Rebel Heart by Penelope Ward
“Down the hall, first door on the left. I need to run to the bathroom.”
“Okay.”
Owen’s room was dark, and I didn’t want to risk tripping over something, so I flipped on the light. As I suspected, he didn’t mind in the slightest. I gently set him down on his bed and pulled the covers over him. I’d never tucked a kid in before at night, and the moment caught me off guard. I studied Owen’s little face for a minute. He was such a great kid, so full of adventure and happiness.
What would it be like to tuck my own son in every night?
I’d read him a story. He’d definitely like scary books. No pansy-ass stories for my kid about trains that talked. I smiled thinking of Gia coming in while I was reading something totally age-inappropriate and scolding us for the tenth time. I’d watch him sleep for a few minutes, before shutting the lights off and heading to my own room. Where I’d proceed to do dirty shit to his mother.
As fast as the warm feeling had come over me as I imagined that play out in my head, I suddenly remembered I wouldn’t be tucking my own son in every night. I’d be tucking Elliott’s son in.
I took one last look at Owen and headed for his door.
Beth was in the kitchen pouring wine. She had two glasses on the table.
“Would you like a glass of wine?”
“Nah. I’m good. But thanks. I’ll see you tomorrow? How about around eleven?”
Her smile fell, but she forced the edges back up. “Sure. That sounds great. Thanks again for today, Heath.”
Back in my hotel room, I cracked open a beer from the mini bar and debated over texting Gia. I’d told her I needed some time, which I did, so it really wasn’t fair to her to keep making contact until I was sure where I stood with things. I’d been checking in with Oak twice a day, having him tell me she looked fine and things were good. But it wasn’t enough. I needed to hear her, even if it was just words in a text. Yet I still settled on Oak.
Rush: How’s everything going?
Oak: Everything’s smooth here, boss.
Rush: How’s Gia? Does she look okay? Is anyone bothering her?
After I typed it, I pictured a big gloating smile on Oak’s face. I didn’t give a fuck. I needed to know.
Oak: Your woman looks good. Came in on time, and I’m paying extra attention to her.
Rush: Is she sitting enough?
A few seconds later, I got a response. Only it wasn’t from Oak.
Gia: Are you texting with Oak right now?
Shit.
Rush: Yeah. Just checking in.
Gia: That’s funny. Because he just looked up at me, then texted into his phone.
I smiled. It felt good to hear her words. I’d missed her calling me on my bullshit.
Rush: I might’ve asked how you were doing…he wasn’t supposed to let you know.
Gia: The man is six-foot-six, inconspicuous is out.
I laughed.
Rush: I’ll try to remember that.
She went quiet after that. I couldn’t let things end that way.
Rush: So now that I’m caught anyway. How are you feeling?
A new message from Oak popped up.
Oak: She’s sitting right now, looking down and smiling. She’s good, boss.
I hadn’t even noticed how tense my shoulders were, until they relaxed hearing that.
Gia: I’m feeling good. No more spotting or anything at all. But I think I grew two inches around my waist overnight. I had to sneak into your office an hour ago and loop a rubber band through the buttonhole of my pants and onto the button. They were so tight.
A vision of Gia with a big round belly popped into my head. I closed my eyes to block everything else out and nab a better look. God, I loved her pregnant. It made me want to go back home just to see her belly again. And then…it fucking hit me.
Elliott’s baby is in that belly.
It was like my brain wanted to torture me. I’d feel like everything was fine, somehow forgetting the shit storm of late, and then it would thrust back into my memory with a vengeance. Those thirty seconds where I forgot felt so good, but it only made it worse when the truth slapped me in the face once again—like cutting open a raw wound over and over.
Rush: Glad you’re feeling well. Have a good night, Gia.
All hell had broken lose.
I’d shown up to pick up Beth and Owen at eleven the next day, just like we’d agreed upon. But when I got there, the two of them definitely weren’t ready to go sightseeing. In fact, it looked like they’d both lost their sanity a little. I was tempted to stay in the doorway for a while to watch the comedy show going on, but that would’ve just led to further damage. Water was spraying full blast from the kitchen faucet, and the two of them were standing in ankle-deep water. Owen had a cracked bucket and was scooping up water from the floor and dumping it into an outdoor garbage can. Only the crack in his bucket leaked out half the contents before he lifted it from the floor to the top of the garbage can. Beth had two hands wrapped around the faucet handle attempting to stop the water, yet it continued to spray all over the place—including directly into her face. She looked like she’d been standing there for a while. Not to mention, a kitchen cabinet hung broken from its hinges, and was that…Cheerios floating in the water?
“What the heck is going on here?”
Beth answered frantically, screaming over the loud sound of the water spray. “Thank God you’re here! How do you shut off the water?”
“Turn the handle under the sink?”
She opened her clenched fist to reveal a rusted valve knob. “It broke off!”
“Where’s your main?”
“My what?”
“Forget it.” I turned around and jogged back outside. Circling the perimeter of her property, I found the main and twisted off all the water coming into her house. When I returned to chaos central, the water had stopped, and the two of them were catching their breath.
“What happened?”
“At night, we put the kitchen garbage can in the sink to keep it away from Mark.”
“Mark?”
Owen responded with a shrug. “Our cat. She’s a girl.”
“Mark likes to knock over the garbage to eat it,” Beth said. “So we put it out of her reach. She must’ve jumped up on the kitchen counter and knocked the garbage over and somehow turned on the water in the process. When I got up this morning, the kitchen was already flooded. I tried to turn it off, but the stupid knob broke off in my hand.”
I took off my shoes and started to roll up my pants. “Why didn’t you call me?”
She pointed to the corner next to the refrigerator where something was floating. “I tried. I dropped my phone. I don’t have your number memorized.”
Wading into the kitchen, I took the bucket from Owen’s hands. “Got a shop vac, buddy?”
“In the basement.”
“Come on. Show me.”
I followed Owen into the basement and grabbed the vacuum. Owen was looking down with both hands in his pocket. His pants and shirt were soaked, and he looked defeated.
I set the vacuum back down and knelt. “Everything’s going to be okay. We’ll clean it up.”
He spoke with his head still hanging. “My dad said I was supposed to take care of the house and Mom. But I didn’t know how to fix it.”
Crap.
I nudged his chin up. “I think what he meant was, he wants you to help out whenever you can. And you did that. From what I saw, you were scooping buckets as fast as the water poured in. Without you, the water would probably be to at least your waist, instead of your ankles.”
His eyes widened. “Really?”
I lied. “Yep. You pretty much saved the house, and you stayed pretty calm from what I saw. That’s the number one thing you need to do in an emergency, you know. Stay calm.”
His frown turned up to a grin. “Mom was freaking out. She wasn’t calm, was she?”
I smiled. “Nope. So it’s a good thing she had you. But I?
“Okay!”
I carried the shop vac upstairs and put it in the kitchen. Beth was in her room getting changed, so I used the opportunity to give Owen a lesson. “Come on, let me take you outside where the water main is.”
The two of us went outside, and I showed him where to turn off the water coming into the house. Then I took him back to the kitchen and gave him an electricity-meets-water lesson. God forbid the water would have been any higher, it could’ve come up to the electrical outlets and electrified the water they were standing in.
Beth emerged towel drying her hair and wearing dry clothes. “Owen, go get changed into something warm.”
“But I’m going to help Heath fix the kitchen.”
“You are, are you? Okay…well…go put on a bathing suit and take off the wet shirt and socks, at least.”
“Okay, Mom!” He took off running toward his room.
“I’m sorry about this,” Beth said. “I’ve ruined our sightseeing morning.”
“Don’t be silly. I made a list of shit I wanted to do out here; first was to see the Red Rocks and second was to clean up a flood.”
She laughed. “Thanks for being a good sport. But you don’t have to help me clean it up. I’ll do it.”
“I got it. Go sit down for a few minutes. You look sort of a wreck.”
“Gee, thanks.”
While I vacuumed up all the water, Owen did as I’d instructed him to—drying off his mom’s cell phone and putting it inside a baggie full of rice. Beth came back into the kitchen with a stack of towels when the excess water from the floor was gone. She started to lay them on the floor and dry the rest of the area.
“What happened to that cabinet door?”
“Don’t ask,” she said. “We ran around like two chickens without our heads until you got here. I dropped my cell. Owen tried to grab the Cheerios from the cabinet while he scooped water because he got hungry, and he wound up dumping the entire box into the water. And then I asked him to get me the electrical tape so I could try and tape up the spray. He couldn’t reach it, so he used the cabinet door as a stool and broke it.”
I chuckled. “You had a pretty bad morning.”
For the next three hours, my shadow and I went about fixing things. After everything dried, we went to the plumbing store and picked up the parts I needed to install a new faucet and valve handle. Owen stuck next to me the entire time. It was really freaking cute.
“First, I’m going to fix the valve handle that broke off. That way when we install the new faucet, we can turn the main back on and control things from under here in case anything goes wrong.”
“Got it.” He nodded.
The wood in the cabinet underneath the sink was soaked even though there wasn’t any visible water anymore. It would probably take a few days to dry out. I slipped off my shirt before sitting down on the floor. I’d need to be on my back inside the cabinet to work on the broken pipe stem and handle. I had to swallow my laughter when little man yanked off his shirt, too. Owen managed to fit inside the kitchen cabinet and watch everything I did while I repaired the valve stem and handle. And he asked some pretty damn good questions while we worked.
“Did it break because it was rusty?”
“Yeah, that’s what happens. The rust causes the metal to disintegrate and then it falls apart when you need to touch it one day. Basically, the rotten metal crumbles.”
“So should I change the ones in the two bathrooms? I looked under the sinks before. I think they’re getting rusty, too.”
What a kid…wasn’t even asking me to do it. Figured he’d take it on himself after he watched me do one. He took the responsibility of looking after his mother pretty seriously. I was familiar with that and respected the hell out of it.
“That’s a good thought. I’ll check ’em out and see if maybe we should do that together.”
A little while later, his mind had obviously wandered. “Dad would’ve been cursing a lot if he was here.”
“Yeah? Well, between us, I curse sometimes, too.” Translation—a fuck of a lot.
“He gets mad a lot. That’s why he doesn’t like it here anymore.”
I stopped tightening the bolt and looked over at Owen. “All adults get mad from time to time. I’m sure your dad liked it here. It’s just that sometimes people need to be separate to like each other again.”
“Do you live separate from your wife?”
No, but I just ran two-thousand miles to get away from the woman I love.
“I don’t have a wife, buddy.”
“How come?”
“I just don’t. Sometimes it takes people a while to find the right person and know it’s time to get married.” I’m having this conversation with a six-year-old. While under a sink. Both of us shirtless.
“I’m never getting married.”
I chuckled. “That’s what I always said, too. But that might change when you meet the right person.”
After we finished changing the hardware under the sink, the two of us climbed out. Beth was standing in the kitchen and handed us each a towel.
I dried my hands and looked over at Owen. “Thanks for the help, O-Man.”
When my eyes returned to Beth, I noticed hers were not looking at her son like mine were. Hers were focused on my chest. It took a good thirty seconds for her to raise her eyes to meet mine. And then I saw her face.
Shit.
It was an expression I knew well. Mostly because I wore it every time Gia was around. I might’ve been full of myself, but I was pretty sure I knew the I want to lick your body face when I saw it. Normally, it was my favorite face on a woman when I was undressed. But not today. Not with this woman. I grabbed my shirt from the kitchen counter and slipped it back on, attempting to break the heavy feeling I suddenly felt.
“Owen here showed me how to fix the sink. Kid’s pretty smart. Must take after his dad.” I winked.
“Yeah. Mom can’t even fix the remote when the back falls off.” The kid had a great sense of humor for only six.
“Two wise guys. Just what I needed after the morning I’ve had,” Beth said. “What do you say, you go wash up, Owen, and we’ll go grab some lunch.”
“Okay. I’m really hungry!”
Owen took off and left the two of us alone in the kitchen.
Beth tilted her head. “You have a lot more tattoos than you did when I moved out here from New York.”
“Yeah. I’ve slowed down now. But there’s still a few more I’d like to get before my skin starts seeing its sagging days.”
“Trust me, you have a long way to go before that body sees any sag.” She looked down and then up at me. “You look good, Heath. Really good.”
And there went that feeling again. Like I was doing something wrong for her even saying that. It nagged at me, but I didn’t want to be rude. “Thanks. You look good, too.”
Luckily, Owen ran back to the kitchen. I was pretty sure he only had a chance to wash one hand, but he’d live eating dirty. “Mom’s paying…so what do you feel like? Caviar? Kobe beef?”
Owen wrinkled up his nose. “How about Taco Bell?”
“You got it, buddy.”
After lunch, where Owen told me one bad joke after another, we went back to their house so I could finish up fixing the faucet. It turned out to be a bigger project than I anticipated, and I wound up going back to the plumbing store a few more times before everything was back in working order. My little buddy stuck to me like glue again.
Beth had been running some errands and came back with two sacks full of groceries. I walked to the door to grab them from her, and when I turned around, Owen had his hands in the air to give him one.
“Owen, I spoke to Jack’s Mom. He wants to know if you want to come over for a little while to play Xbox. He just got some new game.”
His eyes lit up, and then he looked at me. “Are we done?”
“Sure are. Why don’t you go have fun? You did a lot of work today.”
Ten minutes later there was a honk out front and Owen took off. He made it halfway down the driveway before he ran back to me. “Will you be here when I get home?”
“Probably not. But you go have fun. You earned it after all you did today.”
I didn’t expect it, but the little guy wrapped his arms around my waist. “Thanks for helping us today.”
I bent down so I could look him in the eye. “It was my pleasure. And, Owen, you’re doing a great job taking care of Mom and the house.”
“Thanks.”
After Beth came back in from talking to Owen’s friend’s mom, she grabbed two beers out of the refrigerator and handed me one.
She tilted her head toward the living room. “Come on. Let’s go sit.”
Together we sat on the couch. “Do you remember when Dad caught us fooling around in the living room on our old blue couch?”
To this day, I felt bad about that. “Of course. He took off his work boot and chucked it at me when I ran for the door. Thing had a steel toe. Hurt like a bitch. But I deserved it.” I sucked down half of my beer.
“You know, that week we had together means a lot to me.”
Beth had been a virgin when I ruined our friendship by taking things where I led them.
“It meant a lot to me, too. And I’m sorry about the way I ended things. I was…a prick.”
She smiled. “You weren’t really. We’d agreed that it was just fooling around, nothing more. But I didn’t know how to separate sex from emotions back then.”
That was one thing I had always been good at. Sex was just sex. The only emotions I associated with sex were excitement and eagerness. Until out of nowhere, a certain little sassy thing showed up one night behind my bar.
“We were young. You grew up a lot faster than I did.”
“I grew up too fast. Married at twenty-two, a baby at twenty-three. Both of those led to divorce at twenty-eight. Tom wasn’t a bad guy. It was just that neither of us had lived much before we got together at twenty. We hadn’t experienced much.”
“You got a great kid out of it, at least. Owen’s great.”