Nola’s restaurant was in a nice little shopping center by the beach. Palm trees lined the road and the air smelled like salt. It was pretty, and I could see why her parents had zeroed in on this place to dream about.
The shop on the end had a little, cheap looking paper sign strung up that read “Castillo’s Bakery and Sandwiches.”
I pulled up out front and noticed that there was almost nobody in the store. Actually, the open sign wasn’t even on and the lights were dimmed. Fuck. I hadn’t thought to even check the store hours.
I was about to explain to Ben that we might need to wait just a little longer when I saw a guy dressed in a button down and jeans get out of his car a few spaces over. He bent down and checked his hair in the window, pulling an actual comb from his pocket and making a few sweeps with it.
What kind of self-respecting guy carried a comb in his pocket?
But my idle curiosity turned to gut-clenching horror when I saw Nola come half-jogging to the door to unlock it. She wasn’t dressed like somebody who was about to work. She was wearing the same kind of cottony dress she liked to wear on days she’d known she would see me. And her hair was braided all to one side, so it fell over her pale shoulder. The dress was green, too.
Fuck, why did it have to be green? Logically, I knew I’d never told her how sexy I thought she looked in that color, but it felt like a personal betrayal to see her wanting to look good for someone else.
Of course she is still dating, dumbass. You practically shoved her away from New York as hard as you could. What did you expect?
The guy awkwardly went in to hug her with one arm, and I was at least grateful to see that as far as I could tell, it was a first date.
I let out a little of the rapidly building tension. A first date. She wasn’t already sleeping with the guy. She hadn’t completely moved on.
There was still a possibility that I could get her back.
I felt Ben watching me through the rearview as my thoughts raced. Was that my plan? Win her back? When had that become the plan?
“How are you going to help her with her restaurant, daddy?” Ben asked.
“I’m not sure yet. Most people don’t like it when you just give them money. It’s insulting. So I’ve got to think of something a little more subtle.”
“Why don’t people want you to give them money?”
“Because it can make things feel cheap. Like cheating. If I just wrote her a check and fixed all her problems, would she still feel proud that she made her restaurant work?”
Ben was quiet. He had a way of going silent to think about deep, little kid issues.
This trip had been the closest I’d seen him to acting normal again. Even now, asking questions and being so talkative. That was the post-Nola version of Ben. As if I needed another reason to see that I’d been a dumbass for pushing her away, it was sitting in the backseat of my car.
The reality in my face spun around with the things Chris had told me at the bar. About how there’d never be a guarantee. There was no permanent answer, and if I passed on every temporary glimpse of perfection because I was afraid, I’d fade, what kind of life would I be giving Ben. What kind of life would I be giving myself?
Nola and the guy sat down across from each other. I was happy to see he was doing all the talking, gesticulating wildly and doing a lot of pointing to himself and laughing. Nola was listening politely, but I thought I knew her well enough to read her expression, even through the glass windows of the restaurant. She wasn’t into him. Thank God she wasn’t.
“Why are we just watching Miss Nola like this?”
I stirred, then turned the car back on. “We’ll come back later.”
The engine made Nola turn her head toward us. Her eyes went wide and she got up, knocking her chair back.
Oh, shit. You’ve been made, dumbass.
I shifted into reverse and slammed on the accelerator.
“Whee!” Ben shouted as we nearly clipped a truck behind us. I put the car in drive and got out of the parking lot as fast as I could, hoping she’d think maybe I was someone else. I hadn’t really planned an explanation for why we flew down here out of the blue to talk to her. I had barely even given myself a proper explanation.
I’d just known I needed to come, and now I was here.
39
Nola
I spent the entirety of the evening service trying to convince myself I was crazy. I had not seen Jack parked out front. I even double checked his team’s schedule and confirmed he wasn’t back in Florida for another series of games.
Jack was not in Florida.
He had not been parked outside the restaurant during my failed date with Tyler.
I was losing my mind. That was all.
I stuffed my notepad in my apron and went to greet my first table of the evening. They had already come three times this week and claimed the sandwich they’d had was the best they’d ever tasted. Even if I couldn’t say I was coming close to paying the bills, at least I knew we were getting the whole “serve tasty food” part right, I guessed.
The door opened as I was walking back to put their order in—the same sandwiches they’d ordered the last two times—and I stopped in my tracks when I saw who it was.
He was tall, broad, bearded, tattooed, and absolutely not a figment of my imagination.
“Jack?” I said.
“Uh, yeah. Ben really wanted to see you guys, and we were in the area.”
I saw Ben poke his head out from behind Jack’s muscular leg. He waved, then started scanning the restaurant for Griff. The two boys did an adorable running tackle hug when they saw each other and started chatting excitedly about something at Griff’s favorite booth.
I stared in disbelief. My heart was threatening to pound out of my chest, and I was still worried I was imagining this. “You were in the area? In Florida? What were you doing here?”
“A vacation,” Jack said. He seemed stiff and uncomfortable.
“Oh,” I said, feeling myself deflate a little. “Are you hungry? We could get you a sandwich. Maybe some bread? Or soup?”
Jack pulled out a barstool at the counter across from the kitchen and shrugged. “Okay. Surprise me.”
I went to the computer and plugged in my table’s order, then picked out a medley of my favorite menu items for Jack. I felt a little PTSD kick in from the last time I’d tried to feed him. That had ended with me getting a view of his back as he rushed out of my apartment and my life.
“Thirsty?” I asked.
“Water’s fine.”
The boys were still chatting and had gotten out napkins to draw on. It felt surreal. I could torture myself by imagining this was my reality. Some pseudo-reality where Jack had moved to Florida with me and helped me run the restaurant by day and threw shut outs by night for his baseball team.
I built up my nerve as I walked over to him with the cup of water. Don’t be a wuss. Don’t be a wuss.
I sat down beside him. “Jack…” I said slowly.
Jack swallowed. He looked like he didn’t want to look at me. His hands were clenched in front of him and his eyes were fixated on his knuckles.
“I miss you,” I said.
“Yeah.”
“Are you really on vacation?”
“No.”
“Did you come here to see us?”
Jack finally lifted his eyes to mine. I could read all the conflict in them. “I’m not sure why I came. But Ben has been happy as hell ever since he found out we were coming. I don’t know. Maybe Chris Rose convinced me this was a good idea. But he’s an idiot, so I don’t know why I listened.”
“For an idiot, Chris seems to give a lot of good ideas to a lot of people. Well,” I said, thinking to the disaster my dinner cleavage apology had turned into. “Mostly good advice.”
“I want to be honest with you. I think that’s what I need to do,” Jack said.
“Okay…” I waited, watching as he clearly struggled to choose the right words.
“It was like I’d fucked up the very first and most important job as his dad. So I promised it would be the last time. No more temporary moms. Just permanent. And yeah, I’ve dated since. But I never let anyone get close to him. Not like I let you. And I saw a glimpse of how good it could be, but I also started to see how bad it would be if—when—things went wrong and you left. So I had to end it before things went too far to stop them.”
“And how do you feel now?”
“Like I’m torn between what I should do and what I want to do.”
I picked at a chipped spot in the wooden countertop. “I understand.”
Jack let out another heavy breath, then looked toward where Griff and Ben were talking. “I wanted to offer to help you. That was the other reason I came. I know asking you to leave your job wasn’t a financial situation you expected.”
I felt the air of hope start to seep out of me. That’s what this was. It wasn’t a romantic, crazy trip to Florida to get me back. It was a pity trip. He wanted to bail me out because he’d probably guessed my business was flopping.
“I don’t want to take your money, Jack. Thank you. But I got a loan. I’ll be okay.”
Liar.
“Well, at least let me do something that’s not exactly a handout. Damon has a PR team for each of his players. I’m sure I could get him to at least set up a few phone calls with a branding expert. Maybe they could help you get a head start on the marketing side of things.”
I looked up at Pierre, who appeared to be making love to a loaf of bread he was cutting. Figuratively, of course. He had one palm on the bread and his cheek practically pressed to the table beside it as he gently dragged a serrated knife through it.
“Okay,” I said, telling myself I was only taking his help for Pierre’s sake. Not mine. Not out of some long-shot hope that we’d end up crossing paths again if I took him up on this.
“Great.” Jack started to stand.
“No,” I said, pointing at the stool. “This time, you’re eating the food. Like it or not.”
A half smile crossed his face. “Fair. I’ll make some calls while I’m here and see about getting you that branding consultation.”
40
Nola
Jack left my life as quickly as he came. Much to Griff and Ben’s disappointment, his “vacation” lasted until about an hour before we closed up the restaurant.
The following day, I mostly managed to continue with business as usual. Wake up early, take Griff to school, man the helm of my quickly sinking business. Rinse, repeat.
Except I felt the spark of possibility from Jack flying all the way here. He was torn between what he should do and what he wanted. What if I could convince him they were the same thing? What if I didn’t just meekly tell him I understood that he was being a well-intentioned idiot?
Those were the thoughts that led to a spiral of events. First was mentioning to Griff that it’d be fun to go visit New York to see Luca and Lindsey, wouldn’t it? Next was glancing at airline tickets and realizing they were startlingly cheap if we drove to Orlando first. Next was booking them and telling Pierre he could have two days off.
Before I knew it, I was dragging my suitcase into Lindsey and Luca’s apartment with Griff tagging behind me.
Totally not here for some grand apology tour. Not at all. I was here to visit my friends, not to scheme up some kind of way to win Jack back.
This was probably the part where the narrator of my life would chime in and reveal that the heroine of this tale was not an entirely trustworthy one. He might even cough and mutter “bullshit” in his fist at that particular point.
Well, screw you too, narrator.
With Griff safely in Lindsey’s care, I went for a walk. My walk happened to take me roughly a dozen blocks to the street where Jack’s building was. It also led me right up to the door where a bored looking doorman in a coat eyed me.
“Just going to see a friend,” I said, even though I’d been through this routine before. You needed to be on the list to get into Jack’s building, and the doormen had never failed to check before. But I’d also never tried casually brushing past them.
The guy reached out, gently touching my arm and giving me a stern look. “Your name?” he said, swiping through a list on his phone.
“Same name as the last fifty times,” I joked.
Unamused, he waited.
“Nola Castille,” I said.
He flipped through his phone, then looked up and shook his head. “Not on the list.”
“Think you should check again, maybe?”
“It’s alphabetical. You’re not on it.”
Alrighty then. It looked like this was the part where I had to get creative.
I called Damon Rose and asked if he could possibly find a last-minute babysitter for Griff. It was a stretch, since losing my ties to Jack probably meant losing any obligation Damon might have felt towards me. But I was gratefully surprised when he grouchily complied and set me up with Chris’ wife, Belle. She even agreed to swing by and pick him up.
I called Lindsey next. “Hey,” I said, “I need a favor. A kind of big one. And I already got someone to come pick up Griff, so don’t worry about that. Can you bring Luca and that Halloween costume you guys used last year? Remember the UPS package delivery team?”
“Um,” Lindsey said.
“What?”
“We kinda used that in the bedroom a few times. We had to modify the package so there’s a little hole for a hand and the front of the pants is kind of cut open.”
I stared at the brick wall I was standing in front of, wishing I could smuggle a bottle of bleach inside my brain and put the pathways forming that particular memory out of their misery. “Can you find some way to un-pervert the costume or not, Lindsey? This is a big deal.”
“Fine, fine. I’ll figure something out. Where do you need us?”
41
Ben
I wasn’t like most kids. I knew that. It’s also how I knew the babysitter my dad hired for me had something called dementia. I knew that meant she saw little demons who told her things that weren’t true.
Normally, dad made sure he knew babysitters really well. But this time, he said he needed to do something really important and that he’d only be just out for a little.
I figured out most of the things grownups didn’t think I would figure out, so I knew what he was really doing. He was going to make “it” with Miss Nola. I also knew that meant I’d be getting a little brother or sister soon. Other than the poopy diapers and the crying, it was pretty exciting.
I liked Miss Nola better than my real mom. Miss Nola didn’t wear stuff that made my nose burn, and she was super nice. She also made my dad seem a lot less grumpy, which I liked.
I was working on a drawing while my babysitter, Miss Patty, talked to herself in the bathroom. She was on the phone with someone named Hem Roid and she sounded really angry at the guy. She was talking and grunting so loud that when there was a thump outside the door, she didn’t even go to answer it.
I knew kids weren’t supposed to answer the doors for strangers, but I also knew our door had a peephole. So I grabbed my stool and carried it over. I was careful to be quiet as I got on my tiptoes and looked through the little glass window.
There was a man and a woman wearing brown uniforms and holding a big cardboard box. The man leaned forward. “Just need you to sign for this, sir.”
“Just a minute!” I called through the door. Most kids probably didn’t know package delive
ry people worked by themselves. I knew, though. And I knew what this meant. I ran past the bathroom where Miss Patty was still talking to Hem Roid or about him—I wasn’t sure anymore, and slid to my knees by my bed. I dug through my sketchbooks until I found the one I was looking for.
“Home Alone” was written on the cover.
42
Nola
Luca lifted the top flap on the giant box they’d used to smuggle me into the building. He stuck his head over the top, looking down at me. “By the way, you are way heavier than you look.”
“Maybe you should work on those noodle arms instead of criticizing her?” Lindsey suggested.
“Just saying. People are heavy. Not that Nola is heavier than the average person. It was just—”
“Could you guys keep it down?”
“I’m telling you,” Lindsey said. “The kid is by himself. I can feel it.”
“Jack wouldn’t leave Ben by himself,” I said. “He’s either in there, or there’s a babysitter.”
“Then why didn’t the babysitter answer the door? What kinda sitter lets the kid get the door, right?” Luca asked.
There was a sound like tiny silverware spilling on the other side of the door. We all froze, then Luca leaned in until his mouth was close to the door. “Everything okay in there, Mr. Kerrigan?”
“Fine,” Ben called back in an obvious and hilariously bad impersonation of his dad.
What the hell was going on in there?
“Are you able to sign for the package, or do we need to come another time?”
“Just a minute,” Ben called again in that same almost deep voice.
“What do you want us to do?” Luka whispered to me.
“Wait patiently?” I suggested.
My (Mostly) Temporary Nanny: A Grumpy Boss Romantic Comedy Page 15