The Family He Didn't Expect

by Shirley Jump

  Ty’s eyes widened. “How did you know?”

  Dylan wondered the same thing. It was such a sweet gesture from Abby, and one that left Dylan feeling a weird bit of envy. He’d never dated a woman who paid attention like that, who did thoughtful things for him, with no expectations in return.

  “You’re not the only one who talked about your spouse with a whole lot of love.” Abby’s smile was tender, soft. “Virginia used to tell me how much she loved taking care of you.”

  “And she did a wonderful job of it.” Ty cleared his throat, then resettled his fishing cap on his head. “The fish are biting, so we better get a move on while they’re still hungry.”

  The shift in his uncle was nearly imperceptible, but it was there, and it gave Dylan hope that maybe things were starting to turn around. And maybe this outing was going to go better than he expected.

  Uncle Ty boarded first, then put out a hand to help Jake and Cody up the gangplank and onto the pontoon boat. Dylan reached for Abby’s hand as she stepped onto the wobbly crossing. She glanced at him but didn’t take his hand. “Thanks. I’ve got it.”

  Of course, she was a grown woman, not a kid like Jake. And from what she’d said the previous night, he knew she had been on a boat before and knew how to steady herself. Even knowing all that, a little shiver of disappointment went through Dylan. He shook it off and climbed onto the boat, unlatched the gangplank and released the ropes holding the boat to the dock.

  Uncle Ty hadn’t stepped up to start the engine or steer the pontoon out into the water. He dropped the keys into Dylan’s palm, then took a seat on one of the cushioned benches at the front of the boat. Jake clambered up beside him, kneeling on the seat to look over the bow. Abby sat down beside her son and put a cautionary hand on his back. Cody joined them, still immersed in his phone.

  Dylan started the boat and began to back away from the dock, then pivoted the pontoon toward the open water of the lake. It was a sunny day, and the deep blue lake sparkled with gold. A few boats dotted the expanse of Stone Gap Lake, most of them fishermen out for an afternoon of fun and maybe a good catch.

  “Uncle Ty, where’s that great fishing place you always go to?” Dylan knew the answer but figured asking might engage Ty a little more. The melancholy mood was washing over Ty in waves. For a second, the waters would be calm, then his grief and depression would roll in again and the light in his eyes would dim.

  His uncle sat there, staring out at the lake, sadness heavy on his shoulders. “Wherever you think, Dylan.”

  “I remember this spot over by a little grove of trees that we used to go to a lot. Sort of tucked away? Which direction is that?”

  Ty waved vaguely toward the east side of the lake, and Dylan turned. The old pontoon boat—not made for speed—putt-putted across the lake, its cranky engine clearly in need of a tune-up. Item number 753 on the things Dylan needed to do for his uncle before going back to Maine.

  Abby came up beside him. The breeze made her hair dance around her shoulders, and the slight chill in the air added a little color to her cheeks. She was wearing jeans and a thick sweatshirt. The outfit made her look casual, comfortable, like the kind of woman a man could come home to at the end of the day and share a pizza with.

  Where the hell had that thought come from? It was the ham sandwiches, Dylan told himself. One touching moment, and he got all hearth-and-home.

  “In case I forget to say it, thank you for today,” she said.

  He shot her a grin. “We haven’t even started fishing yet.”

  “I know. But Jake is already having the time of his life. Even Cody is starting to loosen up a little.”

  At the front of the boat, Cody had moved next to his little brother. The two of them were talking, with Ty throwing in a word or two, about the water, what kind of fish they would catch, how fast the boat was moving. Jake did most of the talking, of course. Still, Dylan could see the engagement in Cody’s face, the relaxed posture. And the phone that was now tucked in his back pocket.

  Abby sighed and leaned against the railing beside Dylan. “It’s been hard, being both mom and dad. And working full-time.” Then she shook her head. “Sorry. I don’t usually complain about my life.”

  “Or rely on anyone else?”

  She let out a short laugh. “You noticed that?”

  “I do believe you gave me a good lecture about that when we were making PB&Js.” He didn’t add that it had intrigued him, the way she had been both stubborn and confident. He’d met very few women who challenged him like Abby did. He liked that. A lot. Maybe too much.

  “I’m sorry. I’ve just been let down so many times...” She shrugged. “It’s just easier to have no expectations. I grew up relying on myself and I guess it was easier just to keep on doing that.”

  Dylan wanted to shake some sense into the man who had left Abby to raise her sons alone. Even though he wasn’t a father, if he’d had children of his own, he never would have done that. Kids required parents who were there, parents who supported instead of criticized. Abby was like that, and Dylan had no doubt her sons were lucky to have a mother like her.

  He thought about what she’d said, growing up and relying on herself, and realized he had more in common with her than he’d thought. “Where were your parents when you were a kid?”

  “In a bar or on the road.” Abby shrugged, like it was no big deal, but he could see the lingering pain in her eyes. “My mom was busy with her things and my dad traveled for work. Most of the time, it was just me and my sister, home alone. I learned how to make my own breakfast at five, and by the time I was ten, I was getting myself ready and out the door for school every day.”

  “That had to be tough.” It was a life he understood, a childhood that seemed deflated, empty of the essentials other kids had. “You turned out pretty well, though, considering.”

  She shrugged again. “I grew up, I became a different mom. It all worked out.”

  “My parents weren’t too plugged in, either. I had an older brother, as you know, but once he got to high school... I was kind of left behind, being a not-so-cool middle schooler still. When I was seventeen, I went out on my own and pretty much never looked back.” His gaze scanned the water’s edge. Stone Gap lay just beyond the trees, a small town so many people loved—so many people other than him. “I’ve lived everywhere but here.”

  “Why not here?”

  “I’m not much for small-town life.” The expectations that came with that. The disappointments. Far better to keep his roots loose and movable.

  “So neither one of us relies on other people.” She gave him a half smile, her eyes unreadable behind dark sunglasses. “I wouldn’t have thought we had that in common.”

  He wouldn’t have, either. From the minute he met Abby, he saw her as the two-point-five kids, white-picket fence, house and husband type, the kind who built connections and relationships with everyone around her. But she was far more complex than that, and ten times more independent. Every layer of her that he uncovered made him like and admire her more. She’d done things he couldn’t imagine doing—like raising two kids alone.

  “For the most part, I’m the kind who doesn’t rely on others, but I have found that sometimes people surprise you.” Dylan turned a little more north, aiming for the outcropping of trees that marked the edge of Uncle Ty’s fishing spot. “First time I ever ran a construction crew, I had a hard time letting go, letting the guys do their thing. I only trusted myself, you know? I had this one kid who worked for me. He was maybe nineteen or twenty and a real go-getter. Always trying to go above and beyond, prove himself to the guys who had a few years on him. He’d ask me, over and over, for more responsibility.”

  “Did you give it to him?”

  He chuckled. “Eventually, he wore me down. So I put him in charge of a tile job that had to be done over the weekend. Figured he could handle it—he’d laid t
ile with me dozens of times and this job was fairly small. I took the day off, thinking I’d come back and check on his progress that afternoon.” Dylan slowed the boat as they neared the trees. A few more minutes, and they’d drop anchor.

  “What happened?”

  “When I got there in the afternoon, the kid was gone. The guys said he was there for an hour that morning, then said he was going to grab coffee and never came back. I was really ticked off. I finished up the job with the other guys, then went to his house. He wasn’t there. His mom said he hadn’t come home.” Dylan turned a little left, to avoid the stump he knew lurked underneath the lake’s tranquil waters. Uncle Ty had hit it more than once. Dinged up the boat one time badly enough that they’d had to do an emergency repair before heading for home. “I decided I wasn’t going to trust anyone again. Do it all myself, you know, and not let anyone let me down again. A month later, who comes back to work, but the kid.”

  “Really?”

  “Yup. A part of me was mad as hell at him, but another part was glad to see him. Because you know what?” Dylan stopped the boat and shut off the motor. At the bow, Uncle Ty was showing Jake the best place to cast his line. Dylan paused a moment, watching a stick float by them. “I saw myself in that kid. I used to be the person no one could depend on. The one who would take off at the slightest issue. He got scared that day, he said, worried that he would screw up and ruin the job, so he left. I did that once, too, when I was around his age. Responsibility mixed with someone whose age still ends in teen doesn’t always work. Eventually, I grew up. Realized that wasn’t the way to live my life. Though some would say I’m still as undependable as I was when I was a teenager.”

  Some people like Sam. His parents. Dylan’s family had never seen him as anything other than an irresponsible, fickle kid. Yeah, maybe he’d switched from job to job more than the average person, and maybe he did move often, but once he’d grown up and got a clue, he’d never walked out on a job, never let a boss down. Never walked away from someone who needed him.

  “Did you hire the kid back?”

  “Yup.” Dylan tossed the anchor over, then leaned back against the console. “Turned out to be one of the smartest things I ever did. I gave him a second chance and a big lecture, and he turned out to be one of the best workers I’ve ever had.”

  “That gives me hope,” Abby said quietly. Her gaze was on the water, far from him.

  “Hope for what?” Dylan asked.

  But she didn’t answer. Instead Abby pushed off from the railing and crossed to her boys. “Who’s ready for Mom to teach them some killer fishing skills?”

  * * *

  Abby concentrated on fishing and not on Dylan. Or at least, she tried to. The five of them were at the bow of the boat, a wide and generous space because the steering wheel was close to the rear. Ty, Dylan and Cody were fishing on one side of the boat while Abby and Jake fished from the other side.

  Jake was eager to learn but impatient with the fish. Every ten seconds he thought he had a nibble and yanked his pole up. “Mommy, when am I going to catch a fish?”

  “When you sit down and wait a bit,” Abby said. “You have to be patient.”

  Jake sighed and plopped onto the seat. “Okay.”

  Abby glanced over at Dylan. He’d surprised her, with the story about the kid who worked for him. Based on how he was with the teens at the center and with Cody, she could see him doing exactly that with one of his workers—but she understood how he had seen himself in that kid, too. He seemed to be a good guy, but there was a lot of wanderlust in him. Ty had mentioned once that his nephew Dylan had worked all over the country, the kind of guy who got tired of the day-to-day grind and would constantly set off on another adventure.

  Exactly the kind of man she didn’t need in her life. Nor did she need her boys relying on someone like that. At the same time, she couldn’t deny the connection the boys had with Dylan. The way they talked to him, asked him for advice, and interacted with him. Cody was engaging with them, and Jake was slowing down, paying attention, learning whatever Dylan had to share. For the first time in a long time, she was seeing a change in her sons, and she wasn’t ready to walk away from that yet.

  Not to mention the attraction she felt for him. He was sweet and tender, and a hundred times she caught him watching her. She found herself glancing at him just as often, wondering if he was thinking of her as much as she was thinking of him.

  Across from them, Cody let out a whoop. “Hey! I got one.”

  “Great job, Code,” Dylan said, clapping him on the back. “You beat your mom, too.”

  “Let me see!” Jake ran across the bow just as Abby grabbed his pole and saved it from landing in the water. “Wow! It’s a big fishy!”

  “Awesome, Cody,” Abby said. “You might beat us all.”

  “There’s a competition?” Cody asked.

  Dylan grinned at Abby, and she smiled back. “Well, it was a bet between Abby and me, but I think we should include everyone. Whoever catches the most fish...” His voice trailed off, leaving her to fill in the blanks.

  “Gets to decide where we go for dinner,” Abby said.

  Cody perked up at that. “Even if it’s fast food?”

  The forbidden food that Abby only allowed her boys to eat once in a while. Most nights, she had something healthy that she made in the slow cooker, which constantly earned complaints from Cody, who would live on a diet of cheeseburgers and pizza if she let him.

  Fast food or not, this was one of the few times she’d seen her son interested and she wasn’t about to let that go over some fries.

  “Even if it’s fast food,” Abby said. She cast her line into the water. “But if I win, we’re going to that vegetarian place on Fourth Street.”

  Cody groaned. “God, Mom, I hate that place.”

  “Then you better get fishing.” She grinned at her son, and for just a second, he smiled back. It was a start. A really nice start.

  Dylan’s gaze connected with hers. For a second, she thought how nice this was, a family moment, with her boys laughing and having fun. But it was, she reminded herself, just a moment. Dylan wasn’t her husband or even her boyfriend. He was just a guy, a guy who would one day be far away and not here to depend upon.

  When they pulled back up to the dock, Dylan would leave and she would go back to being a single mom. Far better to focus on that than imagine a future that was never going to happen.

  Chapter Seven

  Dylan stowed the fishing poles in the storage bins on the pontoon boat, then grabbed Abby’s cooler and joined everyone on the dock. Uncle Ty looked tired, which surprised Dylan, who remembered a constantly moving, optimistic uncle with more energy than a roomful of preschoolers. Ty said a quick goodbye to Abby and her boys, then headed off to Dylan’s truck, climbed inside and laid his head against the headrest.

  Dylan sighed. The day had been a moderate success. Uncle Ty hadn’t been his usual jovial self, but he had helped Jake fish and taught Cody a few things about giving the line well-timed tugs to entice the fish closer. After Cody noticed the lures attached to Ty’s lucky cap, they had a long talk about the benefits of spinnerbaits over crankbaits.

  But it was Abby whom Dylan noticed the most. She hadn’t been kidding—she was a great fisherman. For the first time since he’d met her, he saw her truly relax, her mood light, her smile wide, as she hooked one fish after another. Cody had the lead until the very end, when his mother nabbed two fish back-to-back. They threw all their catches back into the lake, mostly because Jake worried that the fish were going to miss their families. It was kinda cute and something Dylan remembered saying when he was Jake’s age.

  He was stacking the life jackets in the bin at the front of the boat when Cody came up beside him. “Hey, Cody.”

  “Thanks for the fishing,” Cody said. “I had a good time. I’ve never gone, and it just seemed so..
.peaceful.” The teenager shook his head. “That sounds all weird and nerdy.”

  “Nah, it doesn’t,” Dylan said. “When the water is as smooth as glass and the sun is warm on your back, it feels like the world has stopped for a second. Now I sound weird and nerdy and like some Walt Whitman poem.”

  Cody laughed. “Yeah, I get that. Makes me forget about homework and grades and stuff like that.”

  Dylan arched a brow. “Are you saying homework is usually the first thing on your mind?”

  Cody scoffed. “Yeah, I guess not. But I was thinking about it a lot and I kinda want to change that. I guess I need school to have a job doing stuff like building houses or something.”

  The thought that Cody might follow in Dylan’s career footsteps warmed him. He wondered if that was what it was like to be a parent, to see your child admire and emulate you. Then a part of him remembered he was no role model for a troubled kid. Dylan may have gotten his life back on track but not without a lot of effort and missteps.

  “Building houses is all about figuring out angles and reading blueprints and negotiating contracts. If you want to get a contractor’s license, you have to take a test. So yeah, you kinda need to pay attention in school.”

  Cody toed at the deck, his face shadowed by the hood of his sweatshirt. “Can I ask you something?”

  “Sure.” Dylan straightened and leaned against the railing.

  “You said you and your dad didn’t get along and, like, he wasn’t there much.”

  “Yeah. I mean, he lived with us, but he worked a lot. And when he was home, he was closer to my older brother and I was the one who always seemed to be in trouble. But I had my Uncle Ty to take me fishing and teach me how to fix stuff.”

  “So, like, did you ever—” Cody let out a breath “—did you ever tell your dad that bothered you?”

  “Yeah.” It had been more than a decade, but Dylan could still hear the words ringing in his head, words he had flung at his father before Dylan packed his bags and hit the road. I was never anything but a disappointment to you.