the parking lot, and probably looking like a crazy person, Micah decided to turn around and head to work. His squadron was waiting. Instead, his feet started to move forward, heading toward the school. As he veered into the front office on his right, the young secretary glanced up.

  “May I help you?”

  “I’m a new parent here and I want a quick word with the principal,” he said, crossing his arms and not budging toward the row of seats behind him. There was no time to wait. He just needed to make sure Kat Chandler knew how to treat his son because there was no way he was going to let Ben have another bad school year.

  The woman looked down at an appointment book on her desk. “Um, okay. I’ll just see if—”

  They both turned as Kat stepped into the office, slightly out of breath. “I just ran into Stanley. The graffiti will be gone by afternoon pickup.” She braced her hands on her hips, where his own hands had rested earlier this morning, looking slightly stressed and absolutely beautiful.

  Clearing her throat, the secretary jerked her head in his direction. “You have a visitor.”

  “Oh. Good morning,” Kat said, noticing him now. “I’m Kat Chandler, the school’s principal.” She held out a hand for him to shake as she smiled warmly.

  Taking it, he waited for her to recognize him. She didn’t. But he’d been wearing a ball cap this morning, and coated in sweat. Good. He’d prefer not to lose the first big landscaping job he’d scored in Seaside over this—not that he was going to cause a scene. He just wanted to make sure his son had a great year at SES. Ben was perfectly able to be an independent kid, and part of the reason for that was because he let him carry his own damn lunchbox.

  Micah’s jaw clenched at the memory of last year. He wasn’t going to tell the pretty principal how to do her job—okay, maybe he was—but for Ben, he’d do anything.

  Chapter 2

  Kat studied the parent standing in her office. He had a deep frown creasing the skin between his dark eyes. There was also something vaguely familiar about him. Maybe they’d met at parent orientation last week. “What can I help you with?” she asked, taking a seat behind her desk, and gesturing for him to sit across from her.

  Bracing his hands on his hips, he didn’t budge. “You walked my son to his class this morning,” he said, his voice edged with slight irritation. “He dropped his lunchbox, and you picked it up and carried it for him.”

  She nodded, flashing her best principal smile—the one that was supposed to exude confidence and put parents at ease. “Yes. Ben. I did walk with him this morning. He’s new here and I wanted to get to know him.”

  “You should’ve let him do it alone,” he said in such a way that her spine straightened. “He’s in a wheelchair, but he’s capable. I don’t want him to be defined by his disability here. If you treat him that way, everyone else will, too.”

  Sucking in a breath, she suddenly felt like she was a student visiting the principal’s office. “Mr….?”

  “Peterson.”

  Nodding, she spoke slowly, calmly. This was the first upset parent to walk into her office this year, but he wouldn’t be the last. Talking parents down from their fear-and-worry-ridden ledges was an unwritten part of her job. “Mr. Peterson. I assure you, I was only getting to know your son.”

  “And that’s nice of you, Principal Chandler, but don’t treat Ben different from the other students,” he said, his voice as abrasive as the look he was giving her. While he was handsome, she didn’t appreciate what he was insinuating. “I don’t want my son to suffer because he’s in a wheelchair and you feel bad. That’s your weakness, not his.”

  “Weakness?” She took a deep breath, then bit the inside of her cheek, focusing her energy there. This parent was doing more than insinuating; he wanted a fight, and she wasn’t going to give it to him. That was his weakness, not hers. “Your son didn’t seem to mind that I was walking with him this morning.”

  “Of course not. But walking with the principal doesn’t exactly help him make friends, does it?”

  Seriously? It was hard for parents to let go. She got that. Harder for some than others, but this dad needed to back off.

  “I understand what you’re saying, Mr. Peterson,” she said, continuing to keep her calm, cool demeanor, “but I assure you that I did not treat your son any differently than I would any other student on this campus.”

  “You walk every child to class?” he asked, obviously biting back his temper.

  “If they ask me to, and I have the time, then yes, I do. Especially the new students. It’s easy to get lost if you don’t know our school’s layout.”

  “Ask you?” His face was expressionless, but there was a definite emotion firing in those dark eyes of his, and it wasn’t anger, despite his stiff posture. “He asked you to walk him to class?” he clarified.

  “And carry his books. He said he didn’t want to risk dropping them again.”

  Running a hand through his short, buzz-cut hair, the father surprised her by laughing. It wasn’t the kind of laugh that would’ve put her at ease, though. More of a laugh of someone who was so frustrated, they had no idea what to do. “Figures.” He glanced down as his cellphone rang in his pocket, drawing her attention to his fitted blue jeans.

  She’d seen those hips before. And the V-shaped torso opening up to a broad pair of drool-worthy shoulders. Her gaze jumped up, and—oh, damn. She’d also seen those dark brown eyes. For the love of chocolate. Why hadn’t she recognized him immediately? “Micah Peterson?”

  He didn’t blink. “Good morning again,” he said, true amusement lacing his voice this time.

  A gasp caught in her thro
at. “I’m so sorry I didn’t recognize you. You had on a hat earlier and a different shirt.” As if the hat and clean shirt were a disguise.

  “It seems to me you had on a different shirt, too.” He gestured to the fresh blouse she was wearing, free of spray paint unlike this morning’s.

  “I’ve learned to always have a spare, just in case. In this profession, it’s necessary…So, Ben is the son you were talking about this morning?” Again, duh. Had her brain overheated from the image of Micah’s lower half?

  “Listen, I’m not trying to be a hard-ass,” he said.

  Hard ass? Yep. Very hard. Swallowing, she pulled her mind out of the gutter and straightened. She was a professional, she reminded herself. No drooling over the hot, completely irrational parent.

  “First day of school nerves. We all have them,” she said. “And you’re just looking out for your son. I respect that.”

  “Right.” He nodded as his defensive posture relaxed just a little. “He didn’t have many friends at his old school. And it’s not easy when the other kids are running around and riding their bikes. Ben will never do any of that. To make matters worse, he sometimes puts up a fight about doing the stuff he is capable of.”

  Maybe not so irrational. A parent who wanted to do right by their child always squeezed at her heart.

  “Don’t worry about Ben, Mr. Peterson. Seaside is a great school, and I’m sure he’ll fit right in.”

  His cellphone rang again and this time she averted her gaze to look somewhere less mind-blowing, like at her secretary, Val, who was nosily watching them from her desk. Great.

  “I have to get to work.” He offered what appeared to be a genuine smile.

  That’s a damn good smile.

  “Of course. We’ll see you this afternoon.”

  As he started to walk away, her gaze traveled down his tall, lean body. She should’ve recognized that ass immediately when he’d walked into her office. It was unforgettable, really.

  Val cleared her throat, cracking a whip at her unruly hormones.

  With a sigh, Kat watched the father disappear out of the school’s double doors and pointed at her friend. “I knew I shouldn’t have given you this job, Val. You’re going to be trouble this year.” She shook her head and reached for a stack of to-dos on her desk. Thirty minutes later, her phone rang, breaking the steady progress on paperwork that she rarely got to make.

  “Trouble in Miss Hadley’s classroom,” Val said through the speakerphone. “You better get down there quick.”

  —

  Micah’s phone rang for the hundredth time that morning as he sat in the long line of traffic leading to Camp Leon’s military base. He had a good mind to turn the damn thing off. Glancing at the caller ID before answering, his chest tightened. Yeah, I should’ve turned it off.

  “Hey, Jessica. How are you?” He didn’t hide the distaste of her name on his lips, or the fact that he’d rather be doing PT in the desert than talking to his ex.

  “I’m good,” she said efficiently. “Listen, I don’t have time for small talk, Micah.”

  Of course she didn’t. She never had. “What do you have time for? Other than the Marine Corps?”

  She laughed dryly. Once upon a time, that laugh had been an adrenaline shot to his heart. Now, it made his teeth grind together. “I volunteered for another deployment.”

  Stars burst behind his vision. “What the hell, Jess? Ben has been looking forward to us driving to Georgia at Christmas. He’ll be devastated.”

  “He’ll understand.” There was a dismissive annoyance in her voice.

  “I doubt it,” he said, his fingers gripping the steering wheel so hard that his arms went numb.

  “It’s my job, Micah.”

  “And what do you expect me to do if I get a mandatory, not a voluntary, order of deployment? What happens to Ben then?” Uncurling his fingers, he watched as the blood rushed back into his hand.

  “Your aunt Clara will take care of him. Just like last time. Or you could get out of it somehow.”

  “Yeah, how would I do that? Tell my command that I’m pregnant?” he asked.

  Silence sizzled between them.

  “I never wanted kids. You knew that from the beginning.”

  “Yeah.” He pressed the gas as traffic slowly inched forward. “Will you at least call him later and explain the importance of your career yourself?”

  She didn’t answer. Right. He’d forgotten what a self-centered ex he had. If she hadn’t gotten pregnant during their five-month “relationship,” they never would’ve gotten married. He’d thought they could make it work, though. Micah had loved her, or thought he did at least. But the Marine Corps always came first with her, just like with his own dad. And he understood that, hadn’t even minded that she’d loved the Corps more than him. But he minded that she loved the Corps more than her own son. Getting married had been a huge mistake. Except for Ben. Ben was the only thing they’d ever done right.

  “Fine. I’ll tell him tonight,” he muttered. Then, after a hurried goodbye, he hung up and entered the military base. A short drive later, he parked and was preparing to get out of his Jeep when his phone rang again. With a low growl, he glanced down at his caller ID—he didn’t have the patience for another round with Jessica. He didn’t recognize this number, though. “Hello?”

  “Mr. Peterson?” a woman asked, her voice tight. “It’s Kat Chandler. I’m afraid you’re going to have to come back to the school. There’s been an accident with Ben.”

  Chapter 3

  This didn’t bode well for Seaside Elementary. Ben had barely been here two hours and already he’d been involved in some sort of incident.

  Micah walked right in, didn’t bother to speak to the office secretary, and headed straight toward Principal Chandler’s open office door, pausing at the sight of her—wearing the same fitted skirt that had hugged her body so perfectly this morning.

  He glanced over at the wheelchair in the center of the room and back at her. “Where’s Ben?”

  “He’s in class, sitting in one of the nurse’s spare wheelchairs,” she said.

  Which was no doubt oversized for his small frame. “Is he okay?” Micah asked, his voice coming out harder than he intended.

  She nodded as she stood and walked around her desk. “Yes, he seems fine. As I said on the phone, I’m very sorry about this, Mr. Peterson.”

  “You can’t monitor every second of the day. I know that.” But she could make damn sure Ben’s teacher kept better control over her classroom. Ben had already been nervous about being the new kid. Micah could only imagine how he was rolling with Seaside’s punches thus far. But if she said he was fine, he wasn’t going to interrupt Ben’s first day any more by checking on him while he was in class.

  He crouched beside the chair and inspected the tire. Last year’s chair had solid rubber tires that never would have gone flat. This one had pneumatic tires that resembled those on a ten-speed bicycle, allowing him to move over more surfaces, including outdoors. “Tell me again what happened.”

  “A child stabbed it with his pencil,” she said, stepping up beside him. “I don’t think it was directed at Ben as much as an attention tactic. The school will pay for any replacement parts.”

  Micah laid a bicycle repair kit down on the floor and started to patch the puncture, doing his best not to notice Kat’s long-as-summer legs standing a few feet away. “It needs a patch and some air, just like if you had a bike flat. I keep a kit on me at all times.”

  “I see.” She shifted around, as if looking for something to do. “Would you like some coffee?” she asked.

  “Love some.” Micah had been up more hours than usual, which may have accounted for his outburst this morning. He’d been an ass, and he knew it. But Ben was his son and, while he was easy to love, it was damn hard not to worry about him.

  Glancing over, he watched her grab two mugs from a cabinet, enjoying the view as her skirt raised two inches along the backs of her thighs. Bles
s the person who’d placed those mugs on the top shelf. But he wasn’t supposed to be looking at the good—and engaged—principal that way.

  “He had a flat last month, too,” he said, redirecting his attention to the task in front of him. “The mobility guy who sold us this chair said flats could happen, but rarely did.” Shaking his head, he reached for the mug of coffee that she handed him. “I guess he didn’t realize how active Ben was. Especially for a kid with his level of cerebral palsy.”

  She pulled up a chair and sipped her coffee as she watched.

  Her high-heel shoes were gone, he noticed. There were a lot of things he noticed sitting at this angle. His man parts reacted without consulting with his brain first. His brain knew that checking out Ben’s principal was a bad idea. Clearing his throat, he forced his eyes back to the chair and started pumping air into the tire. He refocused his thoughts back on his son. “Ben might’ve said it didn’t bother him, but believe me, it does. He knows you can’t control what others do, but today’ll hurt. The best I can do is teach him to hold his chin high. It’s not as much fun to bully someone who doesn’t let it get to them.”

  “That’s pretty good advice.” She held on to her mug with both hands, making her look too young to be in charge of a school. When he met her gaze, however, he saw what a quick glance of her appearance didn’t tell: It didn’t matter how young she looked, she’d already seen too much in life.

  Which raised all kinds of questions in his mind that he had no business contemplating.

  “Listen, I’m sorry about this morning,” he said, lowering his voice and turning back to the wheelchair. “Ben had a rough time last year. I just want to make sure he does okay here.”

  “No need to apologize. And he’ll be fine. We’re in this together.”

  In this together. Those words were foreign to him. Since Jessica had quit her role as mother, he’d been handling everything on his own. Of course, Kat hadn’t meant anything by saying that. She was a principal and he was a parent. In that sense, they were a team. But damn if something about those words didn’t make him ache. It also made him feel like running the hell out of her office, which he needed to do anyway. His phone was blinking, no doubt signaling a dozen messages from his squadron. “Ben’s wheelchair is ready to use,” he said, standing.