“So even if you heard right away, you wouldn’t have been here any sooner?”
“I had a contract! Would you have left this inn in the lurch?”
“For Austin? In a New York minute.”
His expression went blank. “I genuflect to your superior parenting skills. But I’m trying here, okay?”
And since Jenny had caught a glimpse of genuine pain cross his eyes before he slapped on a poker face, she nodded. For the first time she really saw that he was, indeed, trying—and that maybe this wasn’t as easy for him as he’d made it appear up until now. “Okay. I guess the important thing is that you’re here now. But you’ve gotta understand that this isn’t going to be easy.”
“I know,” he said wearily. “Believe me, I get it that I’ve got a lot to make up for.”
She pushed her plate away, sat a bit taller and reached for her coffee cup, wrapping her hands around it in an attempt to warm her cold, cold fingers. Despite the lip service she’d given, a part of her must have secretly hoped this was something that would simply disappear if she wished hard enough.
Instead, it was growing more real, more concrete, by the second. She drew in a deep breath, then quietly exhaled. Replaced her cup in its saucer and pressed her hands, fingers splayed, against the cool wood of the tabletop to disguise the faint tremor they’d developed.
“Give Austin time and don’t bullshit him,” she told him quietly, “and he’ll likely come to love you. He adored the idea of you when he was little.”
Jake leaned into the table. Slid his own long-fingered hands across its surface as if to touch her. But he halted their progress when his fingertips were less than an inch from hers.
She hated that the near touch set up a series of quivers deep inside.
“And you’ll help me?” he demanded.
“I said I would, didn’t I?”
He nodded.
“Then I will.”
Even though it’d likely rip her heart right out of her breast to do so.
* * *
“BRADSHAW! GET YOUR head outta the clouds and pay attention!”
Austin literally jerked at the sound of Coach Harstead’s brisk bellow—and raised a baseball mitt-encased hand to acknowledge the reprimand. “Sorry, coach!” Drawing a deep breath, he forced himself to refocus on the Bulldogs’ Wednesday practice.
God, it was hard, though. His so-called father had been trying to pin him down for the past week and a half, wanting to talk and bond and shit. Austin had been doing his best to avoid the guy, but surprisingly, Jenny, who he’d assumed would be the last person wanting him to spend time with the man, hadn’t been much help. She actually thought he should be—how had she put it?—open-minded.
My ass. Resettling his cap in front, he narrowed his eyes on the batter. His friend Lee was up. Dude was right-handed with a tendency to pull the ball, so ninety percent of his hits came straight to where Austin played shortstop, between second and third base. “Come to Mama,” he murmured.
Yet even as he concentrated on being ready for it, he wondered where his “dad” had been when he’d actually wanted a father. Nodamnwhere, that’s where. Or maybe, given the guy’s big-deal job, everywhere.
Everywhere except Razor Bay.
The crack of a ball off the bat focused his attention once again and, seeing Lee’s line drive arc to the left of him, Austin got himself in position. A second later he snagged the ball out of the air, feeling it hit his mitt with a satisfyingly meaty thwonk, and winged it to the second baseman to tag Oliver Kidd, who should have stayed put on first.
“Good work, Bradshaw!” Coach Harstead called. Then to the rest of the boys, he said, “That’s a classic example of the double play that frequently happens when you hit to shortstop. So let’s all work on not doing that, whataya say?”
Stoked over his play, Austin’s concentration improved for the rest of the practice. He actually felt pretty good by the time Coach called it quits. It was a nice little break from the stress he’d been feeling this week with his dad back in town.
Nolan came up and slapped him on the back. “Nice play with Lee and Oliver.”
He grinned. “Yeah, I did okay for once. Usually Coach catches me at my worst.”
“Nah. He knows you’re good. Maybe even all-star material—”
“Austin.”
He stiffened all over at the sound of Jake’s voice and, schooling his expression, turned to face him, giving a sullen shrug of acknowledgment. Making up his mind to play it cool, however, he tried real hard not to scowl.
But, jeez.
The guy didn’t resemble any of his friends’ dads. He was younger, for one thing. And even if he wanted to talk to him, it wasn’t like he’d have the first idea what to say. Jake had like a billion-dollar camera slung around his neck—and between the hot-shit globe-trotting photographs he took for some famous magazine and the way he looked—like an action-movie guy or something—well, it could be sorta intimidating. If Austin gave a rip about that kind of stuff.
Which he didn’t.
Jake turned to Nolan. “Your mother called Jenny,” he said. “She had to take your little brother to the doctor. It’s nothing for you to worry about,” he assured the boy, “but because she’s hung up, I’m here to give you two a ride.”
Crap! Still, there wasn’t a lot they could do about this plan—not when it had the parental stamp of approval. So by unspoken agreement, he and Nolan tumbled into the back of Jake’s Mercedes BlueTEC SUV that everybody and his brother had asked Austin about, as if he would be the first to know anything about it—not!—and visited with each other, ignoring their driver.
When Jake pulled into the driveway at Austin’s friend’s house a short while later, Nolan opened the back door but stopped to say, “Thanks, Mr. Bradshaw.”
Austin, who was damned if he’d thank Daddy Dearest for anything, simply nodded. “Yeah,” he said, climbing out of the SUV in Nolan’s wake. He met Jake’s eyes when he reached back in to grab his pack. “Tell Jenny I’m doing my homework with Nolan,” he said, and slammed the door shut. Then he turned and stalked away.
He refused to feel guilty over the flash of disappointment he’d spotted on the face of a guy he’d assumed didn’t need anyone.
CHAPTER FIVE
JAKE WATCHED UNTIL THE KIDS disappeared through the front door of Nolan’s house. “Well, that went fucking swell.” Blowing out a breath, he put the Mercedes in gear and backed down the driveway. Now what did he do?
He’d expected to get a little more out of the opportunity Jenny had presented him in the wake of Rebecca Damoth’s frantic phone call than to receive the invisible chauffeur treatment. Grumbling to himself to avoid acknowledging the hollow that had formed in his gut when his son resolutely ignored him, he drove aimlessly around Razor Bay.
He had to admire the irony. When he’d heard the news about Emmett and realized that this was his final chance to take responsibility for the parenting he’d abdicated so many years ago, what should have been a cut-and-dried decision wasn’t. He hated to admit it, but part of him had been seriously tempted to simply continue doing what he’d been doing. In the end, however, not a damn thing wasn’t an option. He