“It’s not horrible if I start something with him?”
“You know what I think,” Xeni replied.
Sarah sat back on the cushions and made a show of crossing her legs. “I’m just glad someone is hitting that. I wanted to risk it all every day he came to pick up Winnie. Hell, he’s hot enough that Angelo might have let him join us.”
“Yeah, he’s—pretty tempting,” Sloan admitted, though tempting seemed like a really tame description of the way she was lusting after him. “But I guess, listening to Meegan just now, I’m still not entirely sure what I want. My ex was my only everything. First boyfriend, all that crap, and he was also a huge asshole. Is. He’s currently still an asshole. I haven’t dated at all since we split up. Meeting someone online or in a bar is different than hooking up with your live-in nanny. I think. I’ve never met anyone in a bar. I’m just scared it’s all gonna go horribly wrong.”
“It can go horribly wrong with any relationship,” Shae said.
“Sure can!” Meegan said with a pitiful laugh.
“I thought I’d married my best friend,” Shae went on. “And then, whoops! He finds out he’s infertile and everything goes to shit. I literally never saw that coming. But now I’m with my actual best friend who is actually awesome. I never pictured us being together.”
“Really, it’s not a problem, like school-wise or whatever,” Sarah said. “We had a married father of one of our students who was sleeping with four different nannies. His wife decided to confront all of them on campus, in front of a large number of children and parents.”
“Oh my god. John Hunter,” Xeni laughed. “Where are you now? Are you keeping it in your pants?”
“Yeah, I don’t think I could be that sloppy.” Sloan cringed at the thought. “We’re just taking things slow at the moment.”
“You like him,” Meegan teased.
“I’m really starting to, yeah”
“I can’t believe I missed him,” Shae groaned. She’d arrived last, after she closed up her bakery for the day.
“I’m sure Xeni has pictures,” Sloan said, only half joking.
“Yeah, whatever. My internet stalking skills are creepy until they benefit you,” Xeni said as she started going through her phone. “Here.” She handed the phone to Shae and Sloan watched, awaiting that odd approval that she absolutely didn’t need, but desperately wanted.
“Oh, I have a ginger too! And we’re both divorced. We should start a club.”
“I mean, I’m not sure if I’m ready for full membership, but we’ll see.”
Her finger moved across the screen like she was looking at more than one photo. “He’s pretty hot, Sloan.”
“He’s a good guy, too.” Sarah said with a shrug. “Winnie loved him and he was one the most helpful volunteers I’ve ever had in my class.”
“So, I should lock that down, huh?”
“Yup.”
“What are you looking at?” Sloan asked Shae, a nervous laugh following her question. Shae’s finger had been swiping quite a bit.
“GodsGracie03’s Instagram account?” Shae handed over the phone and sure enough, there was Gracie’s Instagram. There were tons of pictures of her with Rafe, Hope and their parents. They looked so happy, and Rafe—he looked so good at being a big brother. She thought of the pictures he’d sent her throughout the week of the girls and how he wasn’t in any of them. That weird twinge resurfaced, making her throat feel a little tight for just a moment before Sloan did her best to push it back down again. She handed Xeni her phone and then poured herself another glass of wine. She’d sleep with Rafe first. Then worry about that twinge.
After spending some time with his parents and listening to Hope explain all of her issues with the most recent season of her favorite show, Galaxis, Rafe headed out to catch up with his boys. There was no plan. Maybe a short ride down the coast. He knew his cousin Marcus would be up to eat, throw a few back and then call it a night. Nothing too wild, since half of their crew had already done time at some point. He also wanted to be on top of his shit when he rolled back to Sloan’s house. He was off the hook for Sunday nights, but the girls were looking forward to their first day of school and he knew all three of them would be a little on edge. If he could help make things run a little smoother, he would and he wouldn’t be fighting off a hangover if he stepped up to do it.
Rafe parked his bike in front of his cousin’s shop, South Coast Tattoo. The CLOSED sign was flipped, but the neon sign above the door was still on. His buddy Hector’s bike was parked out front even though there was no sign of him in the front of the shop. Rafe could see the shop assistant, Kendy, sweeping up the waiting area. He walked to the door and gently tapped on the glass. Kendy froze, her eyes narrowing before a bright smile flashed across her face. She set down the broom and came over to flip the padlock. A blast of AC and the sounds of a tattoo gun mixed with a Zapp and Roger classic hit Rafe as he opened the door.
“Hey!” Kenny said, stepping into his arms. “How’s it going?”
“Good. Your boss man here?”
“He’s just finishing up. You can go back. He’s doing a cover up for Eddie.”
“Oh, Eddie’s here?” Rafe laughed. Monica’s other nephew was the comedian of the family. If he was tagging along tonight, Rafe knew they were in for a good time.
“Yeah, Eddie’s here!” he heard his young cousin yell. Marcus responded just as fast.
“Man, stop fucking moving.”
Rafe laughed, giving Kendy a light squeeze on the shoulder. “I’ll just head back.”
“Good idea.” Marcus’s artists tattooed at stations scattered around the main shop floor, but he had a private studio in the rear. He owned the place, so of course the biggest space was his, and he was known for his large-scale black and grey pieces. The larger room gave his clients space to spread out and a better sense of privacy when they had to strip off half of their clothes. Rafe came around the corner and, sure enough, there was Marcus tattooing the right side of Eddie’s chest.
“Well, if it isn’t Rafael Whitcomb,” Eddie said, doing his best impression of a White guy with a stick up his ass. “You son of a gun. How the hell are you?”
“Shut the fuck up, Eddie,” Rafe laughed. Almost twenty years of rolling together and Eddie was exactly the same. Sometimes the guy didn’t know when to quit, but Rafe wouldn’t have it any other way.
When he and his dad crossed into L.A. county with their truck loaded down with all their shit, both personal possessions and a hell of a lot of emotional baggage, they moved into a mostly brown neighborhood. Rafe knew there was a good chance he was going to spend the rest of his teen years getting his ass kicked or getting into trouble, and he’d only been half wrong. Meeting his next-door neighbor Hector had been a blessing and a curse. Hector took Rafe under his wing. Taught him how to break into and hotwire your standard Honda Civic. It was all fun and games until they got busted and sent to Camp Kilgore.
When they got out and Rafe’s dad showed up with Monica, Rafe knew his life of crime was over, whether he felt like he still had something to prove or not. Three thousand miles from the streets he knew, Joe leaned on Monica for help. With Hector’s mom’s blessing, Monica’s older nephews sat Rafe and Hector down, and issued an ultimatum. They could all stay friends if they listened to Marcus. Marcus and his friends were cool as fuck, but they all had real plans focusing on trades that would give them the lives they wanted. For Marcus, it was taking over ownership of this shop. Marcus gave it to Rafe straight. He could keep being a stupid little motherfucker and then find himself on the other side eighteen, being charged as an adult for boosting cars or dead for boosting the wrong car. Or, he could surround himself with people who weren’t fuck ups and try to do better with his life.
Rafe was still all fucked up with teen rage that he didn’t understand how to unpack, but he agreed to stop spending his free time running the streets. When he wasn’t watching Hope and Grace, Monica let him hang out with Marcus, his littl
e brother Eddie and their buddies, Nick and Andres, brothers who were training to take over their father’s custom auto shop. Neither Rafe nor Hector could draw for shit, so following in Marcus’s footsteps were out of the question, but they loved learning everything they could about cars from Andres. As Rafe got deeper and deeper into child care, Hector earned an apprenticeship at South Bay Street Customs and now he was the general manager, helping the brothers expand to a second location in Las Vegas.
“Hector’s gonna fight you,” Eddie said.
“Oh yeah,” Marcus added. “He’s gonna fuck you up.”
“Why?”
“You got a new nanny gig?”
“Yeah.” Rafe looked between them confused, like they’d hadn’t been paying attention for the last seventeen years. “It’s what I do.”
“I saw Monica and she said you were leaving the Mary Poppins life behind.”
“I was thinking about it, but—”
“Oh my god, Hector! Stop!” Kendy’s screech melted into a giggle just as Rafe heard the bathroom door slam open. Rafe stuck his head out of the door and sure enough, his buddy was strolling across the shop, winking at Kendy. He turned to Rafe and immediately dropped his smile.
“You bitch ass bitch.”
“What? What the fuck is wrong with you? Why are you so bent out of shape?” Rafe said. Hector’s hostile greeting didn’t stop Rafe’s old friend from walking across the room and giving Rafe a one-armed clap on the back.
“Carlo got sent up again.” Their friend Carlo had not been a part of Monica’s ultimatum.
“Jesus Christ. He wants all three strikes. Dumbass. Three months in juvie fucking cured my ass.”
“Nick said the same thing.”
“Where is Nick? I thought he was coming.”
“He’ll be here in a minute. He had to drop Junior off at Val’s.”
“What’s going on there?” Rafe asked. His friend and his ex deserved their own reality show.
“Same shit. They hate each other and can’t stop fucking each other. I’m waiting for another Junior to pop up any day now.”
“Why don’t they just get back together?”
“I don’t fucking know.”
“So, what do I have to do with Carlo?”
“We got a spot at the shop now. I saw your dad and he said you were done nannying and then my mom saw Monica yesterday and she said you’d just signed on with some doctor and her kids. We’d have to get you properly certified, but I could have gotten you in at the shop.”
Disappointment hit Rafe hard in the chest. “Fuuckkk.”
“Yeah, man. Fuck is right. The two of us, back together on the right side of the law.” There was humor in Hector’s tone, but he was dead serious. Working together on cars would be amazing and Rafe would have loved to work for Nick and Andres, but he was definitely spoken for now—professionally.
“It was a last-minute gig. Her nanny bailed in the middle of the day and she needed someone to watch her twins.”
“What’s the mom’s deal?”
“Uh—” Rafe started, but the split second he hesitated was enough to completely fuck him. Marcus leaned back and shot him a look.
“Ahhh, shit. She’s fine as hell isn’t she?”
“She is very beautiful.”
“AHHH, SHIT!” Eddie whooped. Next thing Rafe knew, Hector was slapping him on the shoulder and doing a stupid dance in the doorway.
“Moms said she was a single Black doctor, but she ain’t say she was fine,” Marcus laughed.
“I hope your Aunt Justine wouldn’t say that.”
“Damn man. A fine doctor,” Eddie said.
Rafe nodded in defeat. “She’s a heart surgeon.”
“Oh yeah, she’s not with fucking you. A woman like that? Shit. She needs a business jerk. Serena Williams style. Some internet billionaire to keep up with her,” Marcus said before he leaned back over Eddie’s chest and continued his work. Rafe didn’t argue. Mostly because admitting what had already happened between them would cause him more problems than he wanted. Eddie would blab to his aunt, who would schedule a conference call with Monica so her follow-up questions could be answered properly.
He also didn’t want to think about how what Marcus had just said rang so true. Rafe wasn’t insecure about his line of work, but there was a difference between late-night sexting and escorting Sloan to some professional medical gala. He shook off the thought that he might not be good enough for her. Her ex was a surgeon and he knew how that turned out. All Rafe had to do was show up for Sloan and hopefully the rest would take care of itself.
9
When Rafe finally called it a night, he considered going back to Sloan’s, but he knew his dad expected to get some garage-centric male bonding in on Sunday morning. He owed it to Joe not to bail. He climbed into his guest bedroom bed and tried to fall asleep, but thoughts of Sloan had him staring at the ceiling.
Usually after a certain period of time, the families he worked for took up space in his heart. It was natural. He spent a lot of time with people and since his literal job was to take care of them, he started to care about things beyond their schedules and general health. He cared about their interests, their feelings and after a while, he found that you cared about them.
It had taken a while with the Craigs. He was young and raw, and still getting the hang of the whole live-in thing. He did his job well, but he kept an emotional distance. He didn’t expect that working with a family that wasn’t his would bring up strange and unexpected issues around losing his mom. Issues he finally opened up to his dad about. With the Bakers, it only took a couple of months. They were warmer and treated Rafe more like one of their own, which was another reason why turning down their offer to join them in Australia had been tough.
With Sloan and her girls, it had taken a whole seven days. Avery and Addison had taken to him so quickly and they were such good kids, it was impossible not to like them. He’d felt a shift at some point during the week, but he knew his feelings for Sloan had painted the whole situation in a different light. His boys had joked about how he was gonna be left a whole chump when she finally met her second husband, but as the night went on he started to notice a familiar feeling settle in his chest. He was grateful for the night off. But while he needed a break from the energy-sapping experience of having two six-year-olds running circles around him, he actually missed Avery and Addison. In the quiet darkness of his guest room, he missed Sloan too.
There was a physical weight that came with adding new people to his life. If they sucked, it felt like being crushed with a brick, but if they were right, he carried the thought of that person around like something warm and perfectly balanced. And when it was gone, he missed it. Yeah it had only been a week, but Sloan and her kids had carved a nice little spot in his heart. Only time would tell just how much space they took up.
He knew there was almost a hundred percent chance she would be asleep, but he reached for his phone anyway.
Hey girl. U up?
Wyd?
If feeling stupid, yet oddly satisfied at the same time were possible, that was how he felt when DELIVERED appeared under his message. He switched over to his sports app and checked the scores from the day, before he switched over to his Instagram to post the one picture he’d taken while he was out with the boys.
I’m up and full of regret.
Why? What happened?
I got a little drunk
but then I started sobering up
and I was tired, but I missed my
optimum sleep window and now I’m wide awake.
Life is so hard.
Did you have a good night?
Rafe wanted to let her know that they did, but he wished she’d been with him. The image of her on the back of his bike, her arms tight around his waist, flashed in his mind. Blood rushed to his cock. He reached into his sweats and adjusted his crotch before he typed out a better response.
I hung out with my pops and Monica
&nb
sp; and then I met up with my buddies.
He sent her the picture he’d taken in the In-N-Out parking lot. Marcus had insisted that be their first stop after he closed up the shop.
Oh wow. That looks like a lot of trouble.
We were on our best behavior.
I swear.
We took pictures too. Here’s one
where I don’t look completely faded.
A picture of Sloan and her friends popped up on his screen. Rafe had gotten the gig through Winnie’s old teacher, but it was weird to see Miss Kato smiling poolside with Sloan. She looked like she’d had a great time. She also looked fucking amazing in the high-waisted bikini she was wearing.
Oh I should probably ask you this in person
But I’m dying to know.
Are you seeing anyone?
No. What makes you ask that?
Sloan replied with a shrug emoji.
I don’t know the rules when it comes to you young people and dating.
You could have seventeen girlfriends.
Monogamy? Rules? What even!
Rafe couldn’t help but laugh. Sloan rambled even over text when she was nervous.
I’m not seeing anyone else.
My last relationship ended about 8 months ago.
Oh. What happened?
Rafe started to give her the abridged version of what had happened between him and Maya, but another message popped up before he could finish typing.
Sorry you don’t have to tell me.
I will. It’s fine.
She wanted me to quit my job.
Ah, I see. I’m not seeing anyone else.
Either.
And I don’t want to.
RAFE: A Buff Male Nanny (Loose Ends Book 1) Page 10