“You should really find some seats in the bleachers before all the good spots are taken,” I forcefully recommended.
“Good thinking,” Mom responded. “Miles you can sit next to me and we can discuss your intriguing book.”
“I’d be delighted.” Miles winked at me. “Let me just wish Chloe a good game. Save me a seat, Cindy.”
My mother blushed. My father narrowed his eyes at his wife before taking her hand and pulling her toward the bleachers. “Take your time,” he told Miles.
Miles walked with me and Henry toward the field.
“Are you trying to break up my parents?” I teased.
“As lovely as your mother is, she is a bit old for my taste.”
“I wouldn’t mention that to her. And let me apologize for any critiques she throws your way.”
Miles looked down at the report he had in his hand. Mom had gone as far as making a cover with fancy lettering and his book cover front and center on it. “I look forward to reading her analysis.”
“Sure you do.”
“I’m in earnest.”
Henry saw Chloe and he jumped out of my arms and ran straight for her. All her teammates immediately stopped whatever they were doing and fawned over the little man yelling, “CO-EE! CO-EE! Come slide with me.”
Chloe picked him up and spun him around.
Miles and I both beamed at the scene.
Miles moved closer to me. “Sophie would have adored you and Chloe.”
Yep, that scent of his was still intoxicating the crap out of me. I had to compose myself before I answered. “I wish we had gotten to know her.” The more I worked on the picture of her and Henry, the more I felt connected to her. In an odd way, I felt like she was my champion, beckoning me on with Henry and Miles.
“Me too,” Miles replied.
It was then I noticed Shelby, Ryder, Jenna, Brad, and Elliott all walking toward the bleachers. My mom was already waving them over. I cringed. It wasn’t that they had never come to a game before, but I knew they were coming because I told them Miles would be here.
“Um . . .” I hated switching the conversation’s direction, but he had to be warned. “All my friends just showed up and they’re sitting with my parents. Please let me apologize again for anything ridiculous any of them might say. Especially watch out for Shelby. The Southern Belle believes everyone deserves a Disney fairytale ending, so she might . . . you know, never mind.” I just realized I was implying that I talked to my friends about him, which obviously I did, but he didn’t need to know that.
“She thinks we deserve one.” Miles correctly guessed.
“Yes.” I tugged on my ponytail. “But don’t worry. I’ve told them all that it isn’t going to happen.” I felt like I was digging myself in deeper. This was probably why I was never emotionally intimate with someone. I was a blustering idiot. “I need to go help Emma,” I said, flustered.
“Aspen.” He tugged on the sleeve of my jacket.
I looked up and faced him eye-to-eye, which wasn’t my brightest idea. Between his cologne and the soft expression in his eyes, my heart was zinging all over the place. Why after all these years of rebuffing men did my heart come alive for the one man it should have remained dormant for?
Miles leaned in. “Please don’t apologize. It is natural for people to assume that I would have a hard time resisting the beautiful nanny. And they would be right.”
I was suddenly feeling lightheaded and flushed. “They are? I mean, you think I’m beautiful?” I closed my eyes and cringed. “I mean I’m not beautiful. Seriously, I need to go.”
“Aspen, please look at me.”
I peeked one eye open like a child to see a bemused smile on Miles’s face.
“I wish you wouldn’t be embarrassed around me.”
Both my eyes popped open. “I don’t see that happening.”
“Well, in that case,” he leaned down and whispered in my ear, “you are beautiful, but for your own good, I will resist you.” He walked away to wish Chloe luck and take Henry from her before I could respond.
My body was in shock from the massive shivers Miles just sent down my spine. When my body and mind came to, all they could think about was what did he mean by for my own good?
Emma was to me in no time, shaking her head, stunned. “What was that all about? A good luck kiss?”
“Will you keep your voice down? He didn’t kiss me. Is that what it looked like?” I looked up into the bleachers to find all my friends and my parents gawking at me with expressions varying from disbelief to downright awe. Shelby even had her hands to her mouth like she was keeping herself from bursting into a song. Crap! That’s exactly what that probably looked like. I didn’t have time to dispel any misconceptions before Miles got to them. All I could do was turn back and face Emma.
“Looks like you’ll be amending that contract after all.” She wagged her brows.
“You’re wrong. He was just telling me that’s exactly what won’t be happening.”
Emma’s forehead scrunched. “You’re lying. Both of your bodies were screaming, ‘Forget the contract!’”
“I’m not lying.” I jogged over to our bench to grab my clipboard. It was almost time for the game to start. Time for me to focus on anything but my boss.
Emma was going to make that difficult. She followed me, slowly. Growing twins was no easy task. She took the clipboard from me and tilted her head to study me. “What is going on between you two? And don’t say nothing, because the heat between you is palpable.”
“I know,” I whispered.
Emma’s eyes popped at my admission. “If you know, then what’s the issue?”
“Em, we have kids and we work together. That makes any situation complicated. Besides, I don’t even know my own heart right now. It’s experiencing some difficult growing pains. And I’m pretty sure he left a girlfriend in London.”
“Well, I would hate to be his girlfriend. No man should look at another woman the way he looks at you if he’s taken.”
“I don’t know if they are still together, but I get the feeling that they’re not done, if that makes sense.”
Emma’s lips pursed. “I suppose it does, but that doesn’t mean something won’t happen between the two of you.”
I rested my hand on Emma’s arm. “Em, he’s promised me it won’t, and so far, he’s been a man of his word.” I’d finally gotten what I’d always hoped for, a man of his word. Why then, did I hope he would go against it?
Chapter Twenty-Three
“He fits in well,” Mom whispered in my ear during lunch at Sage’s Café in Edenvale.
I thought the same thing all through the game as I caught glimpses of him talking to my friends and parents when he wasn’t cheering loudly for Chloe. I can’t say how attractive that was. He and Henry were also the first ones to congratulate her on the team’s win. It brought a tear to my eye when Chloe hugged him and thanked him for helping her. She credited her final spectacular save to his advice. He’d come down at halftime to tell Chloe to watch number seven on the opposing team. She always looked the opposite way of where she kicked the ball. He was right, and had he not mentioned it to Chloe, they might have tied the game up in the last thirty seconds. Instead, it was a sweet victory.
I smiled across the table at Miles and my dad talking about all the geological wonders in the UK. Dad was particularly fascinated with the Seven Sisters in Sussex.
“Did you know those majestic chalk cliffs began forming around 87 million years ago,” my dad informed an attentive Miles. “Back then, Great Britain was entirely under water.” Dad was a geological encyclopedia.
“I’ve been there. I have a friend who owns a holiday home in one of the hamlets nearby. It is quite the sight to see,” Miles graciously replied.
Henry caught my attention next. He had been passed around the table. More like the three tables the restaurant staff had pulled together to accommodate our large group. He was now sitting on Shelby’s lap. Henry h
ad just said, “Mylanta,” forever securing the love of our dearest Southern Belle.
The men, Sawyer, Ryder, Brad, and Bobby Jay, who had joined us for lunch since he lived close by the café were in a heated discussion about who would win tomorrow’s football game. Sawyer and Brad were team Broncos and Ryder and Bobby Jay, sons of Georgia, were of course rooting for the Atlanta Falcons. Bobby Jay was the loudest of the bunch.
“Y’all can claim home field advantage all you want, but your boys are going down. Ever since your boy Peyton Manning left, you’ve been a hot mess.”
“You don’t know what a Mile High crowd can do,” Brad countered.
“If y’all win tomorrow, you can butter my butt and call me a biscuit,” Bobby Jay replied. He had several of us laughing at the table.
If everyone in the South talked and acted like Bobby Jay and Shelby, I really needed to visit.
Jenna was next to grab Miles’s attention while bouncing Elliott, who was more than ready to be home and napping by the way he was rubbing his eyes, on her lap. “Miles, did Aspen tell you that Brad and I own a comedy club here in Edenvale?”
“She has mentioned that.” Miles swirled his ice water.
Jenna, who was sitting next to me, nudged me with her leg under the table. “You should come with Aspen one night. Maybe you could use it in your book. It could be a research trip.” She nudged me again.
I nudged her leg back, indicating she should be quiet now.
“That’s a great idea. I can babysit the kids,” Mom offered.
I craned my neck toward my mom and tried to convey with my eyes she should also refrain from speaking anymore on the subject.
She didn’t heed the warning in my eyes. “We can even keep them overnight if you want to make a late night of it.”
I rubbed my forehead and grimaced. Before I could say a word, Emma voiced her thoughts.
“That would be a lot of fun. We could all make a night of it together and do dinner afterward.”
“Ooh, yes,” Shelby agreed.
“Miles is busy, and Henry might not feel comfortable spending the night with people he hardly knows,” I hurried to say before anyone else got a word in.
Several fits of laughter erupted as most eyes turned toward Henry, who had no issue with being passed around from person to person enthralling them with his cuteness. Not once had he complained about being with anyone he didn’t know all that well, even burly Bobby Jay. It was a lame excuse, but Miles and I weren’t a couple. We didn’t need to get babysitters to watch our children because there was nothing ours about it.
To top it off, my daughter betrayed me too. “I could always watch him at home.” Did she grin mischievously at me? I was beginning to smell a conspiracy.
“Aspen,” Miles directed my attention to him.
I had been trying hard since our odd conversation on the soccer field to avoid long periods of direct eye contact. But Miles had forced my hand. To be polite I faced him, once again embarrassed because my family and friends were imagining things that would never be.
Miles gave me a warm smile, trying to put me at ease. “Do you think the comedy club is a place Isabella would enjoy?” That was a totally unfair question. By the playfulness in his tone he knew it.
I could feel everyone staring at me. I wanted to lie, but that lie would hurt one of my best friends. Jenna prided herself on her club. As she should. It had been one of my only sources of entertainment since I always got in for free. I didn’t only love it for that. The place had honestly given me a reprieve from the difficult circumstances of my life. Laughing really was medicine for the soul. I believed it would do the same for Isabella. You know, if she were real.
Mom squeezed my leg after what I was sure she considered too long of a pause.
“Yes,” I blurted, “she would.”
Miles looked between my parents. “Cindy and Russ, we would love to take you up on your offer. I’ll let Aspen choose when.”
“We?” Jenna said not so quietly under her breath.
I would have smacked her arm if Miles wasn’t still staring at me, drumming his fingers against the table, knowing exactly what he had just done. The question was why? Why was he willing to let everyone believe we were more than we would ever be? Why did he want to push the bounds of our friendship? Or was this how friends of the opposite sex behaved? Maybe he treated all his female friends this way.
All the blood drained out of Chloe’s face. “Mom,” she yelped, transfixed on the entrance.
I whipped my head in that direction and my worst nightmare walked in with his douche bag friend and supposed new boss, Mike.
I jumped up, not sure what I was going to do, but knowing I needed to act. “Chloe, stay here, honey.”
My parents’ heads darted toward the entrance too. Red anger flooded each of their faces.
Miles too was alerted and stood immediately.
Chloe, who was sitting next to my dad, buried her head into his chest. My dad securely wrapped her up in his arms.
By now, everyone at our table saw Leland. For those who didn’t know who he was, Brad filled them in.
I knew I had to go talk to him, intercept him from causing further damage to our daughter, but my feet didn’t want to move.
“Do you want me to go with you, love?” Miles asked.
If I was being honest the answer was yes, I wanted him to hold my hand through this, but I knew that would make the situation worse. If Leland felt threatened, he would retaliate.
“I’ve got this.” Sort of. “Stay on standby.”
“I’ll be watching.” Miles lasered in on my jerk ex-husband.
Mom squeezed my hand before I walked away while all my friends gave me sympathetic looks. Brad, though, was on his feet and ready to join Miles if he needed to. Not sure what they would do, maybe brawl by the looks of it.
Thankfully, Leland didn’t notice me until I was almost to the hostess desk. It was the first time I was glad there was an attractive female around to distract him. Leland and Mike looked as if they had come from his auto body shop. They were in blue coveralls, each with a smudge or two of grease on their hands. Mike the slick, as we used to call him on account of his slicked back brown hair that he was still wearing, saw me first. He tapped Leland and pointed my way.
Leland stopped trying to impress the much younger woman and sneered my way.
I didn’t let his dirty looks stop me. “Can I speak to you outside?” I needed to get him as far away from Chloe as I could.
“Looking good, Aspen.” Mike eyed me up and down. “Still single?” He licked his lips.
I didn’t even bother to respond to him other than wrinkling my nose. I walked toward the door hoping Leland would follow. He did, which might very well be the first thing he had ever done right by me. We stood outside the café in the cool autumn air, the sun bearing down on us to keep away the shivers.
Leland stood there with his left hip cocked and arms folded. “What do you want?” he growled.
So many things, but it could all be summed up in one sentence. “I want you to be a good person.”
His nostrils flared. “How do you know I’m not?”
“For starters, you’re cheating on your wife . . . again.”
“What do you know about it? We’re separated.”
“Right. Let me guess, because you were cheating on her?”
“Get to your point, Aspen,” he snapped.
“My point is, our daughter is in the café—”
His head jerked in the direction of the café window. What we both found there warmed my heart. Miles and Brad stood in menacing poses watching over me.
“You brought your boyfriend and that pansy Brad with you, I see.”
“Brad is more of a man than you’ll ever be, so lay off him.” He was never very nice to him growing up. That should have said something to me. Sure, Brad was somewhat of a nerd, but he was our nerd and I loved him. I should have been better at showing that. “And Miles isn’t my boy
friend.”
“So why is he with you?”
“Not that it’s any of your business, but I work for him and he came to see Chloe’s game today.”
Leland faced me and smirked. “You’re sleeping with your boss? Didn’t know you had it in you. But I thought you said his name is Taron.”
I was surprised he remembered that tidbit. “It’s his pen name and we’re not sleeping together.”
“Since it’s you, I believe you. Always so uptight,” he said, trying to rattle me.
It was working. I know a lot of people thought Leland and I were having sex in high school. After all, Leland had a reputation, so it was no surprise to them when I turned up pregnant my freshman year of college. But we got pregnant my first time. He’d begged me at least a dozen times before that, but I’d always said no. I stupidly thought if I finally gave him what he wanted, he would give me what I always wanted, his whole heart.
I hated that I ever gave him the honor. That he made it something so cheap. That I was so easy to discard. Most of all, I hated that I never knew what it was like to be cherished. For a man to love me soul and body. Someone to be gentle with me and never compare me. I clasped my hands together and breathed. I refused to be the abandoned girl anymore.
“Leland, keep talking like that and you will never see Chloe. I’ll hire the best lawyer money can buy. That’s a promise, not a threat.”
That wiped the smirk off his face. “I just want to see our daughter.”
“Why?”
He stared at me blankly like I’d asked him a difficult question.
“Is this just to spite me?” I finally asked when he couldn’t answer.
He shoved his hands in his pockets. “I know I screwed up. I wasn’t ready to be a dad when we had Chloe. I didn’t want to marry you, but my dad me told that’s what a real man would do.”
I grabbed my heart and held back tears. I wasn’t under some delusion that deep down Leland had wanted to marry me, but his words still cut because the girl inside me wanted to believe that he loved me in his way, and that she was at least wanted by the boy she gave everything to. “You can quit reminding me that you didn’t want me. I got the message loud and clear.”
My Not So Wicked Boss (My Not So Wicked Series Book 3) Page 16