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“Mmph!” The frozen package smacked the floor next to his sneaker, and the cute baby buckled into his cart’s front seat burbled a laugh, pointing with one chubby finger at the unintended crotch missile.
“I—I didn’t…I’m sorry.” Bryce choked back a giggle, biting the inside of her lip. It was totally uncool to laugh while the guy was doubled over after a plastic cutlass and a bag of corn to the nuts. But damn, was it funny! A few snorting giggles came out before she was able to rein herself in enough to ask, “A-are you okay?”
“Depends. If I say yes, are you going to sic the rest of your pack on me?” the guy asked, without a Scottish accent, his forehead even with his baby’s in the cart. Delighted, the little one gave up her stuffed book to grab her father’s ears, twisting them and shrieking in glee. Bryce noticed that the man’s left ear had a notch taken out of it, high up on the stiff ridge of the cartilage. He continued speaking, his head bowed under his baseball cap. “Because if that’s the case, I’ll surrender my pirate vessel and my grocery cart, both. Just no more shots to the groin. Please.”
Bryce bit both cheeks, feeling her abs contract with the laughter she held inside as she managed to squeak out, “I’m sorry. I was trying to help.”
He lifted his head enough to look the chortling baby directly in the eyes, and the hard lines of his face softened. He touched his nose to the girl’s teeny button nose, rubbing to the left and right in what Bryce’s dad used to call “polar bear kisses.”
“You think that’s funny? I can’t believe you’re ganging up on me, too, little Lisi.”
Bryce’s urge to laugh evaporated as the sweet sight left her heart melting like butter, oozing into a puddle at the bottom of her chest. If she captioned this picture in her mind it would read:Find a man who gazes at you with the adoration this father has for his baby.
“In-garden!” Addison, sensing weakness, tugged away from Bryce to brandish her plastic cutlass again.
This time, Bryce snatched the weapon away and swooped to grab the frozen vegetables from the floor, putting both in her grocery cart. She set the gallon of milk on top of the toy sword as insurance against her niece using it once more for evil.
“It’sen garde, and you’re done fencing. You hurt this man, and you need to tell him you’re sorry,” Bryce said.
Addison mumbled an apology, then twirled away. She dashed to the cart, where she swung herself up to stand innocently grinning, while her blue eyes darted to gauge the difficulty in reclaiming her cutlass.
Bryce gave her own apologetic smile as the man straightened. “Sorry. She likes to play fairy. All the time. She won’t take off her wings, even for school—since her parents passed, she’s confused fairies with angels and—”
Suddenly, Cecily shrieked from under the shelving unit. The high-pitched sound was like an ear-busting fire alarm, both in its inability to be ignored as well as decibel-topping tone.
Bryce jumped and spun in one movement, rushing toward the sound before making a conscious decision, and Cecily stopped squealing enough to shout.
“Quit pulling! You’re ripping off my arm!”
“What?” June asked, in faux confusion, holding her hands up in an “it wasn’t me” gesture as she sat back on her heels. “You told me to pull and get her out, didn’t you?”
Bryce made herself take a calming breath. It didn’t help.
June must’ve sensed she’d pushed a little too far because she let go of her sister and joined Addison next to the cart, pulling out her phone once more. Bryce knelt on the floor next to Cecily, heaving a frustrated sigh. “Cici, you’ve got to scoot yourself backward and to the left. Or you’re going to spend the night sleeping under the baby food.”
To her surprise, the man with the bruised balls wheeled his cart over. “Can I help?”
Bryce looked up, noticing with appreciation his muscled arms. His shirt was one of those Dri-FIT jobs and she could see his well-defined biceps. She felt herself staring a beat too long, but before she could refocus, her gaze caught sight of the guy’s forearms. Suddenly, it was as if Bryce’s brain stuttered to a stop. Some girls were chest and ab girls, some dug a guy with a nice ass—and that was great, but Bryce herself was an arm girl. Give her bulging biceps and strong, corded forearms, lightly dusted with hair, and she was off. And this guy’s sleeves were shoved up, showing every glorious inch up to the elbow…
She dragged her gaze away from his arms—although she did note he wasn’t wearing a wedding ring—and she nodded.
“I’d appreciate it. I don’t want to call the manager. If they have to bring in the Jaws of Life to get her out, I’m screwed from ever getting guardianship of my nieces.” Bryce knew she was babbling, but the man had bent down to peek under the shelf at the situation, sending a whiff of his warm, woodsy cologne or body spray or whatever her way, and she sensed her libido moving from simmer to a rolling boil. “June and Addie—can you please watch Mr.…uh, what is your name?”
“Ryker,” he replied, straightening. He released his hold on the cart when Addie came bouncing over with June at her heels.
The unusual last name pinged in her head, but Bryce was certain she hadn’t met him before. Surely, she’d have remembered those forearms? But then again, these past months in Wellsville had felt similar to stepping on dry land after a day spent Jet-Skiing in the choppy waters of the Tampa Bay—she was in a constant state of dizzying vertigo as she struggled to keep her feet pointed in the right direction. So it was possible she’d met this guy, and in her exhaustion-fogged brain she’d forgotten.
“Watch Mr. Ryker’s baby while he looks to see if we can get Cecily out from under here?”
June huffed but obeyed, stashing her phone and pulling his cart out of the middle of the aisle as the man looked on, trepidation in his face. But when June and Addison began a game of peekaboo, making the baby erupt in deep belly laughs, his expression relaxed, and he crouched down, peering under the shelf. Seconds later, the laser-blue eyes were on Bryce once more.
“My arms are longer, so I’ll take that side. Her shoulders are stuck, and she’ll have to wiggle in deeper, get her arm down by her side, and then dip her shoulders around the shelf’s floor brace. Then we can tug her out. Ready?” At Bryce’s nod, the guy stepped over Cecily’s prone body, switching sides with Bryce. Without hesitation, he lay flat on the grocery store floor, adjusting his baseball cap to put his face right up to the edge of the bottom shelf that held the larger jars of baby food as well as some disgusting concoction of pasta and vegetables so overcooked and oversalted she wondered how anyone would feed the crap to a defenseless baby.
Bryce flopped down on the other side, her hand patting Cecily’s calf in reassurance.
“Hey, Cecily, Mr. Ryker has an idea of how to get you out. Listen to him, okay?”
“’Kay,” she said. “Before I get out, can I roll my rock to you, Aunt Beamer?”
