Page 6

Five

Stop worrying about being the hottest chick he’s been with and start being the scariest.

— Searcy to Kent

SEARCY

The first thing I did the next morning was head out for a run.

I couldn’t afford a gym membership.

I also couldn’t afford any weight equipment.

Hell, I could barely afford the clothes on my body.

My shoes needed replaced last year, and every single pair of socks I owned had holes in them.

Yet, running was free, and I had to do something to help me alleviate the complete shitstorm that was my life.

I was a sweaty mess by the time that I arrived home to a bustling house.

Before I could say hi, the kids were out the door, heading to the rec center where they’d spend the day.

There was a summer program that catered to the lower income families like mine.

There they could get free breakfast, lunch, and snacks. They could swim, play, and enjoy their summer, all the while being in a safe environment.

The kids had been going since they were younger—something that I’d never had the privilege of doing because I’d been working since I was five.

The moment the house was quiet, I pulled my computer out and got to work on a book cover for a new client.

After sending out the first draft, I started to clean.

By the time mid-morning hit, I got ready to head to the diner.

Speaking of selfish mothers, ours hadn’t come home last night.

How did I know?

Because I was sharing a room with her for now because Koda was in town and needed his own room.

Before Koda had moved out, he’d shared a room with Kent. However, the first moment that he could, Kent had taken over Koda’s old room and made it into his own.

Not that I blamed him.

Sharing a room with a teenage boy was hard at the best of times. Sharing a room with a boy and a girl was a recipe for disaster.

Angrier now than before as I headed to my room to grab a change of clothes—Koda was still sleeping, and damned if I would wake him—I got dressed in my finest clothes and left.

My finest clothes consisted of a tank top that had a built-in bra in black, short shorts that helped me rack in the tips when old men came in, and my Converses.

I got them last year when a big payout came through for a book cover.

They were my favorite shoes, and I didn’t wear them all that often because I didn’t want them to get ruined.

But when I saw my sister wearing them home from school the day before, I decided that if she was going to wear them and destroy them, I might as well wear them myself and destroy them.

The distance from our house to the diner was a fifteen-minute walk—just shy of a mile.

I had to pass the Dollar Store, the Dairy Queen, and the feed store to get to the diner.

I’d passed the first two and was just to the middle of the parking lot of the feed store when some movement caught my eye.

My mouth went dry as I watched the man from yesterday—Mr. Jalapeno—helping a high school kid load the back of his truck with feed.

I was so focused on him that I hadn’t realized that I’d stopped walking until a honk had me twisting my head toward the car that was waiting to pull into the driveway.

And since I felt like they had plenty of room to get in with where I was standing, I flipped them off.

“You can make it in front of me,” I grumbled as I started my walk again.

I tried not to look back at the sexy cowboy, truly I did, but the moment I was free of the parking lot I turned to stare again.

He was in even more faded blue jeans than the ones he had on yesterday, a white t-shirt that was soaked through with sweat, and motorcycle boots.

It was the sexiest outfit I’d ever seen.

My phone pinged, reminding me that I had five minutes until I was supposed to open the diner for lunch, and I reluctantly finished my walk.

I fully expected to find my mom there already, but when I arrived, the whole place was closed and quiet. My mom wasn’t there opening up the diner, nor was the cook there getting the grills prepped.

And, because I was fucking over everything, I wrote with a Sharpie on the back of an old packing receipt: Only grilled cheese all day.

If I was going to be on my own, you bet your ass I wasn’t about to make this harder than it had to be.

Truthfully, if I could burn this place to the ground and collect the insurance payout, I would.

But, it was minuscule. A measly couple thousand.

And in the grand scheme of things, that really wasn’t all that much when you had rent to pay at home, three kids to feed, and had a mother that was so fucking selfish.

Angrily, I unlocked the door, turned on all the lights, and got the grills started up.

I was about to come back out and get a pot of coffee started when the first customer arrived.

I instantly curled my lip in disgust.

Taryn Durant.

I hated him with every fiber of my being, and the last fucking thing I wanted to do was wait on his ass.

However, since he was a consistent customer, and I loved his dad—Mr. Durant was one of my regulars that tipped really well—I chose to deal with Taryn’s bullshit.

Speaking of Mr. Durant, better known as Tony, he followed on Taryn’s heels.

They chatted while I got the place started up, and Tony waited patiently for me to get the coffee finished up while Taryn huffed and puffed.

“What can I get you, Mr. Durant?” I asked, addressing Tony and not Taryn.

The door opened again and a haggard looking young woman came in carrying a car seat with a screaming baby in it.

Taryn narrowed his eyes and muttered under his breath, “Great, just what I want to hear when I’m having lunch.”

I didn’t comment, but Tony snapped at his son to ‘control himself.’

The ass.

The third person in the door was my cook, and he shot me an apologetic look as he raced past me to the back of the diner.

The door swung closed as he made his way around the corner.

I got the coffee for Tony, then smiled at the young woman and said, “Just take a seat anywhere.”

She nodded and went to the booth in the corner of the room—which subsequently was where Taryn liked to sit.

I smiled at him next, knowing he was pissed that I didn’t address him first, and said, “You can take a seat anywhere, Taryn.”

He muttered under his breath that I was a ‘bitch’ and took off to a seat that was clear across the room from the screaming baby.

Tony took his coffee outside so he could catch up with a buddy, and I took the woman’s and Taryn’s orders—grilled cheeses.

I handed the order back to the cook and got them started on drinks.

Meanwhile, the baby continued to cry.

I set her cup of Dr Pepper down and said, “Can I walk around with him for a bit?”

I loved kids.

I just didn’t ever think I’d get any of my own.

I wouldn’t be bringing a child into this world when I couldn’t even take care of my siblings.

Then again, I’d have to find time to find a man first.

Speaking of men, the sexy face of the cowboy biker popped into my head, and I had to inwardly fan myself.

“Oh,” the woman was soft spoken. “Sure. If you are okay with holding him?”

I held out my hands and said, “I have four siblings, all of which I helped raise myself. Let me at him.”

She handed over the chunky little boy that looked to be about three or four months old.

The baby continued to cry, but I just turned him around on my shoulder and said, “I’ll just be right over there taking their order.”

Another group of people had walked in during our talk.

The woman looked over and nodded, her face a mask of relief.

I patted the baby’s bottom as I walked over to the group—another bunch of regulars—and took their orders.

Just as I got their order written down with some difficulty due to the wriggling baby in my arms, the bell over the door pinged again.

I looked up to find the young girl from yesterday.

Scottie, Posy had called her.

“Hey.” I smiled. “Just take a seat anywhere, and I’ll be with you as soon as I put this order in.”

Scottie went to the same stool her brother had taken the night before and sat, smiling at me. “You have a baby?”

“No,” I said as I filled up drinks. “That woman over there behind you does. But she looked like she was about to have a mental breakdown, so I offered to hold him for a bit.”

She nodded and turned to look.

Sure enough, the woman was likely no longer about to have a mental breakdown. She was now full blown having that breakdown.

She had her face buried in her hands and she was hunched over, shoulders shaking.

The baby in my arms gave a little hiccup, then stopped crying.

I turned so that the young girl could see and said, “Is the baby asleep?”

“Yep,” she answered.

“Good.” I sighed. “Let me get these drinks over, give the order out, and I’ll be back. Unless you just want to come get your own drink.”

Surprising me, she did just that, getting her own drink and then writing her own order down on a pad of paper before sliding it back to Lenny.

Lenny took it with a wink, and I got to work with a sleeping baby in my arms.

“I need some ketchup,” Taryn said when I placed his fries down in front of him.

I reached over to the table that was just a few feet away from his and gave him the bottle, which he took with an eye roll.

Ass.

Since the baby was fully asleep now, I went back to the car seat and placed him inside.

He didn’t wake.

But the woman finally looked up from contemplating her hands.

Her eyes were puffy and red, and I couldn’t help myself.

“What’s going on?” I asked. “Are you okay?”

I don’t know what it is about me, but people always talk to me, whether I want them to or not.

But this time, I was more than okay with her opening the floodgates on me.