by Pamela Stone
He rolled the coffee cup between his hands. “I’m finally content with my life. Kenzie is a kick. My in-laws are supportive and all-around good folks. They give her all the love and family she lost when Belinda and Matt died. My parents are an hour away and spoil her rotten. My business is successful. Life is good.” He winked. “Your purse is vibrating.”
“Oh, crap! I put my phone on vibrate yesterday after Tiffany called.” She jumped up and dug her phone out of her purse. “Hello.”
“Where the hell are you?” Richard barked. “You didn’t answer your phone all damn night. Your mother wouldn’t tell me a thing.”
A million horrible thoughts filled Hanna’s mind. “Richard, what’s wrong? Why have you been calling me all night?”
“We spent the night in the emergency room. The pain medication they prescribed for Ashton reacted with his asthma meds and he couldn’t breathe. You didn’t tell me he was allergic to pain meds.”
Oh, God. She knew something like this was bound to happen. “Is he okay?”
“They put him on oxygen.” Richard didn’t elaborate further.
“But how is he right now? I can be there in a few hours.”
“He’s home and resting, Hanna. It was last night that you could’ve shed some light on what we should do.” Richard sounded like a petulant child.
All Hanna could think about was getting to Ashton, making sure he was okay. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
“No. This is my week with him. You and the cowboy enjoy whatever it is you’re doing. Phoebe and I handled things.” The connection clicked off in her ear.
She stared at the phone and tried to get a grip. Richard knew she was with Vince? Was Ashton really okay? And even if he wasn’t, unless Richard wanted her there, she had no right. Her baby had been struggling to breathe and had had to rely on a woman he hardly knew and a father who’d seldom had to deal with his asthma. Hanna had always been the one to watch out for him and nurse him through.
Vince touched her shoulder. “What’s wrong?”
Turning to him, she was stunned that he was even in the room. “I have no business being here with you. What kind of mother doesn’t hear her phone when her son is in the emergency room?” She darted around the suite, gathering the rest of her belongings. Stuffing her new sundress and shoes into the bag, she spotted her bra from the night before under the edge of the bed. As she stooped to retrieve it, Vince grabbed her arm.
“Slow down. Is Ashton okay?”
“He’s fine now, but he wasn’t last night and they couldn’t reach me.”
Vince leaned down and looked into her eyes. “Okay, but he’s out of danger now. You’re overreacting a little, don’t you think?”
“I’d have never forgiven myself if Ashton hadn’t made it because I turned my phone down so it wouldn’t interrupt my romantic getaway. What kind of self-absorbed mother does that? We can’t just decide not to have responsibilities. Who am I kidding? We have responsibilities, Vince. We’re parents 24/7 whether the kids are actually with us or not.” She jerked away, stomped into the bathroom and stuffed her cosmetics and toothbrush into her bag.
When she came out, he grasped both her shoulders. “Nobody said we weren’t responsible parents. We’re entitled to a break. That doesn’t make you a bad mother or me a bad father.”
She felt like a bad mother. Ashton was the one thing that she’d done right and even that was going down the tubes since the divorce. He was always angry at her. Thought she was screwing up his life. But the one thing he’d never complained about was her being there to help when he couldn’t breathe, and now she’d even failed at that. Zipping the case shut, she tried to calm down enough so Vince didn’t think she was a raving lunatic.
Shouldering her purse, she turned to him. “Vince, this was a mistake. I can’t pretend to be someone I’m not.”
He shoved his hands into his pockets and didn’t say a word, didn’t try to stop her.
By the time she got to her car, she was crying and shaking so hard she couldn’t drive. She tossed her bag in and leaned her head against the steering wheel. There wasn’t one single thing in her life that she hadn’t messed up.
Hanna sat in the car until she’d calmed down enough to drive. She had so many thoughts bouncing around in her mind, she probably shouldn’t have been behind the wheel at all, but she couldn’t sit here in this parking lot.
Just outside of Marble Falls, she stopped for gas and made a side trip to the ladies’ room. She washed her face and dried it with a paper towel, then brushed on a touch of blush, eye shadow and lip gloss. Mom already didn’t approve of this little getaway. The last thing she needed was for Norma to realize she’d been crying.
Feeling slightly refreshed, she drove the last few miles into town and parked across the street from Bluebonnet Books. She found her mother checking out one lone customer, a man buying three books.
“Did Richard get hold of you last night?” The cash register rang as Norma closed the drawer.
“I talked to him this morning. Ashton’s okay.” Hanna blew out a breath and smiled as the gentleman, with a camera around his neck and his new map of the Hill Country in hand, closed the door behind him. “Sorry to put you on the spot with Richard last night, Mom.”
Mom shrugged. “It happens. It just upset me that Ashton was sick and we couldn’t reach you. I’d have called your hotel, but I didn’t know where you were staying.”
“It was my fault for putting my phone on vibrate. I meant to turn the ringer back on, but I forgot.”
“I guess Vince can be rather distracting.”
That was an understatement. Hanna’s emotions surrounding Vince were too raw to verbalize, especially with her mother. “Everything run okay here?”
Norma narrowed one eye as if weighing the wisdom of pushing the point. “We’ve been busy with the lunch-hour rush. Anne Haythorn stopped in and helped out for a bit. She said she was sorry to miss you. But that woman keeps close tabs on every move Vince makes. I’m sure she was just fishing to see if you and Vince were out of town together.”
“Mom! Don’t start.” Hanna gritted her teeth and headed for the minuscule office to put away her purse.
Norma leaned against the doorjamb and sighed. “Sweetie, I just don’t want you to rush into something too soon. Your pride has been bruised, and I’m afraid you’re on the rebound and are going to be hurt again.”
Hanna knew her mother’s concern was genuine, yet she also knew she would keep questioning until she knew every detail. “I know, Mom. If it makes you feel any better, I ended it. It’s too soon for me to consider a relationship.”
Mom poured two cups of coffee. “I think that’s wise.”
Taking one of the cups, Hanna knew she’d made the right choice by breaking things off. “San Antonio was lovely though.”
Norma shivered. “With all that humidity?”
Here she went again with her dislike of San Antonio. “Has to be more than humidity to turn you against such a beautiful, romantic city. Have you ever been?”
Norma gripped her cup. “Once. A long time ago.”
“With Daddy?”
“No, not with your father.” Norma gulped down half her coffee. “It was nothing. A long time ago. Way before you were born.”
“Another guy?” Hanna wasn’t sure how much she really wanted to know. Her mother talked about everyone else, but seldom about herself. Especially not about the past.
“I may need something stronger than this if we’re going to talk about all that.”
Hanna’s stomach knotted. “Did you love Daddy?”
“Yes, I loved your father.” Mom pushed the cup back. “But he wasn’t the love of my life. The man I went to San Antonio with, the man I first gave my heart to, died in Vietnam. After that I never had the desire to return to San Antonio.”
“You didn’t know Daddy then?”
“I knew him. After Brad was killed, your dad started calling me. They were friends and I think Da
ddy wanted us to help each other grieve for Brad. It took him two years to convince me to marry him, but I finally gave in. Not the life I’d envisioned, but I’ve never regretted it. Your daddy gave me a good life, probably better than what I had planned.” Norma smiled. “And he gave me you.”
Hanna’s eyes filled with tears, and she stood up and wrapped her arms around her mom. “Thanks for that. I guess that’s just the way life goes. Best-laid plans…”
Norma patted Hanna’s back. “I’m going to enjoy having you close by to share things with.”
Maybe her mother was finally starting to see her as an adult. “It’s nice to be close again. Get to know each other as women.”
Pulling back, Mom laughed. “Yes, it is. But you’ll always be my little girl.”
Hanna’s heart warmed. Just like Ashton would always be her beautiful baby boy. “I know.”
“So, it didn’t work out well with Vince?”
Not an easy question to answer, but her mom had shared an extremely personal experience. “It worked out too well. It scares me how easily Vince drew me in. I don’t think I realized how vulnerable I am right now. My emotions are all over the place. The last thing I need is to rush into a possible second mistake while I’m still raw from Richard.”
“Richard is a good father.” Mom shrugged. “No matter what happened between the two of you, he loves Ashton.”
“Yes, he does. But Vince is giving Ashton self-confidence, guy confidence. I know I can’t do that, and Richard doesn’t even realize Ashton doesn’t have it.”
“So you’re interested in Vince for what he does for Ashton’s self-esteem?”
Hanna closed her eyes and thought back to the attentive lover and sexy body she’d just spent twenty-four hours with. It would be so easy if Vince’s attentiveness to Ashton was all there was. “Getting to know Vince was an extremely pleasant surprise. He’s not at all what I expected when I met him. But it’d be awkward, unfair to ask him to continue to mentor Ashton since I told him I couldn’t keep seeing him.”
“Ashton will be okay.”
Maybe, but Hanna knew how important Vince and Mackenzie had become in Ashton’s life. And now she’d cost him his new hero. It was just one more thing her angry preteen would hold against her.
Chapter Thirteen
Hanna idled the engine and squinted to focus through the rain-streaked windshield. She didn’t want to miss Ashton when he came out of school. The spring storm had rolled in a couple of hours ago, and she didn’t trust him not to get on the back of Kenzie’s bike and head home on the slick streets. Good judgment had not been in abundance of late where her son was concerned.
Or herself.
She caught sight of Ashton and Kenzie as they raced from the bike rack, pushing the electric bicycle. By the time Hanna jumped out to wave them down, they were already down the sidewalk and Vince was loading the bike into the bed of his pickup. The kids piled into the cab, and Hanna crawled back into her car, unseen. At least they weren’t on that bike in this weather.
What a madhouse. Shaking the rain off her arms, she cranked up the defrost and looked for a break in the bumper-to-bumper SUVs. Parents and kids dashed through the downpour in between cars. Just as Hanna spotted a gap in the line of cars, her cell phone chimed.
She put the car back in Park and fished the phone out of her purse. “Mackenzie?”
“Hey, Mom, it’s Ashton. I’ll be at Kenzie’s. Vince is going to do his paperwork while we’re doing homework. Then he said if we were done early enough and it was okay with you, he’d spring for pizza before he brings me home.”
“Ashton, you don’t want to impose on Mr. Keegan.” Since she’d decided not to see Vince anymore, she wasn’t sure about him continuing to be such a big part of Ashton’s daily activities. Ashton was attached enough as it was.
“Please, Mom. He offered. I didn’t ask.”
“Please!” Kenzie pleaded in the background.
Hanna didn’t have the heart to say no. This was the first day back in school after spring break and they probably wanted to catch up. “Okay, but tell Vince to let me know if it’d make it easier if I picked you up. I do not want us putting him out.”
VINCE FOLLOWED THE KIDS into the house and grinned as Boo’s tail started wagging. The silly dog was getting as attached to Ashton as he was to Kenzie. “Kenzie, go get on dry clothes. And toss Ashton that navy-blue sweatsuit. It should fit well enough while I dry his clothes.”
While the kids were getting dry, Vince changed his shirt and jeans. That rain was chilly. He put on a pot of coffee and heated milk for hot chocolate for the kids. They could all use a warm-up.
“Put your wet clothes in the dryer.” He nodded toward the laundry room, then tossed Boo a biscuit.
Kenzie started the dryer and came back out. “Summer softball signup is tomorrow.”
“I know.” Kenzie had been playing every summer since she was five.
She dug a bag of cookies out of the pantry and grinned at Ashton. “So you’re still not going to sign up?”
“Nobody would want me on their team.” Ashton took a cookie in one hand and rubbed Boo with the other.
“So who cares? Sign up anyway.”
“Nah, I don’t think so. Everybody else has been playing for years and I’m still learning.”
Vince set the two cups of hot chocolate on the bar in front of them. “Do you want to play?”
Ashton shrugged. “I’m not good enough. The guys would make fun of me.”
“Can’t succeed if you don’t put yourself out there.” Vince poured himself a cup of coffee. He’d never met a kid with such low self-confidence, especially when it came to sports.
“Mom probably wouldn’t let me anyway with my asthma. And I’d have to change the weeks I’m at Dad’s.”
“If you want to play, my dad can talk to your mom,” Kenzie volunteered.
“Ashton can ask his mom,” Vince said. After San Antonio, he wasn’t about to challenge Hanna on how to raise her son again. “You’ve come a long way on your batting, Ashton. Kenzie and I practice almost every night during the season. You’re welcome to come over and join us.”
“You think I could get good enough?”
Vince took a sip of coffee. “The only sure way to fail is—”
“To not even try.” Kenzie finished the sentence for him. “He says that a lot,” she explained to Ashton.
“Okay, busted.” Vince laughed. “Now jump on that homework and let me get a couple of bids out. My stomach’s growling, and I can already taste that pizza. Are we going to order in or go out?”
“Order in so I have time to beat Ash on Wii NASCAR.”
“In your dreams,” Ashton said, opening his backpack.
A loud clap of thunder vibrated the windows, and Vince decided staying in was definitely the best plan. “Give it your best shots. I’ll take down the winner.”
“Not!” Kenzie laughed.
Vince went into his office and booted up the laptop, but he could hear the kids talking and laughing. Kenzie was not going to let Ashton off the hook on the baseball deal. She had plenty of friends, but he’d never known her to take to a kid quite like she had to Ashton. It was strange because she typically didn’t have much patience with kids who weren’t like her. Even when they weren’t together, she was talking about some funny thing Ashton said or did.
Vince minimized the spreadsheet he was working on and opened his picture folder. Hanna on the Guadalupe River. Hanna and the kids in the field of bluebonnets. Hanna and him on the river taxi in San Antonio. Hell, it wasn’t just his daughter who had an obsession with the Rossers.
Hanna’s decision to work through her post-divorce issues and figure out where her life was going made perfect, rational sense. The flawless rhythm of her body in unison with his had just as much merit. How could something that felt that right be wrong? What they’d shared on that trip had been too intense, physically and emotionally, not to give it a chance.
She owed it
to herself to get her head straight before jumping into another relationship—he’d never deny her that. But there was a niggling fear that maybe he’d frightened her by coming clean about his past with Belinda. It sure as hell had frightened him. God, he’d never gone into that crap with anyone else, and it was way too early in the relationship to have gone there with Hanna. She likely thought he was a total jackass.
Probably because his brain was still in a San Antonio hotel room, the kids finished their assignments before he was done with his proposal. They plugged in the Wii and he was serenaded with the sounds of race cars and cheering as they got into the competition.
“If you’d just use your instincts and play instead of analyzing how the game works, you might actually win.” Evidently Kenzie had won the first race.
“Games are really pretty simple,” Ashton explained. “It’s just a program that reacts to how you move.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Next race. Quit thinking and drive, Ash! I’ve almost got a full lap on you.”
It was almost eight by the time they finished their pizza and Vince drove Ashton home. Hanna opened the door when they pulled up and Vince got out. He hadn’t actually seen her since she’d run out of the hotel room.
Her hair was kinky from the humidity and she looked comfortable in a pair of faded jeans and a huge white blouse. No makeup. No jewelry. No logical reason his libido was kicking up, but he couldn’t stop staring at her. In his defense, she didn’t break eye contact, either.
“Mom, here’s a paper on softball sign-ups tomorrow.”
She blinked her beautiful dark eyes, and took the paper from Ashton. “Oh, honey, I don’t know about all that running with your asthma.”
“I want to do it. Vince said the only way I can fail is by not trying at all. And I can practice every day with him and Kenzie. I’m getting better.”