“The only reason I’ve never had an extra pound is because I’ve been so concerned about it.”
He studied her. He would never have pegged Sarah as having any kind of self-esteem issues. She seemed as confident, as self-contained, and self-possessed as anyone he’d ever meant. “You should eat.”
“A guy like you wouldn’t understand.”
“A guy like me? All right, try explaining to me why eating is not a good idea.”
“You make it sound so simple. You probably eat four thousand calories a day and don’t gain a pound. You probably can’t gain a pound. And you’re a guy. You don’t have the same pressures. So, no, a guy like you wouldn’t understand me.”
“You’re about twenty pounds from being even an average weight. And you forget I’m helping to raise Angie. I’m pretty read up on any new diet or fad teenage girls are into. So, I do get it. No, I mean I get it with Angie, but you? You’re successful, you’re thin, and yet you’re still insecure about it? How is that possible?”
She pushed the basket away from her. She shook her head. “It doesn’t come as easily for me as it does some people. Kelly looks how she does with no effort. I’m not so lucky.”
She was staring off into the restaurant, her mouth in a tight line. She did not like this conversation. He took the basket and said gently, “Well, one night? A few fries? That will change the course of your life how?”
She twisted her lips. Considering the fries? Who knew fries were a decision of life or death proportions? “Okay. Just a couple.”
He watched her eat a few. Why did that please him so much? But by her stiff posture she did not like him looking at her. He glanced away and finished his burger.
“Are you all right?”
They had been quiet for several moments when he found Sarah watching him. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Angie. That was hard for me at the doctor and I’m not her family. It was heartbreaking.”
“That. Yeah, that’s not so easy to be okay about.”
“What do you want her to do with the baby?”
“I wish I could say I wanted her to keep it like Vanessa did, but God you’ve seen how clueless and young acting she is. I can’t picture her caring for a newborn. I cringe picturing her being responsible when she can’t even keep safe money I give her to see a movie. Vanessa was different than Angie at that age. No more equipped for motherhood, but Vanessa came from an abusive home, and was already on her own. She had already dropped out of school and worked full time. Angie, well, she can hardly wake before noon on weekends, and isn’t exactly a ball of fire about anything, which is fine, or supposed to be fine. She’s supposed to be lazy and growing up as a sophomore in high school, but her taking care of a baby? No way.”
“I agree she doesn’t seem into being a self-sacrificing teenage mom. I really don’t think she truly gets that she’s not just overweight, but that a baby is in her.”
“No, she doesn’t seem to get that.”
“Would you consider adoption?”
He sighed. Would they willingly separate this baby from Angie? From their family?
“Yeah, at this point, I’m thinking of encouraging just that. I wish none of this was even put before her. She’s young and kind of naive about life, and I don’t want her regretting whatever happens for the rest of her life. Or for her to hate me for whatever I encourage her to do.”
Sarah furrowed her brow at him. “You’re good with her. How do you handle it all with such natural ease?”
“I must, she needs me.”
“Because of her mother?”
He let out a long breath through his teeth. God, she would not get off Vanessa. “Yes, Sarah, because of her mother.”
She shrugged. “Well, my brother is fifteen and I can hardly get him to do more than burp at me. I admire how you are with Angie.”
“You have a brother? I didn’t know that.”
She snickered. “That wasn’t included on the Sarah Langston report?”
“Funny. So how come your brother is so much younger than you?”
“My parents had some issues in between us.”
“Ten years’ worth?”
“Yes,” she whispered, looking down at her plate. What was the story there? Finally, she tilted her head up. “How will you approach Angie’s pregnancy with her?”
“I guess what feels right.”
“How do you know what that is without having thought it out first?”
“You think out everything?”
“Yes.”
“That’s the thing about teens, even if you think it out, their moods and opinions change with the tides. There’s no real planning allowed.”
She was quiet for a moment. “I shouldn’t judge so harshly, should I? I really don’t know any better. It’s just when Angie looks up through that hair as if begging me for answers, or a hug, she melts my resolves to be kinder about her mother. I guess what I’m saying is I’m sorry for how I’ve come off toward you both.”
Scott sat back leaning against the booth as he watched Sarah talk. Confused with who she was versus who he had her pegged to be.
“Vanessa. You can say it, you won’t get cursed or something.”
She smiled. “Okay, Vanessa. I guess I would have a hard time if she were my teenage daughter. So what happens with Vanessa? Like tonight will she talk to Angie? Do you stop by their place?”
He shook his head. “They live with me.”
She paused in process of sipping her wine. Her mouth hung open. “You live with Vanessa?”
“Yes.”
“Oh,” Sarah said with a sniff. No doubt what she thought about
that.
“No wonder Angie called you her mother’s boyfriend.”
“I’m not.”
Sarah paused and nodded. “Somehow I sense you’re not anymore.”
He shrugged noncommittal. “When Vanessa got pregnant, my older brother skipped town before Angie was even born. Vanessa moved in with my family for financial reasons, and my old man felt responsible for her after that.”
“So, you were what…ten when you first met her?”
“Yeah. My dad died when I was twenty. From then on it was Vanessa, me and Angie, where we’ve stayed to this day. My dad left me the house, and everything he had. So it was easy enough to help them out.”
Sarah was silent. With a deep frown she said, “She really is your family.”
“Yes, Vanessa really is my family.” He didn’t expound on the few months after his dad died, and he’d been a little crazy with grief. They had an affair that lasted a year or so before completely fizzling out. Vanessa was the only adult in his life to never leave him. And he her. There was no way Sarah would ever fully understand what there was between Vanessa and him.
“I’m sorry about your dad and brother. What about your mother? Any other siblings?”
“Nah, just us. My mom left us when I was a kid.”
By the way Sarah was studying him she read more into his statement than he defined. Did Sarah think he had mommy issues he transferred onto Vanessa?
“What did your dad die of?”
“Cigarettes. Lung cancer.”
“I’m sorry.”
He nodded in acknowledgment a little surprised at the depth of sympathy shining out of her pretty blue eyes. He’d gotten it before, of course, from women. His loner status was quite a turn on in women wanting to fulfill what they saw as a need for intimacy, for connection, for saving. But Sarah looking at him that way made him uncomfortable.
“What about you? Did you lose a parent too?”
She shook her head adamantly. “Oh, no. I have both parents still.”
He thought maybe if he played it up some Sarah just might sleep with him because of it. Something he wasn’t above doing. In fact, it was one of his best pick-up lines. Why then did he mentally shy away from that image? From having casual sex with Sarah Langston. Somehow it didn’t fit. Not at all.
Just as he was about to suggest leaving, his cell phone chimed. He grabbed it. He listened with sigh and agreed, hanging up he found Sarah watching him curiously.
“That was Vanessa.”
“Oh.” She practically grimaced.
“She needs me to pick her up.”
He was already sliding out of the booth. He threw some bills on the table to cover the meal. She finally caught on he was in a hurry. Once on her feet he turned and rushed to his truck. On the road he glanced at her and noticed her stony face. He swore. He should have gone the opposite way to drop Sarah off at her car.
“I can drop you off.”
“You’re driving the wrong way.”
“I can turn around.”
“No, it’s okay. You seem in a hurry to get to
her
.”
He flinched at Sarah’s subtle, icy tone. Sarah was the polite, restrained one of the two. What was Vanessa’s reaction going to be when she saw Sarah? Vanessa didn’t do subtle tones to her voice. Vanessa would more likely throw something at his head.
And now he’d prolonged his time with Sarah, when until today, he didn’t even like her, let alone want to hang out with her. But she had turned out to be a little funnier than he’d have guessed. She had always appeared so prim and proper, very serious and intent with her demeanor, and with whatever she talked about. But somehow that evening, he’d gotten a kick out of her. He’d almost enjoyed her
. Almost
. She was after all that bottle of expensive wine and he didn’t do wine. Ever.
Sarah glared straight ahead out of the windshield, afraid she’d already stared too much at him tonight and given away her sudden, strange fascination with him. She was suddenly attracted to his looks, his mannerism, and his face in ways she hadn’t expected. And yet, he by no means let on that he even liked her, let alone noticed her as a woman.
They drove a short distance out of Seaclusion. The road was desolate feeling as lights became sporadic through the thick growth of trees lining the road. Scott pulled off onto a side driveway that Sarah didn’t see until they were turned into it. For a moment she thought Scott was going to land them in the ditch. Scott knew exactly where they were going, even though she felt like they had, in less than a mile, fallen off the face of civilization. They followed the rutted drive a short length until they came to a single wide trailer nearly hidden among the long grass and tree growth.
She flinched at the scatter of junk. A blue tarp served as a roof in one section of the rusty, red trailer.
God
, did Scott, Angie and Vanessa live there? Somehow it changed what had been a growing opinion of Scott. And she hated herself the snobbery which she’d claimed she didn’t have. But this place was bad. Better left abandoned than lived in. Scott left his truck headlights on the trailer. He turned off the engine.
“No, I don’t live here.”
She nearly heaved a sigh of relief. What could she have said? Nice place you have here? “Did I look that obvious?”
“With your disdain? Yeah, kind of. But I don’t blame you. It’s awful.”
She smiled at him glad he felt that way too, again his appeal climbed another degree in her estimation. “Where are we and why are we here?”
His jaw clenched as he stared straight ahead. “This is Vanessa’s boyfriend’s place. They had another fight, and she’s stuck here again.”
Did Scott realize how much he said, again and another, where Vanessa was concerned? Did he realize how at her beck and call he was? Did he tolerate it because he liked her so much? Or for Angie’s sake?
And how is it, on the day Angie finds out about her baby, old Grandma Vanessa is here? Of all the places to ditch your pregnant, teenage daughter, Vanessa picks here? This shit hole? Sarah held her tongue. She didn’t want Scott mad at her again, especially for the sake of Vanessa Peters. Scott warmed up to her this evening, and she didn’t want him soured yet again. For some reason it seemed hugely important that Scott like her.
“Wait here.”
Sarah glanced at the rusted tin door. “Is he dangerous?”
“Her boyfriend? No.”
“Have you been here before?
“Yeah. They fight a lot. She doesn’t drive here and he refuses to take her home. He’s an immature asshole.”
He was out his door before he finished mumbling. His long legs ate up the knee high grass. His brown work pants clung to his ass. What was the matter with her? Scott was not her type. But here she was staring after him. He walked right into the trailer. What must the inside look and smell like? How could Vanessa stand it?
She was completely alone and in total darkness when the headlights clicked off. The vegetation blocked out any neighbors or cars passing by. Cookie licked the hand Sarah had clamped around the dog’s body for warmth and comfort. It felt so wrong sitting there waiting, staring at the trailer that got uglier and more threatening the longer she stared. Spider-like fingers pressed up her spine. She shook her head and chided herself. She was scared.
Ridiculous
. She was an adult, she did not get scared. But glancing around…she was.
Finally, she decided to go in and find Scott who she felt completely safe with, completely protected with, for reasons she just knew at gut level. He might complain about her, but he would never let harm befall her. Not the kind of harm her vivid imagination was conjuring up as she sat there in the dark lot.
She ran across the grass, and up the porch as if she expected a rat to grab at her feet. She swung open the door. Her eyes took a moment to adjust. The lights were bright, blocked by blackout curtains from shining outside. Scott stood in the center of a messy room, holding Vanessa’s small frame against him. She came mid-chest on him, like a delicate china doll. The very tenderness of their shared embrace was instantly obvious. She had barged in on them in a very private moment. Tears glinted on Vanessa’s cheeks as she snapped her head toward Sarah’s abrupt entry. Vanessa’s gaze turned fierce.
“What is she doing here?” Vanessa hissed.
“We were together when you called. You said to hurry.”
Sarah hated the defensiveness in Scott’s voice. Her hackles rose instantly that he felt he had to explain her being there when Vanessa was the one willingly in the shit hole as Scott so adequately described it. They were still embracing and staring at her. It quickly became evident that she was the intruder here, not Vanessa.
“You should have waited in the truck.” His mouth twisted and his eyes flashed in annoyance.
Sarah turned on her heel too embarrassed to utter she’d gotten scared. It almost felt like she’d walked in on them having sex.