by Ramona Gray
“Yeah,” I said.
“So, get your shit together. You love Natalia and she loves you. That’s all that matters.”
“It isn’t,” I said. “Christ, Jonah, have you listened to anything I told you? She could lose Phoebe because of me. I won’t let that happen.”
“Natalia loves you and is willing to take that risk.”
“I’m not,” I said.
I stared moodily at the floor as Claire squeezed my shoulder again before saying, “Dinner will be ready in about twenty minutes.”
“Thank you, but I’m not hungry.”
“You haven’t eaten all day, Mattie,” she chastised gently. “You need to eat.”
The doorbell rang and she kissed the top of my head. “Starving yourself isn’t going to help.”
She walked out of the room and Jonah gave me a grave look. “You need to be with Natalia, Mattie.”
“I can’t,” I said hoarsely.
“You can.” Jonah stood. “Also, don’t hate me.”
“Hate you? Why would I…”
My voice died out as Natalia walked into the living room. She smiled at Jonah and kissed his cheek. “Thanks, Jonah.”
“You bet. Be sweet to my boy, Nat.”
“I will.” She waited until Jonah left before smiling at me. “Hey.”
“How did you know I was here?” I said.
She hesitated. “I texted Mia who told me where you were and gave me Jonah’s number. I texted him and asked if I could drop by and he said yes.”
I grunted angrily. “Some friends they are.”
Nat’s phone dinged and she gave me an apologetic look before reading the screen. A wide grin crossed her face and she texted off a reply before sitting down on the couch beside me. “Don’t be angry with them. They love you and are worried about you.”
I didn’t reply and she gave me a searching look. “You look tired, honey.”
“I didn’t sleep very much last night.”
“Me either. I missed you. Phoebe misses you too. She asked for you as soon as she woke up.”
“Stop it,” I said. “Please, Nat, you’re only making this break-up harder.”
“You call it break-up, I call it you having a sleepover at your friend’s house.”
Despite my misery, my lips curled up in a smile. Nat gave me her sweet smile. “It’s time for you to come home, honey.”
“I can’t,” I said.
“You can.” Her voice was calm, her look was loving. “We need you, Mattie.”
“Evan isn’t going to give up on this,” I said. “If he knows that we’re still together, he’ll keep pushing and pushing until -”
“Actually,” another grin crossed Nat’s face when her phone dinged a second time, “I’m pretty sure Evan has changed his mind about getting custody of Phoebe. Come with me.”
“Where are we going?” I took her hand when she offered it, relishing even that small contact.
“Outside for a minute.” She snagged my coat from the hook in the hallway and handed it to me and I shoved my feet into boots. I followed her out onto the porch as a car pulled into Jonah’s driveway.
“Is that Evan’s rental car?”
“Yep,” she said. “He texted me to find out where I was. I sent him Jonah’s address.”
“What? Why? He doesn’t…” I squinted into the back seat. “Oh my God, is Phoebe with him?”
“She is.” I couldn’t understand why Natalia had a triumphant smile on her face. “I called Evan this morning and told him I thought it would be a good idea for him and Phoebe to spend some time alone together. He picked her up a couple of hours ago.”
I watched in disbelief as Evan climbed out of the car. He wasn’t wearing a jacket and his designer t-shirt had a giant orange stain across the front. The crotch of his jeans was soaking wet and he pulled at them before yanking open the back door. He unbuckled Phoebe and pulled her out of the car, setting her on her feet.
“Mama!” Phoebe hollered. She took off in a dead run toward us and a surge of love so strong it took my breath away, went through me when she grinned at me.
“Hi, Mattie Daddy!”
She climbed the stairs, tripping on the top one, and I snagged her under the armpits before she could land on her face. I picked her up and held her tight. It’d been less than a day since I’d seen her, but I had missed her terribly.
“Hi, hi, hi!” Phoebe hollered at me. She had a ring of orange around her mouth and her small body was vibrating like a live wire. “Guess what, Mattie Daddy? Guess what?”
“What’s that?” I said.
“I went to Chuckie Cheese’s with Evan and I played a game and then I went in the ball pit, and then I had orange pop and psghetti, and then I dropped my drink in Evan’s lap and then I threw up all my psghetti on him!”
She threw her head back and laughed hysterically before kicking her feet. “Put me down, put me down, put me down!”
I set her on her feet, watching in disbelief as she raced back and forth along Jonah’s front porch. Phoebe had a lot of energy, but I’d never seen her so hyper and out of control. I glanced at Natalia who gave me a smug smile as Phoebe grabbed her hands.
“Swing me, Mama!” She screamed.
Natalia picked her up and swung her briefly before setting her back on her feet. Phoebe ran down the stairs past Evan who had wrestled her car seat out of the back seat and was marching grimly toward us.
“Evan! Let’s make snow angels!” Phoebe screamed at him. She fell on her back into the snow in Jonah’s front yard, waving her arms and legs back and forth in a frenetic motion. “Evan, Evan, Evan! Come make snow angels with me!”
“No,” he barked before dropping the car seat at the foot of the stairs.
“Hey, Evan,” Natalia said sweetly. “How did it go?”
“That – that child is out of control,” Evan said. “She never stopped talking, she insisted I take her to that abomination of a restaurant and even after I told her to slow down eating her supper, she refused to listen.”
He pointed to his wet crotch and his stained shirt. “She threw her drink on my lap on purpose.”
“I doubt that,” Natalia said. “She’s only three, Evan. She gets a little clumsy sometimes.”
“Snow angel, snow angel, snow angel!” Phoebe half sang, half screamed behind us. “I’m a snow angel, Mattie Daddy!”
“She threw up on me, Natalia!” Evan’s face drew down in a moue of disgust. “She threw up on me and then she laughed about it. And she kept passing gas in the car, I had to roll down the windows the smell was so bad. You need to have her seen by a doctor.”
“I’ll take that under advisement,” Natalia said. “Hey, you’re here until Friday, right? Now that Phoebe is so comfortable with you, can you take her on Monday? Her daycare had an emergency and has to close for the day, and I have to work, so… it would be great if you could watch her. It’ll give you a chance to really get to know your daughter.”
Evan’s face turned red and he shook his head. “No. I-I’m busy.”
He glanced behind him at Phoebe who waved at him. “Evan! Snow angel!!”
“You’ll have to find someone else to watch her,” Evan said.
“Oh, sure, I totally understand. Mattie, you can watch her, right?” Nat said.
“Yes,” I replied.
“Perfect. Evan, I’ll keep my week free, you let me know what days you can take Phoebe and we’ll go from there, okay?” Nat took my hand and squeezed it tight. “Oh, but I’m definitely going to need you to take her Thursday night. Matt and I have a double date with Jonah and Claire.”
“I can’t, I mean…”
“Pheebs, sweetpea? Do you want to hang out with Evan again on Thursday night?” Nat called.
“Yeah!” Phoebe shouted. “I hang out with Evan, Mama!”
Evan’s face went from red to green and he backed toward his car. “I’ll, um, be in touch about Thursday.”
“Great! Talk to you soon,” Nat said.
“Pheebs, come up here, please.”
Phoebe stood and shook the snow from her body before barreling up the steps toward us. “Mattie Daddy, catch me!” She hollered before launching herself at me.
I caught her and she giggled hysterically before wiggling free and grabbing my hands. She climbed up my legs with her feet, leaning back and singing some kid’s song I didn’t know, as Evan got into his car. Nat waved at him as he drove away and then burst into laughter.
“Nat? What is happening?” I said as Phoebe hung off my hands and kicked her legs back and forth. “Why is Phoebe so… hyper?”
She grinned at me. “Before I sent her out with Evan, I may have given her some cookies, and then some ice cream, and then some chocolate, oh and a half dozen marshmallows, and then let her watch Peppa Pig instead of having an afternoon nap.”
“I had cookies and ice cream, and then Evan gave me candy too,” Phoebe said. “It was so good, Mattie Daddy.”
I gaped at Natalia. “You hopped her up on sugar and no sleep and then sent her to Evan?”
“Sure did,” Natalia said. “He needs to know how to handle Phoebe when she’s hyper and sleep deprived. I was doing him a favour.”
A grin broke out on my face, and Natalia cupped my face before standing on her tiptoes and kissing my mouth. “C’mon, handsome, let’s go home.”
* * *
We crept out of Phoebe’s room and I followed Natalia down the hallway to our bedroom. It had taken four stories and three songs before Phoebe had finally fallen asleep. I collapsed on the bed as Natalia grabbed her cell phone from the nightstand.
“Holy shit,” I said. “Your idea was brilliant, don’t get me wrong, but I never want to try and put an over-tired, sugar-laden Phoebe to bed ever again.”
She laughed and sat down beside me, resting her hand on my thigh. “Yeah, that was an epic sugar rush for the kid. But worth it.”
She leaned over and kissed my forehead as I said, “Do you really think it’ll scare Evan off from asking for custody? I mean, yeah, Phoebe was kind of hyper but -”
“It already has,” she said.
“What?”
She gave me a gleeful look. “I just checked my texts. I had one from Maggie telling me that Evan’s lawyer contacted her and he’s withdrawing his petition for even partial custody. Apparently, Evan has had a change of heart about taking Phoebe away from her mother for such an extended period every month. I’m retaining sole custody of Phoebe and Evan will still pay monthly child support. He can have visitation as long as he provides prior notification that he’d like to see her, and he travels here.”
“Holy shit,” I said. “It worked. Your plan worked.”
“Of course it did,” she said. “I’m not just a pretty face, you know.”
She leaned over me, her blonde hair falling like a curtain around our faces. “What do you say we do a little celebrating?”
She trailed her fingers over my abdomen, and I cupped her face and pressed my mouth against hers. “I think that’s a fine idea.”
“Good. Get naked, Mr. Andrews.”
I pressed a kiss against her mouth. “I love you, Natalia.”
She smiled and traced my jaw with her fingers. “You and me and Phoebe makes three.”
Thank you for reading the Working Men Series.
Do you love big cat shifter romances?
Look for a new paranormal, romantic suspense series coming soon from Ramona.
“Dead of Night” (Book One)
The Shadow Security Series
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Books by Ramona Gray:
Individual Books
The Escort
Saving Jax
The Assistant
One Night
Sharing Del
Other World Series
The Vampire’s Kiss (Book One)
The Vampire’s Love (Book Two)
The Shifter’s Mate (Book Three)
Rescued By The Wolf (Book Four)
Claiming Quinn (Book Five)
Choosing Rose (Book Six)
Elena Unbound (Book Seven)
Undeniable Series
Undeniably His
Undeniably Hers
Undeniably Theirs
Working Men Series
The Mechanic
The Carpenter
The Bartender
The Welder
The Electrician
The Landscaper
The Firefighter
The Cop
The Paramedic
