by Nikky Kaye
Dean was definitely laughing his ass off at me, now.
I looked up and chuckled as I gave the sky my middle finger. “Fuck you, man,” I said softly. Recently I’d had more moments like that—allowing myself to be happy instead of mournful or resentful.
The summer had gone by so damn fast, with so many changes to my life that it had been kind of a blur. Even now, I realized I had time to kill because I’d rushed through getting out of the stadium. So, I decided to stop and pick up a small stuffed dog for Payton.
She’d been on a puppy campaign for the past few weeks, and Emma had shot her down as gently as possible. Privately, she’d told me that if I dared to get Payton a dog for her birthday, I’d be cleaning up the mess by myself. Payton and I were still working on her, which was one of the reasons I decided to buy Emma some flowers, too.
I parked my car at the dance studio and leaned against it as I waited for the two of them to come out. The moment she spotted me Payton ran ahead.
“Don’t run in the parking lot!” I heard Emma yell at her, but my arms were already full of my niece.
“Hey, sweets! Good class?”
She showed me some new move with her leg as Emma caught up, holding her dance bag and looking a little frazzled.
“Honey, you can’t run into the parking lot like that.”
“Sorry,” Payton said, all her focus on the movement of her outstretched leg.
I tugged on the bag, pulling Emma toward me. “To be fair, she was barely in the parking lot.”
She rolled her eyes. “Only because she practically sprinted when she saw you,” she grumbled, but she let me pull her closer and kiss her.
So. Goddamn. Happy.
When I lifted my head from hers, I saw Payton watching us with undisguised interest. Time to redirect her attention. “I have something for you, Pay.”
Her eyes brightened with excitement and it warmed my heart. “What? What is it?”
“Close your eyes,” I said, brushing my palm against her eyes to make sure that she wasn’t peeking. Emma was giggling behind her as I grabbed the tiny stuffed dog that was in the car. “Okay now, open.”
Payton squealed in delight the moment she saw the dog and hugged it close to her heart. “It’s so soft!” she said, rubbing it against her cheek. “Thank you!”
“You’re welcome, sweets.”
I loved the fact that she was thrilled with the little gift and how excited she was to play with it. She immediately christened the toy Mr. Doodley and introduced it to Emma.
“It’s exactly the kind I want, too! In real life,” she added.
I just blinked innocently as Emma smirked at me. “Nice,” she muttered under her breath at me. “Cheap move, Pennington.” To Payton she just said, “Let’s see how we do with Mr. Doodley first, okay?”
Yeah, we were wearing her down. As I helped Payton into her booster seat, I winked at her and got a tiny fist bump in return.
When Emma got into her seat, she was surprised to see the bouquet of tulips sitting on her spot. She looked at me and I simply smiled and shrugged. “I got Payton a little present, so I thought I’d get you one as well.”
“Thanks, Zach, I love them.”
When she brought the flowers close to her nose to smell them, the expression on her face was remarkably like Payton’s from a couple of minutes before. As I started the car, Emma leaned over to kiss me on the cheek. I turned my head at the last minute and caught her lips, instead. And didn’t let go.
Payton fake gagged in the backseat, and we broke apart.
It was school supply time. Emma had the list of what Payton needed and all I did was push the cart and point out shit I thought looked good. Up and down the aisles, Payton asked questions about starting school. When she told me that she was excited to see Ethan more often, I suddenly had a sinking feeling. It took about six feet for my imagination to take me from their little kid sleepovers to further down the road. The mere thought made me shudder in fear.
“Why do you have that look on your face?” Emma asked as we waited for our turn to pay.
I leaned closer to her and confided, “I just thought of how I’ll have to give Payton ‘the talk.’”
Emma burst out laughing and hit my shoulder. “Why are you thinking that far down the line?”
I shrugged and sighed. “I don’t know. I’m just not looking forward to it. You’ll have to help me, or Ethan will run the risk of being punched in the nuts someday.”
Something flashed in her eyes, but she remained silent and simply smiled. We paid for everything on the list—and then some—then voted to grab dinner on the way home. About halfway home, Emma dozed off. Guess staying up late and then waking up too early finally took its toll on her.
“Thanks for today… Daddy,” said a small voice from the back seat.
Daddy.
Thank god I was at a red light, or I might have run off the road. I spun in my seat to look at Payton, who was still mouthing the word to herself as though trying it on like a new dress.
She smiled at me shyly and said, “Can I call you Daddy sometimes, Uncle Zach?”
“Sweets, I…” Shit. I didn’t know what to say.
Payton sighed, sinking in her seat and explaining, “I know you’re my uncle. It’s just sometimes I hear other kids talking about stuff and I miss Mommy and Daddy. You and Emma could be my Daddy Two and Mommy Two or something…”
I watched her carefully as she stared out of the window, a little frown creasing her forehead. Wisps of her hair were falling out of the braid that Emma had done that morning, and my heart swelled with love for her.
“I’d be honored to have you call me Daddy, Payton,” I said seriously. “I think being your dad was the best job my brother ever had.”
“I guess you have the job now.” Her tone was matter of fact instead of sad.
Maybe we were all adjusting. Part of me hated that we were all adjusting. I sent another silent “fuck you” up to heaven, but without a laugh behind it. Someone leaned on their horn behind me, and I saw the light had turned green while I was having one of the biggest moments of my life.
But then the biggest moments in life usually didn’t take more time than the change of a traffic light, did they? My parents dying. Hearing my name called in the draft. Losing Maggie, then Dean. Gaining Payton. Meeting Emma.
As we continued the drive home, Payton asked, “Do you think Emma would let me call her Mommy?”
I glanced at the sleeping woman beside me and then at Payton in the rearview mirror. “I think that would make her really happy, actually.” I was also ninety-nine percent certain it would also make her cry.
“Okay.”
My heart suddenly ached for my little girl in the back seat. It had been too fucking soon for her to lose the people she should’ve been relying on for support. But I was thankful for the fact that she had faced the storm as bravely as she did. I parked the car and gently woke up Emma and the three of us headed inside the house that we all called home.
Emma helped Payton shower as I watched TV and waited for bedtime story and tuck-in time. When they got out of the bathroom, I could see Emma’s eyes brimming with tears and I knew that Payton just asked her if it would be okay to call her Mommy.
For Emma’s whole life she didn’t have anyone to call that. While she might say that she doesn’t miss it, sure as hell she never wanted another kid to feel what she had. Now here she was, becoming the Mommy that Payton needed.
We took our time going through the bedtime routine with Payton, almost reluctant to leave her to sleep. In our bedroom I wrapped my arms around Emma and pulled her close to me. She rested her forehead against my chest, her whole body sagging in a giant, shuddering sigh.
“Did you know about that?” she asked quietly.
“It came up in the car while you were sleeping.” We sat together silently for a moment, my hand smoothing up and down her back. I kissed her ear, then murmured in it, “Thanks for allowing her to call you Mommy
.”
“I should thank her,” she whispered. “She has no idea how happy she made me when she did.”
We went to bed like an old married couple, quietly and comfortably. No seduction, no passion, just… together. Despite her nap in the car, Emma fell asleep immediately and I stared at her for a moment, memorizing every detail of her face.
Being faced with raising Payton was scary as hell, but now I wouldn’t give it up for anything in the world—if for no other reason that it brought Emma to us. With each passing day, my feelings for both of them deepened and spread.
It made me think that on a day like today, when my balloon of happiness was stretched so thin I thought it would pop, it would still withstand whatever wind came along.
If this was love, then I guess now I can say that I know what it is.
Emma
I knew I stepped on the line when I first slept with Zach. You know, that line between wise and foolish, boss and employee, lust and love.
Sure, I could have taken a step back and told him that it was a one-time thing, never to be repeated. In fact, I’d tried to do that—for about ninety seconds. Truth be told, after that second night my attempts to avoid being naked with Zach were kind of half-assed.
It was more fun to be whole-assed with him.
Nope, I had practically slingshot myself over the line, arcing so far that I couldn’t see it behind me.
I had allowed myself to tumble down the rabbit hole and I wasn’t even sure if Zach was willing to catch me at the end of it or if he even was waiting for me.
Sleeping with Zach Pennington with no feelings attached would’ve been much easier if we didn’t see each other every single day and didn’t have a kid who called us Mommy and Daddy. Payton wasn’t our child, but she sure acted like she was, and seeing the way Zach and she interacted nowadays made me fall for him even more.
So, I’d overstepped. I’d flown high and tumbled down. And now I’d fallen.
Anyone in their right mind would say that I needed some physical therapy.
It only takes getting your heart broken once to be reluctant to risk it again. The thing about the heart, though, is that it’s a damn strong muscle. If there’s a battle between your heart and your brain, odds are your heart will win out—which is why I was looking back at that line and wondering where it went.
The thing was, I was no stranger to heartbreak. I felt it when I was young, when my parents died and that was probably the worst heartbreak one could ever go through.
Heartbreak meant loving, then losing.
If Zach Pennington was to break my heart, he wasn’t the only person I’d lose in the process. It meant that I would lose Payton too. Not only did I not want to put her through that kind of pain, I didn’t want to face it either. Unfortunately, part of what we had in common was knowing what that kind of pain felt like already. All three of us had lost our parents when we were young. It was a strange kind of club. The dues were astronomical.
But if Payton lost me then that meant she lost her mom—twice—in less than a year.
“You know it’s not healthy to be that buried in your thoughts, right?”
I looked up and met Anderson’s warm hazel eyes and smiled slightly. “It’s nothing, Andy.”
“Tell that to the line in your forehead,” he said, sipping a chai latte as we waited for Payton finish her piano lessons. Zach’s assistant and I had spent enough time together that we’d developed a friendship—maybe the first real one that I’d had in my life.
I pressed my fingers to my head. Was there really a wrinkle there? “No, it’s really nothing.”
He put down the tablet on which he’d been maneuvering Zach’s schedule for the month, then looked at me with a glint in his eye. “I’m pretty sure that it has something to do with Zach Pennington and how he managed to make you drop your panties within three days of you living with him.”
My eyes widened and I immediately shushed him, looking around the café to see if anyone had heard what Andy had said. I glared at him and leaned back on my chair, crossing my arms against my chest. “You know that’s not true.”
“Okay, a week.”
I opened my mouth, then closed it again.
He chuckled. “Oh, but you don’t deny that Zach had filled your thoughts and not just…” He glanced down, making me blush and slap at his hand on the table.
“Andy, you’re not really helping here. You’re supposed to be my friend.”
And Zach’s employee, like I was. This is how things got messed up. Was he Zach’s assistant first and my friend second? Was Zach my employer first and my lover second?
Anderson laughed. “How am I supposed to help when I don’t even know what your dilemma is?”
I sighed and then played with my hands. “I just didn’t think…”
“That you’d fall hard and fast for Zach Pennington and not just on the bed?” Andy finished for me.
He was right. I didn’t like it, but I had to concede that it was true. I didn’t expect—didn’t plan to sleep with my boss, but I had. And god knows that I never planned or expected to fall in love with him, too.
“What’s the problem, Em?”
“The problem is I like Zach more than I’m supposed to,” I began to say, “and if I get rejected or if he breaks my heart, I don’t think I could be around him anymore.” I sighed. “Which means I would have to leave Payton.” It was a double whammy.
“And you love that kid too much,” Andy said, looking at me understandingly, “We all do.”
I nodded. “I don’t know what to do, Andy.”
“Why not ask Zach where you stand in his life?” Andy suggested, tilting his head at me. “I’ve never seen him as happy as he is now, Emma. It’s not just Payton that makes him happy. I think it’s you, too.”
My phone buzzed before I could respond. I looked down at the text message, then up at Anderson again. “Do you really think I should ask him that?”
He nodded. “Yes. Yes, I do. I think you’d be pleasantly surprised.”
“Okay.” I took a deep breath. Maybe I needed him with me, but not for moral support. No, I needed him to kick me in the ass.
“Okay, what?”
“Looks like Payton’s art class is cancelled. What do you say we pay Zach a surprise visit?”
“I say ‘surprise!’”
Once her piano lesson was over, Payton was more than happy to be in on the plan. Her delight threatened to ruin the surprise, though, as she was so excited that she ran to the minivan, announcing to anyone in earshot that she was going to the field to see her Daddy.
She loved going to the football field where Zach trained. She’d become a kind of miniature mascot for the team. They would play catch with her and she would run around the field like a crazed kid—which, incidentally, she was—and Zach’s teammates would chase her. It was a novel kind of workout and a fun sight to watch, especially when they tried to teach her to play football. Nothing made him happier than having the chance to teach her the sport that he loved.
It was obvious to anyone watching that he would make a great father to his own kids someday. I couldn’t help but wish that I’d be along for the ride.
When we arrived at the stadium, Payton was so excited she hopped out of the car the moment Anderson parked. I had to chase after her, but I didn’t mind. I was just as excited as she was.
I caught up to her sooner than I expected, since she couldn’t get past the entrance. Before her eyes and above her head was a wall of people with flashing cameras and barking voices. Reporters? I shook my head, trying to recall if Zach had said anything about a press conference that morning. No, these visitors weren’t welcome. The security guards were irritably fending them off and Zach’s coach stood behind them, his face red with annoyance.
“Coach!” Payton screamed and tried to squeeze her way past the paparazzi.
“Payton!” My eyes widened as she disappeared into the crowd. I panicked when couldn’t see her for all the people pu
shing and shoving. My heart only slowed down again when I squirmed in to find her clinging to Coach Matthews.
Matthews yelled something at a guard, then led the three of us inside.
“What’s going on?” I asked the moment we were away from the crowd. I looked back to see Anderson being let through by one of the guards, jogging down the concourse to catch up with us.
“Some celebrity chick just dropped by with the paparazzi hot on her tail,” Coach grumbled.
“Celebrity?” Anderson repeated once we got on the field. There was a strange tone in his voice, one I’d never heard before.
The team appeared to be in a huddle, but there was a gorgeous woman in the middle instead of a football. She looked like a movie star or something. Everyone’s attention was on her, and it appeared from the expression on her face that that was what she’d came for. What she expected.
But not Payton.
“Daddy!” she screamed as she rushed to Zach.
It was only then that I spotted the tangle of cables in her path.
It was as if everything happened in slow-motion as I ran to Payton, but she sprinted faster than I ever could and her excitement to see her uncle only fueled her adrenaline. I watched helplessly as she tripped and hit the cement. Hard.
“Shit!” My heart stopped the moment I spotted blood. “Payton!” I screamed, and it was a race to see who could get to her first.
Zach was the first to reach her. He cradled her in his arms, his face drained of color. Payton was barely conscious, and though common sense told me not to touch her head I couldn’t help but want to stop the blood oozing from it. In the background I heard someone calling an ambulance, and I felt like I was going to be sick from shock.
Finally, the paramedics arrived. They let Zach ride in the ambulance with Payton, but not me. I was nearly wild with fear and fury, and only Anderson was able to yank me away and propel me to the car to make our own way to the hospital. When we met them in the ER, Zach was struggling to answer questions about Payton’s medical history.
