Likely, that’s why Ashley had chosen to work here. She’d told him her life revolved around her son, and he believed her. It made him marvel to think of it. Such a foreign concept to the Sharpe-Lowe family.
He turned back for a moment, watching her reflection move across the windowpane. He could watch her all day. He felt calm and languid after her attentions. The dust of the desert had been washed down that golden sink of hers. It had felt nice to have her fingers sift through his hair. She was nothing like Fleur. Nothing. If two women could have completely opposite personalities, it was them.
He paid the young receptionist, then approached his grandmother, who was sitting on a sofa in the waiting area. She had a fancy black cane by her side—an antique, it looked like. That was new to him, Gram using a cane. When he’d gotten off the plane and met her at the town car, it had bothered him to see it because he preferred to think of her as forever strong. But now he couldn’t help wondering—had she deliberately maneuvered him into meeting Ashley today?
Aidan had gone to St. Bartholomew’s School as a boy, too. It was a tiny, elite school with exceedingly high expectations. He knew how difficult a place it could be.
Ashley didn’t seem to understand that as well as he did. That was only natural.
You could help her, a voice inside said.
He closed his eyes. Nope, he said to the voice. His life was too complicated and messed up as it was. His interest was the last thing Ashley needed as she tried to make a better life for her son. If that was at all in his grandmother’s mind, then she could just forget it.
It was too bad, he reflected, on his way out the door and down the stairs. He liked Ashley. Liked her basic kindness.
And he really, really liked the way she’d given him that sexy shampoo.
ASHLEY THOUGHT ABOUT Aidan long after he left. Long after two more clients—a cut and color and then a set—had come and gone.
She couldn’t shake the sense that she’d made a mistake in getting too personal with him. She really didn’t know him that well, and what if there were repercussions? He’d recognized Brandon’s school jacket, and that had unnerved her.
Her hands shaking, she stepped around Jordan, the young intern who was busily sweeping hair from Ashley’s workspace.
“Thanks,” she said to Jordan. Maybe if she distracted herself from thinking about Aidan by helping someone else, she’d be okay. “Are you a student?” she asked Jordan.
Jordan flipped her long straight hair over one shoulder and smiled boldly at Ashley. Nothing shy about her. “I graduate in June. I’m hoping Ilana hires me after I pass my state exams.”
“That’s great.” Ashley hesitated a beat. “I’ll help, if you want. I know someone who sat on the state board for years and years.”
“No, thanks. I’m good,” Jordan said. “Thanks anyway.”
“Sure.” Ashley nodded, hiding her disappointment and gathering up her purse. She was finished for the day and had no reason to stay longer, other than to try to alleviate the general feeling of uneasiness that she wanted to shake.
“You’ll get used to working here,” Sandie, the stylist who’d worked at the chair next to Ashley, murmured in her ear, causing Ashley to jump. “You just have to get past Ilana’s probationary period, and then it’ll get better.”
“It’s not easy starting over someplace new,” Ashley admitted.
“You’re very brave,” Sandie said. “I saw you earlier with Dr. Lowe.”
Had she? And what was brave about washing his hair? “He didn’t want a haircut,” she explained. “I did what I could.”
“Well, you were a hit. I overheard what he said to Ilana. You impressed him, Ashley. He’ll probably come back to you as a regular client now.”
Ashley froze. She hadn’t even considered that could happen. That was...that was...
“How did you get this job, anyway?” Sandie asked her curiously. “Because Ilana is...particular. Turnover is high at Perceptions, but the stylists who stay—well, we have a good reputation. The pay is great, and the customers are loyal.”
Ashley sat reeling, still absorbing the information. “I won an industry award last March,” she said, “for styling the models’ hair at the Museum of Art’s Pompeii exhibition party.”
“That’s great! But how would a hair stylist get involved with the Pompeii exhibition party?” Sandie asked.
“Through my younger sister.” Ashley smiled to herself. “She got me involved with the museum a few years ago. She has a big interest in archaeology.” Lisbeth, besides being a doctor, was also a history nerd. A big, lovable history nerd. “I learned to style hair for the Roman period using pictures my sister showed me. The women back then wore really intricate braids and headpieces. It was interesting. Some of the museum members commissioned period costumes for the party, and I designed the hairpieces for their outfits.”
“I could see where Ilana would be impressed with you.”
“I hope so,” Ashley murmured.
“Well...” Sandie glanced back toward her station. “Will I see you tomorrow?”
“Of course.”
Feeling uneasy again, Ashley clutched her purse and headed out the door to meet Brandon. As she passed the receptionist station, Kylie nodded at her. “Goodbye, Ashley. Are you coming back tomorrow?”
So uneasy.
* * *
OUTSIDE, THE SUN had lowered behind the buildings enough that it wasn’t as hot as it had been when Ashley had been outside with Aidan earlier.
She walked past the park where she’d sat with him, but she couldn’t think of that right now. Feeling shaky again, she paused to take a breath. She’d been walking so fast, so lost in thought, that she almost bumped into a woman coming toward her on the sidewalk. The woman—with a little dog in tow, pulling on his leash—frowned at Ashley as she passed.
Ashley moved to the other side of the sidewalk. Put her hand over her stomach and took a deeper breath.
Almost home. She was at the building next to theirs, which housed a liquor store on the street level. A “package store,” as they were known in New England terms, or at least, as people in her old neighborhood called them. “Packies” for short.
Her gait slowed. She couldn’t help glancing in the window at the rows of bottles. Wine, her particular weakness, would be at the back of the store. She was no connoisseur, hadn’t cared about vintages or grapes, she’d just sipped now and then to keep the edge off and to help her nerves. Shaky nerves, like she had now after her unsettling day of work. The vague sense of shame that she’d done something wrong, but wasn’t quite sure what. The anxiety that she was an inadequate person and didn’t quite know how to fix it, other than to do what she had to, which was to take care of her child. The child she’d been blessed with, a most precious person. The one person who always loved her back, and she couldn’t screw him up, not like she and her sister had been screwed up by their mom and her alcohol-and-men problems.
Ashley touched the window, her hand trembling. A part of her, so raw and visceral, desperately wanted to go inside that package store. To hear the tinkling of the bell over the door. The cool feel of the bottle in her hand. The crinkling of the brown paper bag that covered it. And then, at home in her kitchen, to pop open the cork and pour the white wine into the large plastic cups that she and Brandon had used back when she’d last tasted a drink.