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“Yeah, why?” she asked innocently, and my gaze shot to Mike’s.
“No reason other than he’s not a fan of mine,” Mike replied dryly.
“Well, don’t worry about him. I think he might have even been glad that you were staying here. He said something about this being a stable place for Harley for a while.”
“Wait, are we talking about Ethan Winston, our brother?”
She rolled her eyes. “Yes. Sometimes I think you and Cara do everything you can to provoke him just to see him flip out. Don’t worry. He didn’t seem like he was flipping, though.”
After she finished, I think she realized what she had said, because she suddenly looked nervous.
“Carmen, I appreciate you doing this. What do we do now?”
“Well, I would spend as much time with him as you can. I will send you a list of tutors and a couple of private schools that you should consider. I want to see him again in a few days to see how he is settling in. He will need to see a doctor, and I am sure once they hear what his diet consisted of, they will want to do blood tests to see what’s going on inside his body nutrition-wise.”
“Do you think he’s going to be alright?” Mike asked tensely.
Carmen smiled. “I think Harley is going to be great. I think he will flourish into a bright young boy after proper nutrition, vitamins, and just being taken care of instead of caring for someone else. He already is. I’m quite surprised how open he is, but I think he doesn’t know any better. He hasn’t been around many people and probably no children. We just need to get him past a few things and make sure he deals with them so they don’t come back to bite him in the ass later. It’s important to keep him talking and listen objectively. I know it can be hard to hear some of these things, but try not to react.”
Mike stepped forward. “Carmen, can I hug you?”
“Of course,” she replied, and her cheeks turned a little pink as he stepped forward. She peered over his shoulder and mouthed, “Oh, my God! He’s so hot!”
I hid a laugh behind my hand.
“I don’t know how to thank you.”
“Just take care of that little boy, Mike, and it might get overwhelming, but you have Candy and me, and I’m sure the rest of our siblings would chip in if you needed something.”
“Hey, do you think Wesley Young might be able to check him out?” I asked. He was over an hour away, but he was a pediatrician.
“I’m sure he would. Give him a call.”
“I’ll walk you out,” I told her, and she collected her things and said goodbye to Harley, who had ice cream and chocolate all over his face. “Mike, can you get a wet paper towel and clean up this little dude?”
“On it,” he said.
Outside, Carmen put her bag into the trunk and turned to me. “You and Bollard? I didn’t see that coming.”
“Yeah, and if our brothers had their way, it wouldn’t.”
“Because of Cara?”
I nodded. “I understand their concern, but Mike isn’t part of the club anymore, and he was friends with Bryan—close friends.”
“Still, you will need to be careful.” She paused. “And even more so now because he has a child. Don’t let him get attached to you, and then you leave. That would be two important women disappearing from his life.”
“Hey, even if things didn’t work between Mike and me, I would still be around for Harley because I’m going to be a partner at the tavern.”
I frowned. “I thought you weren’t?”
“Oh, I am. Laney is already changing the paperwork.”
“Wow, do I get discounts then?”
I laughed. “Of course, you would ask that. Let us get things going before you ask for discounts.”
“You know I was just here for almost two hours. That’s about eight hundred dollars before being submitted to insurance.”
