by Emerson Rose
“Wow, I have to say, you’re the only person I’ve ever seen him get excited about babysitting him.”
Cannon stops his victory dance and whips around glaring at his father. “I’m not a baby.”
I place the tip of my finger on my bottom lip and tap it contemplating, “Well, let’s see… You don’t poop your pants, right?”
He wrinkles up his nose. “No, ew.”
“And you use a fork and a spoon when you eat?”
“Yeah.”
“And you can put on your clothes and wash your butt?”
Cannon giggles and one corner of Ash’s mouth twitches like he’s suppressing a smile.
“Yeah, I wash my butt.”
“Then it’s settled. You are most certainly not a baby, and that means you cannot be babysat. How about we hang out and keep each other company like friends?”
And again up go his arms, and joyous yelling commences along with another bout of running around like a lunatic.
“Stella, where are you from?” Ash asks out of the blue.
“Redwater, Montana on the Deardon Rose Ranch.”
“I’ve heard of it. Isn’t it right across from the Whiskey Hill Ranch?”
“Yes, that’s us… the people across the road from the Whiskey Hill Ranch,” I answer, my words saturated with sarcasm.
He grimaces, “Wow, hit a nerve?”
“Sorry, yeah, our families don’t get along, it’s a very long, very old story.”
“Hmm, maybe you could tell me over breakfast tomorrow?”
I chew on the inside of my cheek and try to decide if he’s insinuating that I will be spending the night again or if he’s being polite and inviting me to breakfast.
“In the café downstairs,” he adds, when he sees me struggling to either sling him some sass or politely accept his invitation.
“Oh, okay, sure. You might regret it, but we all have to eat breakfast, so we might as well do it together.”
He leans back and kicks off his boots, one and then the other with his eyes still on me. “I don’t think I’ll regret it at all.”
His words are, I don’t know, loaded chock-full of innuendos and dirty flirty tones that make me press my legs together.
“I, uh, I think I better go and find my room. The dinner’s at six o'clock, if I’m back by 5:45 will that be okay?”
“I would like it better if you didn’t go and find your room and stayed here with us, but if you insist, yes, 5:45 will be okay. And thank you for offering to stay with him, you didn’t have to.”
He stands and takes a step toward me. When he’s in my space, my bubble, my zone, he bends his knees so that we are eye to eye. “I don’t know what planet you came from or what kind of magic it is that you wield but, lady, my son likes you, and that means I like you, too. I don’t plan on letting you disappear anytime soon.”
I like the sound of that.
I feel warm air enter my mouth when it falls open, drying my tongue. I stand frozen in place watching his absurdly perfect ass exit the room. When I start breathing again, I’m sure I have most definitely stopped, I gasp and organize enough brain cells to tell my legs to get the hell out of here.
On my way through the Presidential Suite, that I have learned includes three bedrooms, a full kitchen, a formal dining room, more bathrooms than I have had time to count, and a living room bigger than the lobby downstairs, I see Cannon dumping out a large duffle bag of toys onto the dining room table.
He’s busy, and Ash is nowhere in sight, good. I pad across the plush thick carpet to the door and sneak out into the hall carrying my suitcase instead of rolling it to keep quiet.
I have to get out of here, smoke a cigarette, and screw my head back on straight. I came here to do business, not fraternize with fellow ranchers, right? Right.
But that was before People magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive started flirting with me and luring me to his hotel suite with his daddy skills and his adorable overzealous son.
I’m starting to think this convention might not be the dread-fest I was expecting. A few days with Mr. Whoa, oh my God, superhumanly handsome, yet familiar–– because he’s on the front of a magazine, sounds like it might be fun.
I can handle a roll in the hay and a few laughs with a hot guy with no strings attached, right? Usually, but this hot guy has a kid and kids equal strings. Can I handle that?
For Ash, I think I’m willing to find out.
4
It’s only temporary
Ash
Stella’s been gone for two hours and miracle of all miracles Cannon is asleep. I straighten my tie and button one button of my suit jacket in front of the mirror. It’s 5:30, Stella will be back in fifteen minutes, and I will be leaving her with my terror of a son.
I would be lying if I said I hadn’t thought twice or even three times about canceling tonight. I haven’t been able to leave Cannon with anyone for years without coming home to one kind of chaos or another.
He’s a good kid deep down inside, but he’s had a rough go of it with no mother, no grandmother, and my jerk of a father as his grandpa. I cut him a lot of slack for that.
Parenting Cannon is a balancing act of discipline and showing him compassion. If I go either way too far, he acts out. When I’m a hard ass he’s wild as hell, when I show him too much grace he takes advantage, and around and around we go. There is no middle ground with him.
That’s why I am so amazed by the way he reacts to Stella. He’s like a different kid, and I don’t know if it’s an act or if she’s a natural source of calm for him. Either way, I’ll be right downstairs if Dr. Jekyll decides to turn into Mr. Hyde.
“Is Tella here?” a sleepy Cannon mumbles from my bed, not even fully awake yet.
“No, she will be in a few minutes, though.”
“Can we get ice cream?”
“I’ll let Stella decide what you two are going to do.” He smiles and hugs the pillow like he knows Stella will let him do whatever he wants.
“I won’t be late. I’m just going to dinner with some work people, and when it’s done, I’ll be back up. Tomorrow you can come with me to the convention and walk around if you behave.”
“Will Tella be there, too?” Wow, he has it bad for her.
“I’m sure she will but, you know how we are here because we own a ranch?”
“Mmhm.”
“Well, Stella is here for the same reason except she’s here because her family owns a ranch. So she might have to go off on her own and do some things separate from us, understand?”
He lowers his eyes and his brows knit together. He doesn’t like that idea. Now, I hold my breath and see how he chooses to react to it.
“Okay. But sometimes she will be with us?” He looks up, his eyes glimmering with hope.
“Yes, I’m sure we can do some things together. I’ve already asked her to meet us at the diner downstairs for breakfast.”
There’s a knock at the door, and he’s off the bed like a shot running to open it without knowing who it is again. “Wait for an adult, Cannon,” I call after him, but it’s too late.
He’s dragging Stella into the living room chatting about the convention tomorrow and breakfast at the diner. She drops her purse onto a chair and perches on the edge of the couch to listen attentively to Cannon talk.
She looked great earlier in jeans and a T-shirt, but she looks amazing freshly showered wearing a black Victoria’s Secret tracksuit. Her long dark hair is still damp making it appear almost black and she’s removed what little makeup she had on earlier revealing a more vulnerable youthful face. Of the three Stella’s I’ve seen so far: ready for the day beautiful, pissed off beautiful, and now everyday comfortable beautiful, the latter is my favorite.
“Hey, you look cute,” I say, nodding at her outfit with the words Victoria’s Secret glimmering in gold down her leg. Usually cute isn’t a word I use when complimenting women, but for Stella, right now it’s fitting.
She looks down at herself. �
��Yeah, well I’ve never bab… hung out with a friend who’s four and a half years old before so I figured I should be comfortable.” She had caught herself before she uttered the dreaded word babysit in front of Cannon. Good move, she might have lost his trust had she tripped up.
“Good idea. So, you’ve never been friends with a kid?” I’m pretty sure we have established that being friends means babysitting.
“No, I have two younger siblings, though. A brother and a sister.”
I round the couch and stand in front of them slipping my hands into my pockets. “So you’re used to being in charge then.”
Cannon is bringing her his book collection, stacking them on the table in front of her. “I can hold my own, yeah,” she says, looking away from Cannon for the first time. Her lips part and her eyes close and open in a slow blink. “You look fantastic.”
I smile at her reaction. I get this a lot from women, but usually, I don’t give a shit. Women only want two things from a man like me, sex and money, but I don’t feel that way with Stella.
I don’t get a manipulation vibe from her at all. There’s physical attraction, chemistry, maybe even sparks, but I haven’t felt like she had an ulterior motive for being with Cannon or me.
After what was a bit of a forced start, I realize she genuinely seems to enjoy our company and that’s a first for me and I think Cannon, too.
“Thanks. I usually don’t suit up unless I’m going to a club so this feels a little weird.”
“Well, you don’t look weird at all.”
“Daddy’s the sex… sexes… se…” Stella takes pity on him and gives him a hand. “Sexiest man alive?”
“Yeah, dat.”
“Quite a little spokesman you got there.”
I sit across from her and respond, “He’s had good coaching.”
Stella rolls her eyes, “I’ll bet.”
Cannon is watching us carefully. “No, really, daddy coaches peewee.”
“You’re lucky, my daddy sucks at sports and he never coached anything. I like baseball, though. We should toss a ball around tomorrow.”
Cannon pops up off the couch about to explode with excitement but he remembers he said he wouldn’t scare Stella by yelling.
With his palms pressed together in a prayer gesture he leans his head back and closes his eyes, “Pleeease, Daddy, can we play catch with Tella tomorrow?”
My bad ass kid just used the word please and refrained from screaming when he was clearly dying to let it rip. How can I say no to that?
“Sure, if the weather’s nice and we get all of our work done I think we could arrange that.”
“Great, it’s settled then, breakfast,” she says cheerily, “work,” she says lowering her voice and lifting one corner of her lip in a side grin, “and baseball!” she ends on an upswing and a happy clap.
Minus the work part, it sounds like the perfect day.
“You better go or you’ll miss before dinner cocktails.”
I don’t even want to go to dinner now. I’d much rather hang out with these two and read The Very Hungry Caterpillar and eat ice cream. Another first.
“Alright, my phone number is on the table in the dining room if you need me, along with poison control and the local fire department. If I don’t answer and it’s an emergency, call the front desk and have someone come and get me.”
With narrowed eyes, she lowers her head and looks at me like I’ve lost my mind. “Poison control and the fire department? What in the hell do you expect to happen?”
“Believe me, nine out of ten nannies have needed both of those numbers and the tenth just used 911 regularly. Not that you’re a nanny or a babysitter, of course.”
“Nine out of ten? Are you kidding me? For this kid?” she says, hitching her thumb at the angelic dark haired boy on the couch reading a book beside her.
“Yes. For that kid.”
She makes a disgusted pfft sound and waves her hand at the door rolling her eyes. “Go eat dinner, we’ll be fine.”
She has no idea the havoc he can wreak, and I hope to God she doesn’t ever find out.
“Okay, numbers are on the table, Stella. I’ll see you later, buddy, be good.”
Cannon waves and turns the page without looking up. Stella smiles a smug as hell smile that I commit to memory. Her expressions, no matter what they are, draw me in. Anger, smugness, happiness, calm, all of it appeals to me on the same level, the scorching hot I need to have her in my bed so I can taste every inch of her level.
But I won’t, yet. She’s Cannon’s girl for now, and I’m enjoying seeing him well behaved and civilized, even if it only lasts for a few days, which I expect it will.
When she’s good and fed up with him, I’ll step in, and we can take what we want from one another. When it’s over, she will leave, and we’ll never see her again. Just like every woman who has ever touched my life.
5
Love you, Tella
Stella
I never knew that hanging out with a kid could be so much fun. Cannon spent an hour reading and showing me books from the classic Goodnight Moon to a documentary on bugs of the world titled Creepy Crawlies in the Night.
I learned more about bugs than I ever wanted to know, but he amazed me with his knowledge. He might not be able to read, but someone reads these books to him so regularly that he has every word and every bug fact memorized.
Then we ordered pizza for dinner and took a walk down to the local corner mom-and-pop ice cream shop for a cone. Cannon announced to the teenager behind the counter that I was his new friend Tella and his favorite flavor ice cream was, oddly, coffee, same as mine.
We finished up and walked back to the hotel where I thought Cannon might want to crash the convention’s dinner party to see his dad. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
He couldn’t wait to get back to the room so he could show me his three-hundred-strong army of superhero action figures, and watch X-Men movies until he passed out on the couch with his head in my lap.
Usually, I can only go a couple of hours without a cigarette, but tonight I haven’t craved one, not even once. I thought about it when we walked past the hotel’s patio bar where a few people were puffing away, but it was only an observance, not a craving. I’ve been smoking since I was fifteen, could it be possible that I simply needed a kid to distract me from my habit to quit? I guess I’ll find out, if we keep spending time together this week.
After I clean up his toys and books, I head into the kitchen for a bottle of water. On the way, I see Ash’s emergency phone number list laying on the table, crumpling it up I toss it in the trash and snort to myself.
What kind of pussy ass nannies has he been hiring anyway? This kid is perfectly behaved, pleasant to be around, polite, and fun. He has an occasional outburst of excitement, but hell, what kid doesn’t?
I mean, yeah, I can tell he likes me, and that makes it easier, but I can’t imagine him being as terrible as Ash describes him. He makes him sound like a holy terror in need of an exorcism.
Maybe I missed my calling. I should have done something with kids. But then again, I never got to explore my options. As soon as my sister Charlotte told my parents that she wanted to be a veterinarian and that her dream was to work on our family farm in that capacity, all of the college funds became hers.
Her career choice was worthy of their money since that was investing in the ranch’s future success. I've never known what I wanted to do with my life, but after that, I didn't want it to have anything to do with ranching.
So far, I haven’t been able to help it. I live in an apartment over the main barn a few thousand feet from the house I grew up in, and I herd cattle and help mom with the accounting for a living
I exist, I don’t live. I want to see the world, find out what lies beyond the fences of our ranch and the borders of Montana. I want to experience the ocean, drink tequila in Mexico, climb a mountain, go to New York and see a Broadway show. I want to go to college, meet people who don’t
shovel shit and look at cow’s asses for a living or consider Wrangler jeans high fashion.
I’m thirty years old, and I haven’t left the state of Montana, I don’t have an education past the twelfth grade. I've been stuck in neutral for going on twelve years.
I need a change and it took Cannon Pride, a four and a half year old extraordinaire, to make me realize it.
I carry little man into his daddy’s room draped over my shoulder. His arms and legs dangle limply when I pull back the heavy down comforter and fall into bed with him still in my arms. I couldn’t put him down gently, he’s a solid kid and I don’t want to wake him, so here we are spooning.
It’s not until I quit moving, my brain stops thinking, that I realize how utterly exhausted I am. A long day of traveling, getting settled, and meeting the Pride duo has taken its toll.
As my heavy eyelids slide shut, my last thoughts are of Ash Pride and his beautiful son tucked warmly inside the curve of my body. I whisper, “Goodnight, sweet boy, thanks for being my friend.”
I thought he was sound asleep until I feel his hand on one of mine and he murmurs, “Love you, Tella.”
My heart flutters, and I gasp. This little guy, who has only known me for one day, is the first of the male gender to ever confess his love to me, other than my daddy.
I don’t return the sentiment. First of all, I’m almost asleep, second, he is asleep again, and third, I don’t think I should be confessing that I love a little boy that I’ll probably never see again after this week.
But, I’m pretty sure I do.
6
Five Times
Ash
This fucking dinner party is torture. I’d rather have a root canal done then spend one more second with these people. It started out all well and good, but that was before thousands of people took to drinking whiskey and tequila and everything else they’re serving at the open bar.
Open bar, what idiot thought of that? It was probably Valentino.
