Her Protector: A Firefighter Secret Baby Romance

by Ashlee Price

  Tanner walked up to her, grasped both sides of her face with his hands, and kissed her. “Stop using Brandy as an excuse. I told you I’m done. But I know that’s hard to accept when she keeps popping up, so I’m going to show you that we’re completely done with each other. I don’t even think we will be friends.”

  “Okay, if you say so,” she sighed. Jenna wanted desperately to believe him when he said they were over, but she had seen Brandy in action. She knew how easy it would be for Tanner to cave in and take care of her for whatever reason. He had a history with Brandy just as much as he had a history with her. There was no way that someone who had been ready to propose would just let a person go out of his life for good. Jenna refused to believe that. Besides, if it was that easy for Tanner, then what would happen to her? What would happen when she left for grad school and things got tough?

  There were far too many decisions for her to make, and she couldn’t make them in Tanner’s apartment. They’d be up all night while he tried to convince her to take their relationship more seriously, and she wasn’t ready for that discussion. So she left. She didn’t care how late it was. She didn’t care what her father would say. She simply went home, hoping that by morning she’d have all the answers she was looking for.

  Chapter 14

  Sneaking into her house in the middle of the night made Jenna feel like she was in high school again. It hadn’t been a frequent occurrence even then, and whenever she did try it she’d always gotten caught. Tonight was no different. She made sure to turn her key as quietly as possible—only to open the door and see her father sitting there on the sofa. He wasn’t asleep, and he wasn’t happy.

  With his arms folded across his chest, he began his lecture. “Do you have any idea what time it is?”

  “Yeah, I do,” she said nonchalantly. “Calm down, Daddy. It’s not that serious. I’m home now.”

  “You could have called! You should have called! You’re not at the bar, and there are things going on that—” he stopped himself, taking a deep breath. “I just want to keep you safe, and if you’re going to be out all night I’d at least appreciate a phone call.”

  “I know, Dad, and I’m sorry. Time got away from me and I just needed to get home. So here I am.”

  She was about to head upstairs when there was a knock at the door. They both glanced at each other, confused, before looking back to the door. It might have been a branch or the wind blowing something around. But when the knock came again it was followed by a familiar voice. “Come on and let me in. I know you’re up.”

  Paul nodded to Jenna for her to open it. When Mr. Hannity stepped into their home at close to three in the morning, Jenna’s heart nearly stopped. This wasn’t business hours. This wasn’t normal.

  “Um, Jenna, good night. We’ll talk in the morning.” Paul motioned for her to go upstairs. Jenna didn’t want to, but something told her she didn’t want to be privy to that conversation, either. No more eavesdropping; she had enough on her mind without adding any more Hannity business to her thoughts.

  When she woke, it was still early. The sun was barely up. She could hear her father and Sean still talking downstairs. There was another voice there too, but by the time she reached the staircase her father’s guests were leaving.

  Mr. Hannity looked up to see her walking down and uttered his parting words. “Take care of that one, Paul. She’s proving to be much better luck for you than either of us anticipated. Sign the papers and get that over to his office by eleven. No later than that, okay?”

  “Yes sir, Mr. Hannity,” Paul murmured, closing the door behind him.

  Jenna was so confused she could no longer keep her mouth shut. “Okay, Dad, enough is enough! What the hell is going on here? Who is Sean Hannity?”

  “Fine, sit down.” Paul pulled a chair out at the kitchen table. Jenna eased into it, feeling more like a toddler in trouble than her father’s adult daughter. The story he told her was familiar in its outlines, but for the first time ever, the holes in their history were all filled in:

  “Your mother was sick. Everything snowballed. She was fine when she was first diagnosed, but after that first year of treatment, the insurance we carried wouldn’t cover any more. You were headed into your sophomore year. We tried everything, and then she told me about Sean, um, Mr. Hannity. He’d helped a family she knew, and she thought he was a philanthropist. One of those millionaires with a guilty conscience, or just a big, giving heart. And when he paid for her first round of chemo that’s exactly what he was. He came into the hospital and I could have sworn the nurses cheered. He was like a white knight coming in to save the day. Until he found out we owned The Wheel.

  “Mr. Hannity is most definitely a millionaire, but he’s also a loan shark, a gambler and an all-around unsavory guy. He’s into different things around Doveport, but I hadn’t any idea what I was getting into when we went into business together. The first loan was simple. All I had to do was pay it back by the day we agreed, plus a little bit of interest. I did that, and when he asked me how, I showed him the bar. I was already renting out the back room for poker games and things like that, and he liked the idea so much he took over. Mr. Hannity isn’t exactly the kind of man you say no to. We’ve been doing business ever since. He paid for your mother’s funeral. He’s made my mortgage payments, and even a tuition payment here and there. In return he uses my bar for whatever he needs.”

  Jenna sat there confused, worried, and even a little scared, “So you keep taking his money?”

  “Well, expenses keep coming up and no bank will touch me. The medical bills bankrupted us before I even heard of Mr. Hannity. We maxed out credit cards, you had moving-in expenses, and your mother and I didn’t want you starting your first year in college worried about money. It’s easy to take money when you have a business to pay it back with,” he told her with his voice riddled with shame.

  “It’s going to be even easier for Mr. Hannity to take the business when you can’t pay his money back. I don’t like what he’s doing, either; moving so much cash around the bar.” She moaned and shifted uncomfortably before whispering, “I think he’s doing something illegal.”

  “Jenna, please,” Paul took her hands into his own, staring deeply into her eyes, “please do not say that, or anything I just told you, around Mr. Hannity. When I tell you that I’m working on getting him out of The Wheel, you need to believe me. I promise that I’m close to resolving all of this and you’ll be proud of me. Your mother is going to be proud of me.”

  “Wait a minute, did Mom know about Mr. Hannity?”

  “No, I would have never been able to look her in the eye if she knew she was the reason this man came in and did this to us. That would have killed her even sooner,” he sniffled. “We’re going to be fine. Just go finish getting your party together and let me know if the guys need to do anything to get the place ready. You might as well put in your requests now while we have a construction crew there.”

  “I’ll let you know, Daddy.” She got up, kissing him on the cheek and hugging him tight. “I’m going to run out for a bit, meet up with Hannah, and I promise that if I stay out extremely late again, I’ll text you.”

  “Call,” he told her, squeezing her hand lightly.

  “Fine, call,” she huffed, running upstairs to get ready.

  It didn’t take long for Jenna to get dressed and head toward the Doveport Employment Center. It was one of the newest buildings in town. It reminded her of her school’s computer labs. Everything was grey. There were large windows to let in lots of light, along with air conditioners on full blast. The place was fairly empty as she walked inside. The only thing she saw was a security guard sitting at a desk. He was ready to send her into the waiting room with the rest of the unemployed, but once she gave him Hannah’s name, he handed her a guest pass.

  There were pictures all over one wall of Hannah’s office. Pictures she’d seen before but had forgotten were even taken. Her family, friends and
all the things that represented why she loved Doveport. Hannah’s degree and professional certifications hung proudly on another wall. Behind her desk was a large window. The blinds were down, but they weren’t closed, and the sun shone in on a picture of Hannah and Jenna together at their high school graduation.

  Jenna picked up the picture, running her hands over it. She remembered that day so vividly it almost made her cry. It had been the last of her graduations that her mother had been able to attend.

  “That was a great day, wasn’t it?” Hannah said, walking in behind her.

  Jenna was so startled she nearly dropped the picture. Putting it back, she agreed, “Yeah, it was. I can’t believe how long ago that was. It feels like yesterday. Sorry for just showing up like this, too. I couldn’t stay in the house anymore. Dad and Hannity were there.”

  “Are you alright? What happened? Why was he there?” Hannah sat down behind her desk.

  Jenna plopped down into the chair in front of it, telling her about the conversation she and her father had had. By the time she was done, Hannah looked like she was about to cry.

  “So what can I do?” she asked Jenna.

  “Nothing! Please don’t do anything. You warned me. Dad warned me. Even Tanner told me to leave it alone, and now I just think I have to, until I can figure out how to help without my dad suffering any consequences. Maybe I should just focus on planning my party and what I’m going to do about Tanner.”

  “What do you mean? What did you two do that you all of a sudden have to figure things out all over again? I thought you were going to take my advice and just have fun for the summer.”

  “I was, but then we slept together, and I don’t want to stop, because he’s amazing! But we fought about him getting back together with Brandy, and I’m going to grad school in a few weeks. I don’t want to be in a long-distance relationship. I don’t want him with anyone else. And I had a nervous breakdown, but he understands and doesn’t ask questions.”

  “Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute, slow down, rewind. You’ve been in a serious funk these last few days and your dad told me it was something contagious, which by all means keep that to yourself, but are you telling me you had a meltdown and I wasn’t there for you but Tanner was and you didn’t call me?!?”

  Jenna sat silent for a moment with her mouth open, waiting for the right words to find her. “Don’t be mad! It just happened! I was standing outside, we had that thing in his office and I was ignoring him again so he came by. By the time he got there I was a ball of tears on the front lawn because I kept remembering stuff.”

  “You love him,” Hannah said flatly.

  “I told you before that I loved him. We were together for a lot of our firsts. And there I was thinking about the first time we said ‘I love you.’ The first time we kissed. His stupid old pickup truck and me crying in it all night after my parents had the talk with me. He was there. Even when Mom died, he was there for me at the funeral and after. It wasn’t until I went away to school that things changed. Now that I think about it, me going away to school has always been our breaking point.”

  “Okay, I get that. I get all of that, but Jenna, you’re in love with him now,” Hannah giggled. “This completely defeats the purpose of just having fun for the summer. And is he really getting back together with Brandy? Even after the thing at the bar?”

  Jenna rolled her eyes. “I told him he was and he told me he wasn’t. She went to grab her stuff from his apartment, apparently with a police escort. Do you know what she said to me? She said he was going to ask her to marry him. He was going to ask me! No! He actually asked me!”

  “And you said no!” Hannah chuckled. “And if Tanner tells you he’s not getting back together with her, maybe you should listen to him.”

  “I listened to you!” she exclaimed. “You were the one who told me they always get back together!”

  “But that was before her other boyfriend texted Tanner. Call me crazy, but that seems like a deal breaker for the get-back-together thing…”

  A subtle knock at the door interrupted their conversation, and they looked up to see a young freckle-faced kid standing just outside. He was tall, but he looked fresh out of high school. His smile was bright as he peeked into the office.

  “Hey, Miss Jay, just wanted to tell you that I decided to stick with my dad’s plumbing job.”

  “Now hold on a sec, Ryan, you said you hated being his apprentice. You want to be an electrician, right?” Hannah shifted into work mode seamlessly.

  “Yeah, but Mr. Hannity’s running the next few projects for Dale Construction, and he never lets us have the time to do things right. I don’t think he knows what he’s doing, but every time I try to correct stuff, the guys tell me to just do what I’m told. Right now they’re working on that bar, The Wheel, and they don’t need any electrical work so I’m out for now anyway. But when the next project comes up…” He trailed off as disappointment stained his words. “I just don’t want any problems, and my dad told me that if I do a great job with him this year, he’ll put in a word for me with his buddies at the utility company. But thanks for everything, Miss Jay. You really helped narrow my options down. I’ll see ya around. Well, if the apprenticeship doesn’t work out, I’ll definitely see you! Take care.”

  “Okay, Ryan, take care.” Hannah waved uncertainly.

  As soon as he left, Jenna turned to Hannah with a wide-eyed glare. “Hannity’s making them do shoddy work?!? For what?!? What do you think they’re going to do at the bar? We can’t let this happen!”

  “Relax, breathe,” Hannah told her. “We don’t know what they’re doing at the bar. I thought you said it was mostly woodwork anyway.”

  “They’re replacing the floorboards! What if they don’t do it properly, or skimp on the materials?!? Someone could get hurt!”

  “You’re jumping the gun here. Chill out. Let’s get back to Tanner. That’s a problem we can address now without peeling up the floors at your dad’s bar. So he says he’s not getting back with Brandy. You need to believe him until he gives you a reason not to. Okay? And about this Hannity thing, please, please, please let your dad take care of it. You gotta learn to listen to people and let them do what they say they’re going to do. You can’t fix the world in a day, Jenna.”

  But that was just it. Jenna wanted to fix every problem in her life before her birthday, or at least before she left town in the next few weeks. Heading into the next phase of her life as chaos drenched her with anxiety didn’t feel like the best way to start grad school. Even worse, she still hadn’t chosen one yet. It would be easy if she’d only been accepted to one or two, but there were too many options. And what was she going to do about Tanner?

  Jenna wished there was a clear-cut answer for every aspect of her life, but she supposed it wouldn’t be life if things were that easy. So she left Hannah’s office without any direction or solutions. One thing, though, seemed to be a no-brainer: she had to get Sean Hannity out of her dad’s life. After that, she’d learn to relax—and maybe even listen.

  Chapter 15

  Jenna found herself driving toward the outskirts of Doveport. While she’d been warned and yelled at by practically everyone she knew, there was a part of her that wouldn’t give up the idea that she could fix all of her dad’s problems. If negotiating with Mr. Hannity had gone so well when they first met, perhaps now she could figure out a feasible way to ease the burden her father was carrying.

  It hadn’t taken long to find out where Mr. Hannity spent most of his time. When one of The Wheel’s regulars asked her about their re-open date, she took the chance to get an answer for one of her life’s many questions. It sent her to a flower shop at the edge of town. It was the oddest place for a florist; there were nothing but factories and warehouses around it.

  She stopped her car right out front. There were no people walking up and down the street. There were only parked cars and silence. When she closed her car door, the sound r
ang out in the stillness. She got a weird feeling as she stood outside the florist. Her eyes darted up and down the street while the butterflies danced in her stomach.

  Jenna kept squeezing her fingers, one hand and then the other, wondering if she was crossing a line. Of course she was. Anxiety wouldn’t be coursing through her body if this was a good idea. But she’d already driven all the way out here. Taking a deep breath, she decided to go inside.

  The chime of the door made her pulse race as she walked into the shop. Her heart was in her throat and she felt like she was on the brink of tears. The flower shop was gorgeous, but it seemed a bit dark. The only window was next to the door, and even that had its shades drawn. Jenna kept listening, but there was nothing to be heard; not a shopkeeper in sight. The longer she stayed in the shop, the faster her heart beat.

  There was an interior door just behind the counter. She entered it. Curiosity was guiding her. Her logic? Must have left it in the car, because all she wanted to do was talk to someone. Anyone. And anyone was who she found at the end of the hallway.

  A woman with big white hair and shocking green eyes stared at her with a pair of shears in her hands. A bouquet as big as her beehive was sitting in a vase with roses and other blooms waiting for her to finish trimming. After snipping another leaf, she stood back and eyed the finished product. Turning to Jenna, she looked her up and down before she spoke. “So tell me what ya think, dear.”

  “Excuse me?” Jenna was confused.

  “Don’t just stand there, girl. Tell me what ya think? Should I trim some more off the side? I don’t want it to be uneven as it leans against the coffin,” she said, tilting her head from side to side.