Chapter 2

Chapter Two

The cramped office was meant to look bright and cheery, yet it was anything but. Jen shifted in the hard folding chair, holding Colby closer.

Her knee bounced, a leftover habit from her youth that anyone in her family would appreciate as a sign of her nervousness. She stilled it and smoothed a lock of Colby’s blond hair from his forehead. His hair was still so light that his pink scalp was visible under it.

She set her chin down on the top of his head. His hair smelled like watermelon kids’ shampoo. Wrinkling her nose, she focused on how soft his hair was. She’d never liked watermelon-scented anything, but her mom had bought it for him, so here they were.

Either way, her soft, watermelon-scented child shouldn’t be in the principal’s office.

The door opened, and the preschool’s principal, Miss Tierney, walked in. She gave Jen a polite smile and sat, her chair creaking. “I had asked for an appointment without Colby.” She gave Colby a friendly smile that overcompensated her statement, her white teeth contrasting with the brown of her skin.

“I didn’t have a sitter.” Jen set Colby down. She fished into her purse for her cell phone. “Here, baby, take Mama’s phone.” She slid it open and clicked on a game, all the while feeling Tierney’s eyes on her. Great. Now she probably thinks this is how I parent. She felt heat climb up her face. “He rarely gets to play these games, so he won’t even pay attention to us.”

Colby took the game happily and sat on the floor, his eyes instantly glued to the screen.

Tierney observed Colby for a few more moments before folding her hands. She didn’t look pleased, but she sighed. “I’m concerned about Colby’s behavior. There’s been a lot of hitting lately. The other day he drew blood when he pinched one of his classmates.”

Jen had already heard about the incident from her friend Lindsay who was Colby’s preschool teacher. Lindsay had apologized for having to report the incident about twenty times. Not that Jen blamed her. If Colby had shown up with a giant welt from being pinched, she would have wanted to know which kid had done it, so the other parents probably felt the same way.

“He’s been having more nightmares again, but his therapist says he’s doing really well.” Jen glanced at Colby, her heart falling. How could it be that her angelic son was capable of such violent behavior? He never seemed to fight with his cousins this way.

“Unfortunately, we can’t really have him here without an immediate improvement in behavior.” Tierney leaned forward, setting her hands on her desk.

“The problem is”—Jen lowered her voice, eyeing Colby—“I need him to be here. I can’t keep taking off work while he’s on these timeout days.”

“If I can make a suggestion, I would look for in-home, one-on-one care. With the issues Colby has right now, he’ll face similar challenges everywhere.”

No kidding. And other places didn’t have her best friend as a preschool teacher. “Unfortunately, I can’t afford that.”

Tierney bit her lip and pulled out a file. “You can’t really afford us, either, Miss Klein. Gina says you’re delinquent on the last two payments.” She turned the file so Jen could look at the ledger.

Jen’s heart rate kicked up a notch, the back of her neck breaking out in a cold sweat. She didn’t need to look at the ledger. The invoice amount had caused her to avoid Gina’s phone calls a week earlier.

But Christmas was approaching. For the past three years, since Colby had been born, she’d approached the season with dread and anxiety. She couldn’t afford this time of year. Hell, she couldn’t afford any time of year, but Christmas made that disparity clearer.

Jen lifted pleading eyes to Tierney. “Can you give me another month? I have a lot of overtime coming my way from my jobs during December.” That much was true. But it also meant having somewhere to drop Colby off on the days Mom couldn’t watch him.

“Look, Miss Klein, the truth is we’re all pulling for you. And if it were just about the money, that might be something I could wiggle around, but this is the fifth incident this month. The fifth time I’ve had furious parents at other conferences. We all love you and love Colby, but this isn’t the right place for him.”

Jen swiped tears from her burning eyes. She nodded a few times, then stood. She didn’t need the added humiliation of crying in front of Tierney. “I’ll . . . uh . . . we’ll go then.” She gathered her purse and squatted beside Colby, whose concentration remained unbroken on the phone. “Ready, bubba?”

She lifted Colby and set him on her hip, not wanting the scene of trying to wrestle the phone away from him. Because he rarely got to use it, trying to take it away was always a process. She was embarrassed enough.

She let herself out and hurried down the hall of the small preschool. The walls were plastered with art projects from the different classrooms. Stopping by the door to Lindsay’s room, she knelt in front of the cubby. She shifted through it for the gallon-sized plastic bag holding the spare set of Colby’s clothes.

Through the open doorway, Lindsay caught her eye. She motioned to the assistant and crept to the doorway, her dark eyes filled with concern. “What happened?”

Jen found Colby’s bag and stood, lifting her son once more. “They kicked us out,” she whispered. She pasted a tight smile on her face. “But we’ll talk about it later.” She didn’t want to attract any attention to herself. Open-door policies meant any of the teachers from the nearby classrooms could see.

Lindsay gave her a mournful, sympathetic expression and pulled her in for a tight hug. “I’m so sorry. I’ll come over after work?”

Shaking her head, Jen shifted. Colby was getting heavier these days, his ankles showing below his pants leg hems. It seemed like he had skipped sizes three and four entirely and gone straight to size five. Another thing she couldn’t afford. “I have a night shift at the cabins tonight. Luckily, my mom can take Colby tomorrow so I can work at the café. Maybe after I get off?”

“Don’t you have a date with Brad tomorrow?” Lindsay gave her the eager look that she used whenever Jen mentioned a possible romantic attachment. Her best friend’s loyalty was heartwarming. Lindsay seemed to want Jen to find a boyfriend more than Jen did.

Jen shook her head. “Saturday.” Any excitement she’d felt had been dampened by the news Tierney had given her.

The two women parted, and Jen hurried out of the double-glazed doors. An icy breeze blasted her, throwing her long blond hair over Colby’s face. He squirmed, annoyed that his game was being interrupted, and she took the phone away as they approached her sedan.

Colby howled as she put him in his seat. “I wannnnnt it!”

She pushed his shoulders back, desperately trying to pull his arms through the harness straps as he wiggled. “I know you do, but we’re all done.” His arms thrashed, legs kicking, and he caught her right in the gut.

And this was, precisely, why she never gave her kid her cell phone. Strapping him in, Jen closed the door. Hopefully, no one had seen. She peeked through the parking lot, but the parked cars appeared unoccupied.

Yeah. Only she and Colby were being kicked out in the middle of the day.

Jen lifted a shaking hand to her hair, pushing it behind her ear. She sucked in a deep breath, the cold air filling her lungs and making them ache. One thing at a time.

Getting in her seat, Jen glanced in the rearview mirror at Colby, whose tear-streaked face was red. He’d almost returned to his normal, pleasant self, but he had a hurt look in those ice-blue eyes. Eyes that reminded her so much of Kevin.

She pushed the thought far out of her mind. The last thing she needed right now was to dwell on that asshole. Not right now. Never.

“How about a cheeseburger?” she asked Colby as brightly as she could.

He nodded with a bright smile, and she pulled out of the parking lot onto the main road. When she got home, she’d go through the linked calendar her mom had shared a couple of weeks ago. Mom’s work schedule for the month was on it. Mom only did three shifts at the hospital a week, but with Warren and Alice asking her for help with their two youngest this fall, Mom was tired enough as it was. Jen couldn’t expect her to do any more than she was already doing.

Jen pulled into the line at the fast-food place and gripped the steering wheel tightly, trying to relax her shoulders. Earlier this fall, she’d felt relief when she dropped Colby off at the preschool in the morning. Deciding to put him in hadn’t been the easiest, but Lindsay was there, and Jen trusted few people as much as her. But shortly after the school year had started, her anxieties had drifted away. Colby only cried at drop-off the first week, but so had the other three-year-olds.

She’d just been a regular mom, swapping stories about how hard it was to yank her kid off her leg. None of the other moms gave her the side-eye, as they did at church. Even people who wanted to be sympathetic still treated her like she was a screwup.

But now, here she was. Jen the screwup. Twenty-three years old, no career in sight, and barely holding on by the threads of the life she’d struggled to sew together. With broken knitting needles, apparently. No wonder she’d failed out of English as a senior in high school. She was terrible at metaphors.

The car behind her honked, and her chin jerked up, her foot mashing the brake reflexively. The car in line in front of her was a few lengths away, the space in front of the illuminated menu, open. She glanced back at the car behind her, a fancy sports car with Illinois license plates. Giving the driver an apologetic wave, she pulled up to order.

As she got to the cashier window, an unenthusiastic teenager mumbled her total, not making eye contact with her. She handed him her debit card. A few moments later, he pushed it back toward her. “It says declined.”

“Of course it does,” she muttered under her breath. The cold, sweaty feeling was back on her neck. She flipped through her wallet for another card. Her paycheck for the first of December should have hit a few days ago. Just how negative had her balance been?

She hadn’t wanted to check the app on her phone to see.

Grabbing her credit card, she handed it to him. Please let there be some credit left on it.

A few more beats. “It’s not going through.” The kid held the card out again.

She popped open the coin holder beside her window. Only about forty cents there. Shifting her gaze to the rearview mirror, she noticed the line of cars accumulating behind her. Oh, God. Come on.

Another credit card came back declined. “Um...” Jen swallowed, her throat thick. “Can you, um... take off the adult meal and leave the kid’s one?” Maybe her debit card would go through if it was less?

Now the teenager looked annoyed. He chewed on his thumbnail. “Hang on, I have to ask my manager.”

Movement beside her window made her jump. The driver of the car behind her, a tall dark-haired man, stood there. Maybe in his late twenties. Wow , he was good-looking.

Great, all she needed. No matter how hot he was, she didn’t need an angry man pissing on her. “Mind if I step in?” He reached into his back pocket, pulling out a razor-thin wallet.

Before Jen could say anything, he handed a card to the cashier, who shrugged.

“Y-You don’t have to.” She’d rather drive off. Preferably a cliff.

“It’s my pleasure.” Hot Guy flashed her a smile. His piercing blue eyes met hers briefly, then he glanced toward the back seat.

And there it was.

His smile faltered.

Every. Single. Time.

She felt self-confident that she was pretty enough still. But once they saw Colby, most of them took off running. Thank goodness Brad didn’t seem to mind that she was a mom. She’d even talked about introducing him to Colby soon.

The cashier thrust a receipt out the window, followed by a greasy bag of food. Food that this guy must not eat often, with a physique like his. Fate had apparently sent him here to seal her humiliation.

Hot Guy took the bag of food. He held out the bag, and Jen took it from him, avoiding eye contact with him. “Thanks,” she mumbled. She should be more gracious. But then again, she hadn’t asked him for this. Rescuing her only brought more attention to her troubles among other people in line.

Any enthusiasm the guy had about helping her seemed to vanish with her response. He handed Colby’s drink to her, then smoothly tapped the window frame, still holding the chocolate milkshake she’d ordered for herself. “Next time, check your wallet before you hold up the line. Cute kid, by the way.”

Her jaw dropped as he took a sip of the milkshake and sauntered back to his car with it.

Jackass.

She wanted to run back there and dump the milkshake in his lap. Instead, she drove off, hands shaking.