Page 53 of The Thief

Then the drilling started, and Ava moaned that she couldn’t hear her cartoons on the TV. So I offered to take them both out for ice cream.

Twenty minutes later, the three of us were sitting in a private booth in a dessert shop in town. Ava ordered the works: cookie dough, a knickerbocker glory, and a strawberry milkshake to wash it all down. Jess told her she wouldn’t be able to manage it, but I told Jess, “It’s fine. Let her have what she wants. It’s my treat.”

“You won’t be saying that when she’s throwing up in the back of your car on the way home,” Jess shot back, giving me a knowing look, but I didn’t care. I could handle it. I’d cleaned up worse.

Jess ordered a banana split, and I just went for a vanilla ice cream and a coffee.

“Vanilla?” Jess quirked a brow as the waitress walked away from our table after taking our order. “I never had you down as a vanilla kind of guy.”

“There’s nothing vanilla about me, but you’ll find that out for yourself,” I said, the words spilling as naturally as if she’d asked me my name.

Jess blushed and picked up a menu to read it, even though we’d already ordered. I found it cute that she was getting embarrassed.

“Are you gonna use that to hide from me?” I smirked, and she lowered it slightly, stifling a grin. Ava was busy colouring the activity sheet the waitress had given her and was totallyoblivious to what we were saying.

“I don’t think I could hide from you even if I tried,” she said, putting the menu back and staring straight at me.

Sitting across the table, I wanted to ask her about her life.

What had happened with Ava’s dad?

Where was he now?

Was he someone I had to worry about?

So many questions were swirling around my head, but I didn’t ask them. It didn’t feel right to bring them up around Ava.

So instead, I put my elbows on the table, leant my chin on my hands and asked, “What do you like to do when you get a night off? Tell me about Jess Porter on her downtime.”

Jess laughed.

“Downtime? What’s that? I’m a single mum. I don’t get nights off.”

“You must do something.” I arched my brow in question, waiting for something, anything. A little nugget about who she was underneath it all.

“Nope,” she replied. There was no regret or negativity in her response, but she dipped her head and started to rearrange the cutlery and napkins on the table. I could tell she felt uneasy, and knowing that didn’t sit right with me.

“Jess, you need time for you,” I said quietly, reaching across the table to touch her hand as she fussed over the position of her spoon.

But she pulled her hand off the table before I could reach her and put it in her lap, staring out the window as she sighed. “It’s not the right time to leave her. Not now. Not after everything that’s happened.”

“This is exactly the right time,” I said, but in reality, Iunderstood what she meant. I knew how hard it must be for her. “Life goes on, Jess,” I urged, despite feeling like a fraud.

I couldn’t get these girls out of my head. I couldn’t bear to spend a night without seeing them. If Jess had a girls’ night out, I’d probably drive myself insane with jealousy.

“I know,” she whispered, then sat up, shaking off any negative thoughts as she smiled back at me.

“Would your mum have Ava overnight?” I asked. I glanced down at Ava as she coloured her picture, humming to herself, lost in her world. “Ava loves seeing her grandma, she told me so herself.”

Ava looked up at me and nodded, then carried on with her colouring, leaving us to talk.

“I think we should ask Grandma to do some night shifts,” I announced. “You deserve a night off, Jess.”

Jess sighed. “If I had a night off, I’d probably use it to sleep.”

“Two nights off then.” I wasn’t giving up that easily.

“Mummy needs to have a spa day,” Ava declared as she stared at her activity sheet, grimacing at the colour going out of the lines in the part she’d just completed.