7. Dylan

7

DYLAN

" D addy!" Max yelled as he jumped up from his toys and ran to me.

I scooped him up and stepped into the nursery.

Jessica looked up. Confusion creased her brow. She looked at the light coming in from the window and then back at me. "You're early."

I nodded. I had missed at least one week of having dinner with my son, and I didn't want to keep doing that. Knowing that Jessica was at home taking care of Max had allowed me to focus on projects and spend more time at work. But something changed over the weekend. I don't exactly know what it was, but I felt the need to be home to see my son. And Jessica.

"I thought I'd come home for dinner, and maybe even be around to do more than just read Max a good night story."

"Your timing is great. We were finishing up with playtime so we could start cleaning up before dinner."

"Cleanup time?" I asked. "Don't you just pick up after him?"

"I'm his nanny, not his maid. And he's not too young to learn to take on some responsibility of helping to put his toys away."

"Let me help out," I said as I set Max down. "I'll put my stuff away and be right back."

Jessica didn't have time to protest. I wasn't going to let her. I crossed the hall and basically tossed everything onto my bed before returning to the room. She was kneeling on the floor next to Max with a colorful plastic bucket. Max was moving around the room picking up items at random and putting them into the bucket. I grabbed a handful of blocks, and before I could put them into the plastic bucket, Max was shaking his head frantically at me.

"No blue, no blue!" he said over and over again.

I dropped the blocks into the bucket, and Max immediately dropped what he was holding and pushed me.

"Hey, Max," Jessica started. "No pushing. Your dad doesn't know how to do this. He's trying to help."

"I know how to clean up."

"Yes, of course you do, but you don't know the system we have set up. Blocks go in the red bucket, dinosaurs in the blue bucket. Max, why don't you grab the red bucket for your dad?"

Max got up and ran across the room and dragged the red plastic bin back to me.

"Hey, I didn't mean to upset you," I told him. "You'll have to teach me how to clean up here."

With a very serious expression, Max showed me the blocks and how to put them into the red bucket. "No throwing," he said.

Cleaning up in the nursery took all of five minutes, but when it was over, Max looked so very proud of himself. I had to admit, it was a lesson worth teaching him.

"Join us for dinner," I told Jessica.

She shook her head.

"It wasn't a question. Come on, you don't have to hide to eat." I held out my hand and didn't budge until she slipped her hand into mine. The touch of her palm to mine sent a surge through my body. It was a simple touch, but it was potent.

She had to have felt it too. As soon as she was on her feet, she dropped my hand and rubbed her hands against her jeans as if trying to get something off them.

"Fine, I'll have dinner with you."

Her smile warmed my chest. Her company had me smiling and Max giggling through dinner. It was more than pleasant. It was something that was missing from my life, the simple joy of being around someone I liked.

"I'll take Max and get him ready for his bath," she said as we finished eating. "Come on, let's get you ready for bed."

I was a bit behind them when I heard Clara call out to Jessica. One moment, Jessica held Max's hand as they headed down the hall toward my mother's rooms, and the next, there was a crash of broken glass and Clara was yelling. "Look what you've done! Get that child away from me. What do you think you're doing?"

They couldn't have been anywhere near her. It was as if she had dropped the tray and blamed Max on purpose. By the time I caught up to them, Jessica was holding Max behind her, he was crying, and she was bending over trying to help pick up large chunks of broken ceramics. Clara wasn't in the hall.

"What happened?" I asked.

"I don't know, but…"

Jessica's eyes went wide as we could hear Clara loudly complaining to my mother that Jessica had sent Max running down the hall and he had crashed into her, making her drop everything. The roaring in my ears blocked out the rest of what she said. Anger rose with my blood pressure.

"She called out to us," Jessica started.

Max continued to sob loudly.

"I'll take care of Max," I said, stepping in. I picked up my crying son and patted his back trying to calm him.

Jessica stared up at me with wide eyes. She looked scared. "I didn't do anything."

I nodded. "I know. I saw. Are you all right?"

She nodded with quick little movements.

I had the urge to reach out to her and comfort her as I was comforting Max. My gut tightened at the thought of wrapping her in my embrace and stroking her hair and skin until her shaking stopped.

She ran her hand up and down the back of her other arm. "I think I'll go for a drive, if that's okay. I need to get out of here."

I nodded. "That's actually a good idea. I'll take Max. He'll calm down and fall asleep. You want to come with?"

Her hair bounced as she shook it. "No, but thank you. Maybe… maybe next time. I think this time, I need to just drive along the coast with my windows down and music blasting. Max would not find that very soothing."

I nodded in understanding. The rage drive combined with as much salt air as possible, I had done that often in my youth. One of the benefits of living on the coast. The water might have been too cold for the beach, but there were still winding coastal roads and the waves and the wind.

"Drive safe," I said.

"You too. Thanks." She gave me a weak smile before she left.

I made soothing, shushing sounds for Max as I carried him. Jessica was already gone by the time we got to the car. I grabbed my keys and got him into his car seat without too much fussing. I put on his favorite audiobook and started driving.

"Dylan." Ryan's voice came through the speaker phone.

I punched the volume button on my steering wheel. I didn't want his voice booming through the speakers and waking Max. He had finally settled and was not quite fully asleep.

"Ryan, how can I help you, man?"

"I was hoping you would be able to give me some good news. I hadn't heard anything regarding the proposal I sent over," he said.

"You did receive a confirmation from my assistant, right? I did get the proposal files. I've distributed them to the appropriate team players and board members to review."

"Yeah, yeah, I got that email saying the files were received. But it's been crickets ever since," he pointed out.

Crickets? It had been a very long time since we had been associates. I couldn't remember whether Ryan had always been this impatient. I chuckled. Overly bright headlights from a car headed in my direction took my attention from the conversation for a moment. I cursed under my breath.

"Is there a problem?" Ryan asked.

"That wasn't for you. I'm out driving. Look, I gave my people a few days to review everything before we come together and review the proposal."

"Well, I'm not in town forever," Ryan pointed out.

"Don't hang around on account of us," I said. "We can always schedule a time for you to come back to the peninsula for a meeting."

"I was hoping, based on our conversation on Saturday, that you'd be able to streamline this process."

I thought about his words for a moment. I was doing exactly that. His proposal didn't sit in my inbox as I reviewed it before forwarding it to my group to get their opinion. I sent it out right away.

"Ryan, you know these things take time. Go home. You can relax knowing I've got your proposal and I sent it to my people with my endorsement to move forward. I'll light a fire under everyone and get a meeting with everyone on the schedule as soon as I can. I know from my perspective, I have a full couple of weeks coming up."

"Yeah, yeah, I got ya. But you have to know this isn't going to be a great opportunity for long. Someone else is going to either come up with the same idea, and then we are just copy cats and not industry leaders."

"I hear you," I said. I also heard what he wasn't saying. If I didn't move on this, he would walk the proposal over to a competitor and hand it to them. This was clearly an ‘if you snooze, you lose' situation. "I'll see what I can do to expedite the process with my people."

"I knew you were the right man for this. So, how's that pretty nanny of yours? Must be a real challenge knowing she's under the same roof. Hmm."

I did not like the tone in his voice when he asked about Jessica. I stretched my fingers out and then wrapped them tightly around the steering wheel. My foot pressed down on the accelerator, the car responding with a purr and more speed. I didn't really have the kind of road I needed to really open the car up and let it cut through the night at high speed. Besides, with Max in the back, it would have been stupid to put my boy in danger because I had a need to get my aggression out.

"I'll shoot you an email once I get things moving," I said, completely ignoring his comment about Jessica.

"Okay, talk to you la—" I punched the End Call button on the steering wheel before he was finished.

I checked on Max in the rearview mirror. He was out. Good. Not that he would have been able to repeat anything, but I didn't want Jessica knowing that Ryan was asking about her.

Something inside me hated that Ryan even knew about her. I wanted to keep Jessica like she was some beautiful secret for just me and Max.