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“I was just telling your dad that we loveThe Sound of Music. He wants to watch it with us one day.”
In the rearview mirror I see Olivia’s eyes light up when she says, “Yes!” But then she breaks out into song, and I’ve never been so happy to see that the GPS now reads only three minutes to our destination.
“I am sixteen, uh, uh, seventeen,” she belts out.
“See,” Skylar’s grinning from ear to ear, “it’s educational too. Olivia can count to twenty because of that movie.”
“Twenty? Hah, she already knew how to do that. Nice try, Obi-Wan.”
“Obi-Wan? How very predictable, the engineer is a Star Wars geek. And I’m sure you already know this, but naming numbers to twenty is vastly different from pairing the appropriate number of objects with a number. From one geek to another,I’mthe one who taught her that.”
“A geek, huh? Bet a certain someone’s mother wouldn’t call me that,” I tease, referring to our conversation from before.
“No, she probably wouldn’t.” She shakes her head. “Please swear to me upon pain of death that you won’t ever talk to her, let alone date her. You should hear the way she snaps at,” she moves her lips to form the girl’s name silently. “She’s not a good person.” When I don’t respond she turns to me with a worried look. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have brought up the d-a-t-e thing.”
“D-a-t-e. Date!” Olivia exclaims.
As we pull up in front of the address, Skylar answers my shocked expression. “Yeah, her reading skills are going through the roof. She’s like a sponge.” Turning to Olivia, she high-fives her and says, “Way to work that silent E!”
I drive off after Skylar gives me the name of the diner and I see a younger guy, early twenties, walk outside and wave to Skylar as she’s getting Olivia out of her seat.
She asked me to come inside but I made up an excuse. Just felt like I’d be barging in on her life without really being invited. Today was supposed to be about Olivia meeting her family. I was just a last-minute, unexpected addition to this outing.
I drive back to the main street, thinking there must be somewhere closer than the diner one town over. It’s nothing like what I expected. Skylar mentioned once before that she grew up in a small town, but this is more than small, it’s desolate. Main Street has more shuttered store fronts than open businesses, and most of the homes I pass aren’t well maintained.
I make it to the diner and settle in at a corner booth. I power up my laptop, order some coffee and an egg sandwich, but I’m useless as far as getting work done goes. I have this heavy weight on me, a sorrow that I can’t immediately define. But it doesn’t take much soul searching to know that it’s Skylar who has me feeling this way.
I knew she had it hard, what with losing her parents so young and the circumstances surrounding their death, but seeing first-hand where she comes from has me feeling her pain as if it’s my own.
Chapter Twenty
Skylar
“Whose rich prick-mobile is parked out front?”
Ah, he always did know how to make an entrance.
My cheeks flush as I look to Leo, whose brows are creased as he takes in Tyler, the guy who just introduced his daughter to a fabulous new word.
“Come on in, Tyler,” Garth says as he gets up from the table, shooting me a nervous look in the process.
I stay in my seat but feel as jumpy as a jack rabbit. “Hi, Tyler.”
“Hey, Sky.” He looks around, pauses when he sets his eyes on Olivia sitting on the floor next to James’s little cushioned mat, and then again when he looks at Leo sitting next to me at the table. “How are you?” he asks once he finishes taking an inventory of the room.
“I’m good, how about you?”
“Same…You know,” he answers absently.
“Tyler, that’s Olivia over there with James, and this is her father, Leo. I, um, work for them. I mean, uh, I’m Olivia’s babysitter.”
Fixing his eyes on Leo he says, “And you made the trip down here all together to see the baby? That’s nice.”
Leo stands and extends his hand. “Leo Hale.”
Tyler takes it and gives it one firm shake, sizing Leo up as if they’re rivals. They’re the same height and their builds are similar, but they are no match. Leo exudes power, along with an air of confidence that’s hard for someone in Tyler’s state to come by.
Leo’s probably having a laugh at Tyler and his juvenile show of jealousy right now, even though he’s doing an admirable job of hiding it. And all the while I sit like a stone, paralyzed by my discomfort.
