Eye of the Storms (Eye of the Storms #1) (21 page)

“I know, Jack.” When he ran out of steam, I felt the need to fill in the gap. “I would be fighting you every step of the way with even the slightest custody, wouldn’t let you be here with him, wouldn’t have let you take him out yesterday, if I didn’t know so.”

The clank of a crutch echoed in the hall, and as Tristan was moving much easier, stronger and faster each hour, we barely had time to jump a space apart on the bed before he appeared in the door.

“Finished my lunch,” Tristan proudly announced, and asked of the game he’d quickly become addicted to, “Who wants to race me?”

Curving an instinctive smile when I saw he was unconsciously swinging his crutches around, as he stood balanced just fine, I knew that it wouldn’t be long before he was riding the red bike Jack had promised him. Or, playing basketball with the shorty goal brought in from the car yesterday along with other prized items, like a black hoodie and the temporary tattoos, which now decorated his tiny arms.

“Come’re, sweetheart. Jack and I need to talk to you.”

Interested, he obediently closed the distance, and I held his crutches as Jack pulled him onto the bed. Over Tristan’s head, I sought silent substantiation from Jack and took in a deep fortifying breath.

“Remember we talked about your daddy a couple of times?”

Tristan had been quick to figure out that a true family unit began with a Momma and a Daddy. Possibly, from his shows, or maybe he had rationalized his grandparents relation to me and deduced from there. In whatever way it had happened, he had been curious enough to question things I was not ready to answer at his young age.

Nodding, Tristan tilted his head upward to Jack. “My daddy lives in Cally Fornya”

The pronunciation of California threatened to crack me up every time. To me, ‘Cally Fornya’ screamed stripper stage name.

Jack reeled with Tristan’s revelation for a different reason. I saw the surprise in his eyes. He had never expected Tristan to know even a minute detail like that, and his look locked with mine.

“And he likes to sing! Like me!”

Another spark lit Jack’s eyes, and although the emotion wasn’t clear, it was good.

“Tristan.” Stroking his back, I waited until he looked at me. “Remember, I told you that when you got bigger we would talk again about your daddy? Well, you’re bigger, and we’re going to talk now.” Instinctively, realizing the seriousness, that this talk was about to change his life, his eyes grew large and his bottom lip tucked under his teeth in a nervous gesture. “When you had your surgery, I called… I mean your daddy…”

Heaving a breath, I blurted, “Jack is your daddy.”

Transfixed, his eyes stayed on my face before comprehension dawned, and his wide dark gaze searched mine. Transparent, the emotions went through his eyes like a slide show.

Stupefied. Happy. Wary. Wonder.

My hand slid to his shoulder in support. When Jack’s hand rested on his other shoulder, Tristan swiveled, and I was no longer privy to his feelings. Instead, I watched Jack’s face, and the tenderness playing over his features.

Quietly, we let the news settle on him and then softly, Jack said, “If you have any questions, you can ask me or your mom— ma.” Hastily, he added the last syllable.

“Do I say Jack or Daddy?”

“What do you want to say?” Jack’s eyes anxiously met mine as he voiced the question to his son.

“Daddy.”

J
ack’s face radiated an aura of so many emotions. His eyes were glowing as they ran gratefully over my face, and he gently pulled Tristan’s shoulder to him in a tentative hug. Tristan turned, throwing both arms around Jack’s neck, clamoring to his lap. Easing up, I left the two alone.

Moving about in the kitchen, I assembled a large salad and raked part of it into a serving bowl, before putting the rest in the fridge to chill for supper. Because I had ended up binge eating the ice cream the previous night, and had not completely worked off the loaded breakfast burrito this morning, I shook a few drops of olive oil and vinegar in lieu of my favorite ranch salad dressing.

Before settling at the bar with the light lunch, I dumped the red beans, soaked since early morning, into the slow cooker. Next, I tossed in a large sausage link, along with heavy sprinkles of creole spice.

Ironically, just as I finished my last lettuce leaf, Jack and Tristan proposed an ice cream trip. Again. The amount of ice cream brought into this house was maddening. I gained a half a pound every time I walked near the freezer.

“Coming with, Mariss?”

Mariss. At the last use of that endearment, I had been in his arms. Well, my legs had been in his arms…

“Come on, Momma. You need to get out of the house.” Tristan peered from over the couch where he was powering off his game, and I burst into agreeable laughter. As humorous as it was to hear that quote from a four-year old, he was right.

Tristan prattled on from the back seat of Jack’s Audi rental about what flavors he wanted in his three scoops, and Jack, after playfully lending counsel, glanced from the road to me, then back again.

“What flavor for you?”

“Banana pudding.” It was one of my favorite desserts, and the frozen version was just as delicious.

“Good choice,” he approved. “All scoops or just the first?”

“The one and only scoop.”

“You aren’t seriously getting only one scoop?” His tone dripped disapproval.

“That’s all she ever gets,” Tristan piped, leaning as far as his seat belt would allow toward the gap between the two front seats. “If she gets any scoops. Most of the time, she just eats bites of mine.” The last part was a disagreeable grumble.

I twisted my head surprised. My son had always generously shared the bites I became carried away with, but obviously, he harbored a secret grudge.

“I promise to stay out of yours, you little ice cream miser,” I teased and released some of my slight animosity in a sigh.

“I think you should have a scoop of peach with the banana,” Jack stoically advised, the smirk dancing in his dark eyes instead of on his lips

“That doesn’t sound good.”

“Trust me, it is.” He came back smoothly in the tone of a flavor connoisseur.

“I just want one scoop. Is that a freakin’ felony?”

He laughed, and I loved hearing the sound again. Here, in the car, almost to the shop, which boasted over two-hundred flavors of homemade ice cream, it was too easy to pretend we were a real family and not just bonded by blood.

The feeling pervaded as we strolled into the cold building with Tristan riding piggyback on Jack. Once inside, Jack turned to allow his passenger an easy view of the flavors, which put him face to face with me.

I studied his features, wondering if we were back to the way things were before the fight, or if our words were still wedged between us. And I wondered where I wanted us to be. I didn’t want to be hurt again, and yet, I wanted every piece of him I could have, until having him was no longer an option.

Having Jack in my world, lending his support during a vulnerable time had temporarily deluded me, and I now realized that much. The way sex had become a meaningless thing the second we argued had opened my eyes. The texts coming in every other hour on his phone, the calls he took to the privacy of the patio, all of this and more drove home the fact that there was another life waiting for him on a different coast. Rock stars married models, not casino workers—even when the average woman was his baby momma.

Even after having plenty of thinking time in the car, Tristan took another ten minutes to narrow his choices down to three. All the while, even throughout my serious thoughts, Jack and I indulgently smiled and made faces as the teenager holding the empty scoop grew more and more impatient with his tiny customer.

Once we were in the car, I began passing Tristan napkins along with precautions against making a mess. Jack shrugged it off. “It’s a rental. So what if they throw an extra charge on for cleaning? We had fun, and that’s what’s important.”

Turning away from our drippy kid, I lightened up. Jack, I was learning, came from a well-to-do family even before making it big in music. He would never understand the equal ratio of money to fun. Maybe Tristan would grow up with a healthy balance.

I was finished way before they were, and I clenched my empty container, refraining from begging a bite from each of Tristan’s flavors. As if reading my mind, Jack passed his over. “Try this.” When I shook my head and voiced a polite refusal, his persistence manifested once more. “Red Velvet… Come on. You know you want it…”

Ignoring the teasing lilt of his voice, I curved a smile but was firm. “No. Really I don’t. But thanks for wanting to share.” Here, I shot a look at Tristan before I could stop myself, slightly hurt that my kid resented the sweet bites he had once given with sweet smiles.

“Watching your weight?” Jack joked. Suddenly, the dawning crossed his face, either from my expression or from the clues in our time together. “You are watching your weight!” Incredulous, he shot another look to me, this time down my figure as he pulled to a four-way stop.

“True dat.” Tristan surfaced from his bowl long enough to verbalize through a bite.

Jack lifted one of those dark brows, bouncing a dumbfounded look through the rear-view to the back seat, and I wanted to giggle. This gangster talk, or whatever slang Tristan was quickly picking up from ‘listening to Jack on the phone,’ was as hysterical as it was annoying to hear. The most amusing part was watching Jack learn how fast kids sponged up their environment.

“She weighs every day and writes it down.” Swallowing his bite enough for a whole sentence, my son sold me out, and I indignantly glared.

“No way.” Displaying flat disbelief, Jack assessed me again, particularly my waist and legs, instead of my chest, which was his common eye-candy.

I had to wonder if he thought I would be fat one day. As quickly as the thought came, it angered me that I was especially self-conscious when it came to him.

“Mariss, if anything, you're too skinny. I thought stress had you underweight…”

“Too skinny.” A gurgle of a laugh was on my lips. “That’s such a line.”

“A line? Not one I ever used,” he scoffed, as he swung a left turn.

No doubt because all of his women had been skinny models. I bit back the retort and instead said, “Well, you just did.” Adjusting the dash vent to blow cold air directly on my flushed face, I continued, “There’s not a girl alive who doesn’t know. When a guy says that, he is wanting in your pants.”

“Jack couldn’t fit in your pants.”

Sucking in an aghast breath, I stared ahead, unable to even look at Tristan. Only a few times had I made such a careless lapse. Of course, this latest blunder was after practically accusing Jack of not censoring what he said around Tristan.

“His legs are way too long.”

The observations continued from the rear seat.

I was mute, and I closed my eyes for a blinding moment from Jack’s extreme enjoyment of the situation.

“I can’t believe I said that!” My hushed whisper was directed to Jack once we were home and alone in the kitchen. I dropped our spoons and sticky cardboard bowls into the trash.

Jack only grinned as he lifted out the bag and with a twist, sealed it. As he headed to the outside can with it, he turned, “Do not say another ‘dope’ word to me.” Sporting the brow and smirk combo, he stepped out.

After measuring rice into the steamer, I stretched on the couch, reclining on the opposite arm from where Jack currently sprawled. The sounds of Tristan and Jack racing lulled my into a doze, and eventually we all felt the crash of the sugar rush.

I woke with my legs on Jack’s and carefully extracted myself, then stood staring down at father and son, so alike, especially in sleep. From his recliner, Tristan stirred, and as if by instinct, Jack also shifted.

The red beans and rice turned out ‘so dope,’ according to Tristan, and Jack’s eyes met mine before I voiced a correction. Jack’s earlier advisement, and possibly his first verbal collusion as a parent, was to ignore the new words, concluding that as long as the expression was not being heard around him anymore, Tristan would stop. To call him down on it would only imprint it in his head.

Jack and I were conversing as normal again, and as we laughed over the latest banter with Tristan, we also ignored the bites dropped to Bally. At least our son was no longer in the habit of feeding the dog with his fork.

Across the room, the newscast flickering on the muted tv screen drew my eyes. When I looked back, Jack had found closer entertainment.

“What’s this?” He was inspecting a scrawled up envelope, and his fork stopped midway to his mouth in surprise as he read.

The conversation Olivia had advised me to jot. Reaching across the bar, I plucked it from his hand. With a quick look at Tristan, I mumbled, “Nothing.”

“It’s not ‘nothing.’ Why’d you write that down?”

“Because Olivia told me to.”

Confusion shaded his features, but at this admission, the inclination quickly became suspicion, and saying nothing, he resumed eating.

The reprieve was short.

The second Tristan was tucked into bed with three stories, Jack joined me on the couch. Somehow, I had fallen with the best of them and had become a hardcore addict to the race car game.

“Want to play?” Wheedling the question, I lifted my controller.

As if he hadn’t heard, he resumed the earlier inquisition. “Why did you write that stuff down?”

Giving up, I cast my game piece to the sofa table and considered my words.

“Olivia said I could have taken what you said all wrong. That I would see things more clearly if I wrote them down.”

Relaxing his posture, he bent to rest his arms on his knees and focused on the floor. When he turned his attention to me, his words were quiet.

“And did you?”

The gulp in my throat threatened to choke out my breath. After reading over it while cleaning up in the kitchen, I was no longer certain Jack had spoken of full custody in that horrible argument. Exactly what he was speaking of, I could only guess. And guessing only made me hope. And hopes had a way of being dashed.