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CHAPTER TEN
At what cost?
Tim gave his rye and cola a little shake to make the ice settle and set the cup on the seatback tray. He didn’t usually drink while flying, but his brain was a mess and he was desperate to suppress all the futile wondering.
It didn’t matter how busy Tim made himself on that plane. He couldn’t stop chewing on Valerie’s words. He knew a little bit about giving things up. Sacrifice was part and parcel of being an adult, but he wondered if sometimes people were too quick to martyr themselves.
If he’d understood her right, she wanted the same things he did—a house with some kids who took up a bunch of space and made a lot of noise. Ahome, really. And he couldn’t help but picture what having that with her would look like.
“You’re in a shitty mood. You need to deal with that.” Heidi pushed her sleeping mask down over her eyes and slipped more cozily down into her first-class seat.
“I’m in the same mood I’ve been in for days.”
“And like I said—it’s a shitty one. What are you stressed about? Your dad’s going to keep an eye on Kevin while we’re away on business, and I’m only going to be in Bermuda for a few days, anyway.”
“I wasn’t worried about Kevin, for once, but thanks for planting that seed in my head.” Tim closed his hand around his drink and stared at the dark liquid, unseeing.
He didn’t get that kid of his. Not at all.
Before he and Heidi had driven to the airport in Norfolk, Tim had tried to sit down with Kevin and ask if he wanted Tim to move the trip back. Tim would have if Kevin wanted him to—if he wanted to try to connect and break down some walls between the two of them.
Kevin’s response had been, “Who cares?”
Tim’s dad had told him to justgo, and that he’d try to make sense of Kevin. Tim half hoped he’d fail just so he could be assured that it wasn’t only him having a hard go of it.
“Do you know what usually helps to improve my mood?” Heidi asked.
Tim laughed, probably for the first time in a day. “If it were as simple as having sex, I’d ask you to endure me long enough for me to alleviate the frustration.”
“Ha ha.” She put her head against the window and grinned. “I could probably talk myself into it, though. Just give me some warning so I can get into the right headspace.”
“Hopefully it won’t come to that.”
“Whatever happened to the last chick you were…” She let the words fall off, and probably for good reason. Even in First Class, alternative lifestyles couldn’t be discussed without horrifying the folks in the neighboring rows—not even in veiled language.
“That I wasseeing?” he provided.
“Right.”
“I saw her once.”
“Oh. Like the others, then.”
“It was an interesting four hours in her acquaintance, but suffice it to say, I didn’t feel much of a click. She was too enthusiastic. Too…plastic.” He liked having his cock sucked as much as any other guy, but usually, women weren’t so giddy when asking to do it.
“Sounds like my last one,” Heidi said.
“What went wrong?”
“I just got the feeling there was more curiosity than intent to make something of it.”
He grunted.
That was one of Heidi’s biggest problems when it came to dating. She was a beautiful woman. Finding a woman to take home wasn’t too arduous a task. Her companions were all perfectly willing to be with her for a night or two, but when it was time to go out and actuallydate, they’d all say they really wanted to find a nice guy to settle down with.
“Clay says he could set me up with someone,” she said with a chuckle.
“Yeah, he could probably shake someone out of his extensive network.”
