“This is Mr. Austin. And he was just leaving,” Gwen says, looking pointedly at me.

Yeah, I don’t think so.

“Austin is the capital of Texas. Do you like pink? My favorite color is pink.”

Bending down to get a better look at the little pipsqueak, I see she has the exact same gray colored eyes as her mother, the same smattering of freckles over her nose and the same dark brown hair. Gwen though, has added a few streaks of blue and purple to hers and I’m not gonna lie, it’s hot as fuck.

“You’re pretty smart for a kid. What are you, like twelve or something?”

Glancing up, I see Gwen giving me the stink-eye.

“You’re funny,” Emma says with a laugh. “I’m six. My mom says I’m really smart. Are you smart? Do you have a job?”

Gwen snorts and now it’s my turn to glare at her before looking back at Emma. “I’m a genius. And I’m also a Navy SEAL, which makes me pretty bad ass.”

Emma holds her hand out in front of me and taps her foot. “One dollar, please.”

Pushing myself up to my full height, I stare down at her in confusion. “Uh, one dollar for what?”

“One dollar for the swear jar. You said a bad word. Every time my mom says a bad word I get a dollar for my college fund,” Emma replies without missing a beat.

Awww shit. That’s right. You’re not supposed to swear in front of kids.

With a sigh, I reach into my back pocket and pull out my wallet, forking over a five. “Here, keep the change. I’m sure I’ll be putting you through college in no time.”

Emma snatches the five out of my hand and runs over to Gwen. Little Miss Perfect over there probably never swears in front of her kid. And now she’s got one more thing to add to her ever-growing list of reasons why she hates me and doesn’t want me here.

“Look, mom! I got five dollars. That makes a total of…”

I watch as Emma tries to calculate in her head, scrunching up her face and thinking really hard. It would be kind of cute if I thought kids were cute. Which I don’t. At all.

“That brings you up to sixty-two dollars,” Gwen tells her quietly.

I can’t help the bark of laughter that bursts out of me. “Well, well, well. Looks like someone has a potty mouth.”

Gwen huffs, taking the five dollars from Emma and sticking it into the front pocket of her jeans. “You’re forgetting we live with my brother. Uncle Brady isn’t used to living with a little girl, right Emma?”

Emma giggles and shakes her head at Gwen. “Last week you gave me twenty dollars when you were trying to fix the leak under the kitchen sink. And the week before that you gave me ten dollars when you dropped a big book on your toe. And the day before that-”

Gwen immediately cuts her off by placing her palm over Emma’s mouth. I think I might be changing my mind on my opinion of kids. Staring at Gwen challengingly, I wait for her to explain.

She sighs. “It’s been a bad couple of weeks. Emma, why don’t you take your bag into the back room and get started on your homework?”

Gwen removes her hand from Emma’s mouth and the little girl smiles up at me before scooping up her backpack and racing off to the back room.

When Emma is gone, I watch as Gwen nervously fiddles with things on Brady’s desk. She rearranges a cup full of pens, moves a legal pad to an opposite corner and straightens the desk calendar that doesn’t need straightening – anything she can do to avoid looking at me.

After a few minutes, I decide to break the silence. “Cute kid you got there.”

She finally turns to face me and gone is the irritation that’s been there since I walked through the door. She suddenly looks small and vulnerable. Looks like I finally found the one thing, or person, who can melt this woman’s heart of stone.

“Where’s the father?” I ask curiously.

I know Gwen lives with Brady and she doesn’t have a ring on her finger, so obviously there isn’t a man in the picture.

“That’s none of your business,” she replies haughtily.

Poor guy probably couldn’t stand to be around her bad attitude for more than one night; I feel his pain.

“Hey, I’m just trying to make conversation. We’re going to be working together so we might as well get to know each other,” I tell her with a smile.

“There’s nothing you need to know about myself or my daughter. And how many times do I have to tell you that I don’t want you here?” She asks angrily.

“Look, I could give a rat’s ass if you want me here or not. I’m staying, end of. Your brother is worried and it must be for a good reason. This isn’t just you we’re talking about here. You’ve got a kid, much to my amazement. If you’re too stubborn to let me look out for you, at least I can keep an eye on her.”

I watch as anger flares in her eyes at the mention of Emma. Her hands ball into fists at her sides and her breathing picks up, her chest heaving with barely concealed fury. “I can look after my daughter just fine without your help. She’s my responsibility and I will keep her safe on my own, just like I’ve done for her entire life. Go. Away.”

Jesus Christ, I’ve never even met al-Qaeda members who were this annoying.

At least she’s got one thing going for her – she’s consistently a bitch. I can handle bitchy Gwen. That whole scene with her freaking out and spilling coffee is out of my comfort zone. She looked scared to death and helpless. It took everything in me not to pull her into my arms and tell her everything would be okay. That alone should have me running out of here like my ass is on fire. I don’t do touchy-feely, comforting shit. Good to know she seems to be the type of person who would rather chew off her own arm than accept comfort from someone else.

“Darlin’, you can tell me to leave until you’re blue in the face. I’m not going anywhere until Brady comes home, so get that stick out of your ass and get used to it,” I tell her, flopping down on the chair at Brady’s desk and clasping my hands behind my head.

With a frustrated growl, she turns and stomps off to the back room.

As I stare at her ass in those tight jeans until she disappears from sight, I can’t help but wonder what the fuck her deal is. How can someone so small be full of so much piss and vinegar? At least one good thing will come of her being such a bitch – I won’t be tempted to sleep with her anytime soon. I prefer a woman to use her tongue on me for pleasure, not making me miserable with her verbal lashes.

Brady is going to owe me big time for this shit.

Chapter 4

Gwen

“Come on, asshole, give me the money shot.”

I stare through the zoom lens of my camera at Mr. Bradford, standing in the parking lot of a Harley Davidson dealership. Mr. Bradford, a fifty-two-year old foreman at a local car manufacturing plant, “slipped and fell” at work and has been collecting workman’s comp for the last four weeks. Supposedly, the spill he took at work slipped two disks in his back that have been causing him extreme pain. Strange how someone who is supposedly in so much agony that he can no longer work, is thinking about purchasing a motorcycle.

Under normal circumstances, just buying a motorcycle wouldn’t be cause for alarm, but if this idiot gets on the bike and drives away, he’s toast. While I wait for Mr. Bradford to negotiate with a salesman, I can’t help but think about the previous day at the office. I can’t believe Brady had the nerve to send Austin to keep an eye on me without letting me know. I’m going to kill him. I get where he’s coming from – he’s been on edge ever since I told him I was filing for divorce, but this really wasn’t the way to go about calming his nerves. If William hasn’t tried to contact me by now, I doubt he ever will. Having Austin under foot every day until Brady gets back is just going to make things worse. I don’t know what it is about him that puts me so on edge and I don’t like it. I don’t like how I want to punch the smug look off of his face one minute and kiss him the next. He’s hot – there’s no denying that fact. His body looks like it was carved out of stone and my fingers itch to touch the muscles on his chest. These conflicting feelings just piss me off and I can’t help but be a total bitch around him so he’ll just go away and I won’t have to worry about the things I’m feeling. I have no business wanting any man, especially a friend of my brother.

I couldn’t help but be a little hurt that Austin had no idea I have a child. I just can’t believe that Brady never mentioned it to him. I guess I shouldn’t be all that surprised, since Brady didn’t even know I had a child until I showed up at his apartment a few months ago. Turning my back on him all those years ago when he left for the Navy had hurt him deeply, but I was the one left behind to deal with our parents day in and day out. I was the one they transferred every single expectation onto in Brady’s absence. I wasn’t able to run away like he did, not until I had a child of my own and knew I would do whatever it took to keep her safe.

I really wasn’t surprised by the look on Austin’s face when Emma ran into the office. Men like him are a dime a dozen. They’re all over you until they find out you’re a single mother and then they head for the hills. And yet, Austin took the time to talk to Emma. I’m sure it was just a ploy to butter me up so I’d agree to let him hang around the office.

Emma had a million questions for me after we left Austin, and those questions led to questions about her father. Why doesn’t he call or come to visit, does he miss her, can she write him a letter… Ever since I left William, I’ve done nothing but second-guess my decision. Even though he did everything he could to break me, he was always a decent father to Emma. He never laid a hand on her and up until the night I left, he always made sure she was never around when his anger got out of control.

Maybe enough time has passed… maybe the fact that he isn’t contesting the divorce is proof enough that he’s okay with me leaving him and he can be a part of Emma’s life again. I never wanted to take her away from him, but I didn’t know what else to do. I couldn’t survive one more day with him. I knew if I spent even one more hour in the same house as him, there would be nothing left of me.

My cell phone rings and without pulling the camera away from my face, I reach blindly into the center console and answer it.

“Hello, Gwendolyn.”

The sound of my mother’s smooth, cultured voice makes me sit up straighter so I’m not slouching. Even after months of being out of her presence, my automatic response to her voice is still the same.

“Mother, this is a surprise. I didn’t expect to hear from you until next week,” I tell her.

Even though I skipped town without a word to anyone, and never told my parents where I was going, over the last month or so I reached out to my mother. To say Brady was pissed is an understatement. He didn’t trust them at all. When they found out he wanted to go into the military instead of following in our father’s footsteps of becoming a lawyer, they pretty much disowned him and he hasn’t spoken to them since. As angry as I am with them for pushing me towards William and for never believing my accusations of abuse, they’re still my parents. I needed to at least let them know that Emma and I were alive, even if I couldn’t tell them where we were.

“I know, but I had some news I wanted to tell you,” my mother answers. “I really think it’s time for you to put an end to this foolishness and come home. There are things happening here that you need to fix.”

There’s a reason why my mother and I only speak on the phone every two weeks. I can only handle so much of her guilt and refusal to understand the life I left behind.

I ignore her demand to come home. “What’s going on?”

She sighs into the phone and if I was in the same room with her, I’m sure she would be sitting at the island in the kitchen with her fingers against her temples, like what she has to tell me is causing her a great deal of stress.

“I’m sorry to be the one to tell you this, but William is seeing someone.”

She pauses dramatically and I’m sure she’s expecting me to burst into tears or rage at the unfairness of it all. Hearing this news, I feel nothing. Absolutely nothing. I’m definitely not sad. If anything, I’m relived. The fact that he’s left me alone all this time makes more sense now.

“Did you hear me, Gwendolyn? I said, William is dating someone else,” she reiterates.

“I heard you mother. I’m not really sure what you expect me to say. I’ve filed for divorce. He’s free to date anyone he likes,” I remind her, pulling the camera away from my face and resting my head on the seat back.

“You’ve made your point. The two of you had a few problems and you left. Obviously he’s hurting so badly that he needed comfort. It’s time for you to come home and work things out. You need to stop thinking about yourself for once and put your family back together,” she tells me.

I take a few deep breaths to calm myself before replying. Screaming at my mother will accomplish nothing. No matter how many times I try to explain things to her, she never listens; she never hears me. She’s so in love with the idea of me being married to one of the top surgeons in New York and the prestige that comes with it, she doesn’t even care that her only daughter spent year after year in her own private hell.

“If this is how our conversations are going to go each time we speak, then I really don’t see the need to continue putting up with this every other week. You know why I left; you just don’t want to accept it. I’m not coming home, mother. And if you want to continue being in your granddaughter’s life, you’ll respect my wishes and stop trying to make me feel guilty.”