Paradise City: Harrison Series Book 1
Page 28
Dad and Mandy crowded around the bassinet beside me, trying to get a good look at the sleeping baby.
“Oh he’s just the most precious thing!” Mandy said with a grin, touching Zach’s little knit hat.
Dad grinned at me and hugged me after I’d managed to sit up.
Scott leaned on the doorframe looking in on us.
“How does it feel to be a grandpa under 40?” Dad asked over his shoulder to Scott.
I saw him wince before his arms unfolded and his hands stuffed in my pockets, eyes on the ground.
“Sometimes I forget that I’m actually a grandpa. I’ve been so involved with Sam and Zach...”
“What do you mean?” Dad asked, turning around, looking at Scott full on now.
“It means just what it sounded like,” he said, looking confused.
“How INVOLVED have you been?” Dad questioned, looking from Scott to me and back before flicking his eyes over the room.
“Who’s room is this? It doesn’t look like a room suited to a young man.”
“It’s my room,” Scott said unapologetically.
“Why are you sleeping in Scott’s room?” The question was directed at me now.
“I couldn’t stomach being in Tyler’s old room,” I admitted.
“It’s awful nice to give up your room to your pregnant daughter in law,” Dad said carefully, slowly.
Scott’s jaw clenched and I felt the anger and accusations sparking in the room.
“Scott stays here,” I said irritably. “He’s been taking care of me while you’ve been on a perpetual honeymoon, DAD.”
“You’re SLEEPING with your father in law?” Dad growled out in a low, threatening voice.
His eyes swung back to Scott and I watched the muscles in his back bunch as his fists clenched, his strides slow but intentionally toward Scott.
Scott removed his hands from his pockets, straightened from leaning on the doorframe and prepared to meet a father’s fury.
“Dad!” I shrieked as his fist flew out, nailing Scott on the jaw, just below his cheek.
Mandy shrank back, removing herself from Zach’s vicinity before saying, “Jerry!” In a shocked voice.
Dad clutched Scott’s shirt in his hands, Scott standing straight, strong, but unmoving as he met his stare, nose to nose with him while Dad growled, “You… During her most vulnerable time, after losing her husband, YOUR son, you take advantage of her? There’s a dark, hot place in Hell for bastards like you. I hope you rot there for a long, long time.”
“Get out!” I shouted, causing Zach to wake up. “Get out and don’t come back until you have an apology!”
Dad dropped Scott’s shirt and turned to me. “You’re coming with me, Sam. I can’t leave you here with him. He’s toxic!”
I took a fortifying breath and repeated my last words.
“Get out. And don’t come back until you are ready to apologize to Scott. He’s a good man and deserves respect.”
Dad’s eyes filled with shock, hurt, and I saw disgust register there.
“Who are you? You’re not the woman I raised...”
My heart broke in two in my chest. I scooped the crying Zach into my arms and turned, unable to meet his eyes.
Mandy pressed a kiss to my head, then Zach’s head and pulled on Dad’s arm until they were out the door.
When the door slammed closed Scott’s back hit the doorframe again and he slid to his butt, elbows propped on his knees as he pressed his head into his hands.
“Sam...” he started, regret heavy in his voice. “You can’t tell your dad not to come back because he’s angry...”
“He was out of line,” I told him sternly as I exposed a breast to feed Zach. “He’ll see that quickly and he’ll be back. Dad couldn’t stay away even if he wanted to. This is his grandbaby… He can’t just let that go.”
“He has every right,” Scott said with melancholy. “And I don’t fucking blame him. I deserve it.”
I huffed in my frustration.
“You didn’t do anything to me that I didn’t want you to. I’m a grown woman and I can make whatever choiced I want, SLEEP with whoever I want. Just because you raised Tyler doesn’t make you any different in my eyes. It shouldn’t in anyone’s eyes.”
Scott just sighed and leaned his head back against the doorframe, looking at me. His hair was mussed, his shirt blotchy with milk stains and dark shadows lined his eyes from lack of sleep and stress.
“My dad was right about one thing,” I conceded. “As grateful as I am that you’re willing to take care of us, we’re not your burden. I AM an adult, and I can take care of Zach on my own.”
Scott’s expression turned hollow.
“You can’t run this place on your own while losing what little sleep you get. And I need to take some time, to figure out what I want, what I need in my life. I need you Scott, but I don’t know in what role, yet.”
Scott just nodded and stood, leaving the room.
My emotions erupted then and I let the tears bathe my face while I tried to ignore the painful, piercing feeling of Zach’s nursing.
In the first year I had a hard time coping with being a single mother. I’d moved into the house when Zach was 3 weeks old, and I still hadn’t heard from Dad by then. I let the situation rest because I was too overwhelmed by managing life by myself. Managing a child, by myself. Sleep became a thing of the past, as did my social life and any fun things I’d liked doing. I still worked at the hotel part time while Mandy babysat for me. Her and I managed to have a good relationship but over the year I realized that my relationship with Dad was badly damaged. We’d seen each other a couple of times, but after small talk nothing followed. We were both hurt and stubborn and unsure how to mend things between us.
Scott however stayed at the hotel, though he spent many a nights in the ‘guest room’, but really ended up staying my room much of the time. The two of us had found a good middle ground where we were both happy. Scott was part of Zach’s life in a big way, and I had the independence I wanted. We went out occasionally together. On each other’s wedding anniversaries we’d go to a fancy dinner then spend the night together, and occasionally we’d have a date when one of us really needed the presence of another person. Otherwise Scott managed to step into the grandfather roll well for Zach. His first birthday passed, and the second, and we became a sort of warped type of family.
To our word, Scott and I never moved past the occasional date and hook up, and he never tried to become a father to Zach, always respecting that I had the first and final say. About 3 times a week Scott would come for dinner at the house.
Zach was 5 now, and the two of them would play outside on the rope swing forever, until dinner was ready, anyway.
Today, however, Zach was watching TV while I made dinner and Scott worked on the dripping faucet, curses falling from his lips periodically. Evidently that was a trait that Tyler didn’t really pick up from his father.
The thought made me laugh as I stirred the marinara on the stove.
“Goddamn fucking piece of shit,” I heard from behind me.
Scott’s hip bumped mine as he tried to lean over, looking up from the sink basin to see what the faucet was doing.
“I’m going to need payment after this,” he informed me, grabbing a wrench from the small toolbox beside him.
“You know you pay for everything around here,” I told him with a laugh. “You’re my own personal sugar daddy,”
Scott stopped working and turned around, a wry look on his face, telling me he didn’t appreciate my humor.
“Then I’ll expect a sugar daddy’s payment if that’s how you want to play this,” he mumbled and leaned back into the sink.
I leaned against the countertop as the sauce simmered and took a good long moment to observe him. At 42 he was veril as ever. His mass hadn’t changed nor had his personality. However, there were now streaks of grey in his hair. His temples now almost completely grey while a few greys peppered the dark h
air near his forehead.
Handsome was the only word I could associate with his looks and it was a fitting word. I stood there and stared at his ass while he leaned over the counter and he sent a smile at me when he briefly turned and noticed.
“Getting ready to administer payment,” I commented. “Just as soon as the sugar baby is asleep.”
Scott let out a belly laugh while the doorbell rang.
“Unless it’s a hooker send them away!” Scott called after me and I giggled while telling Zach to go back to his TV show. He jumped on the cushion for a moment until I firmly told him to put his butt on the seat, then I went to the door.
The moment my hand touched the knob I froze, just like I did every time I answered the door, not knowing who was on the other side. I remembered that moment I saw the police officers standing there with sympathetic smiles and sad eyes.
I took a deep breath and opened the door. A man stood there, his face covered in a bushy blond beard, long dirty hair and filthy, worn out clothes. My eyes scanned him until I reached his eyes. Clear, crystal blue eyes stared back.
“Sam?” his voice ground out hesitantly.
“Tyler?”
Continue reading Samantha and Tyler’s story in the next book,
Welcome to the Jungle, Book 2 of the Harrison series.
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About the Author
L.L. Ash is a Washington-born writer who has traveled and lived across the western coast of the US. She lives in Utah with her husband and 3 kids, all of which are a handful!
Ash has been writing fiction since she was 11 years old, and finished her first full-length romance novella at 12. While her writing has improved since then, her love for literature has not changed. Oftentimes you can find Ash reading an indie romance or enjoying a historical fiction. She has been an artist for decades but found her true love and passion in romances.
But Ash is not content to write a romance with untried characters or predictable ‘happily ever afters’. Ash strives to create honest stories revolving around struggling heroins and bruised heroes, both trying to find happiness and acceptance, just like we in real life do. She writes about real struggles and real hardships, often giving the characters a tarnished facade. But through the constant loving and hating of the characters, you will fall in love with them as they grow and change and evolve through the stories.
As Ash always says, it’s all about real romance for real life.
Other Reads By L. L. Ash
Harrison Series
Paradise City
Welcome To The Jungle
Estranged
Bloodlust Series
Exposure
Immersion
Revelation
Novellas and Short Stories
Hitchhike
The Horror Of Our Love