AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“And…? Did he text you back asking you to leave him alone?”
“No. He told me I was right and that he was going to get me back. Then he had breakfast sent over from the diner this morning to help with my hangover and said he would be seeing me soon. What the hell does that mean and what do I even do with all of that?”
“Well, I’d assume it means he plans on seeing you again and maybe trying to work things out. Did you text him back.”
“No. I was too embarrassed, and I didn’t know what to say. How can I trust that he won’t push me away again? I can’t go through losing them both a second time.”
“From what I heard from Landon, he was pretty fucking miserable this week. And if you don’t give him another chance, you’ll always wonder what if. Maybe text him back and thank him for breakfast.”
“Yeah, I supposed I could do that.” I shoot a quick text off to Cash thanking him for breakfast and almost immediately get one back telling me it was his pleasure.
Spencer and I get lost in organizing her classroom. We work straight through lunch and only realize it’s getting late when our stomachs protest the lack of sustenance. We’re both taking a break when one of the high school football players knocks on the door.
“Hi. Are you Chayse? I was told to drop this off here for you.” In his hands is a bag of Chinese food and it only took one guess to figure out who it was from.
“Thank you. Do I need to pay?”
“Nope, it’s all taken care of. Have a nice night!” He’s out the door the next minute, and I’m left completely stunned.
“Mmmm, that smells delicious.” Spencer says as she snags the bag from my hands. I snap out of it and start looking for my phone. It’s under a stack of folders on Spencer’s desk. When I unlock the screen, there’s a text from Cash.
Cash: Heard you and Spencer were working hard today. I know if she’s anything like you, you’ll be going until it’s dark and forget to eat. So, dinners on me. Hope you ladies have a lovely night. Can’t wait to see you soon.
<3 Cash
Turning to Spencer, I raise an eyebrow, but before I can say anything, she’s raising her hands. “Don’t look at me like that. I did not tell him you were here. Didn’t you talk to Landon earlier and let him know what we were up to? Didn’t he have a swim lesson with Penny today?”
She’s right and I never told him he couldn’t tell Cash what I was up to. I actually changed the subject once he had a swim lesson because I’d love to be there cheering Penny on, but I know that’s not an option right now. Spence can see me stewing and thankfully stops my spiral.
“Maybe this is his way to warm you up to the idea of giving him a chance to reach out and come to terms with how much of an idiot he was. If he keeps telling you he’ll see you soon, it’s not far off, of an assumption. It’s pretty sweet that he sent us dinner and knows you well enough to know you’d lose yourself to the work and forget to eat.” I just nod my head because everything she says totally makes sense.
Over the next few days, Cash has found one way or another to take care of me or do something sweet for me. I woke up Friday to the prettiest hand made chairs on my front porch. Saturday brought breakfast from the diner and a reservation for me, Landon, and my sisters to go to the ax throwing and rage room downtown. How he knew breaking shit would be helpful is besides me, but it felt amazing to smash some shit.
When we all got back to my house, we had everything we could need and more for tacos and margaritas. Looks like someone forgot to leave their key behind once all of the work on the house was done. I should be pissed, but it gave me hope that meant there would be a future for us.
Sunday dawned and my anxiety over Penny’s party was quickly becoming overwhelming. Although Cash has been doing all these things for me, he hasn’t asked to talk or told me whether or not I should come to her birthday party. Spencer and Emerson both said I could just ask him, but I already did, and I never got an answer. I don’t want to have the little hope crushed if he tells me no.
Thankfully, my family knows me too well and before I knew it, both of my sisters barged into my house to make sure I didn’t sit and wallow all day. We decided to go for a hike to our spot and then head to Dad’s after to have a cookout. Even though my mind still wandered to Penny, I couldn’t help but enjoy the time with my sisters.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Cash
ComingtoChayse’sdadmight have been the most terrifying part of my plan to get her back, but I needed to do it. He gave me shit for everything I put her through, but he also understands the desire to never see his girls hurt. It’s why he still hasn’t settled down with anyone even though their mother has been gone for years. In all honesty, he should’ve been the one I was talking to from the get go. It would’ve saved both of us a ton of heartbreak, but you live and learn and move on. It was easy for me to move on with my plan to spoil her and take care of her for the next few days to show her I could be the man for her. And it just made everything better knowing I had the support of her father and sisters.
Sending Chayse little gifts and doing what I can to make her days easier or better over the past few days have given me such a great feeling of purpose that I was doing what I needed to get her back and prove I could be a man she could count on. It was hell to not deliver the gifts myself, but her sisters said she would need a little time to think on it at first, so that seemed like the best advice to follow.
I finally broke down and told Penny that I made a mistake and broke up with Chayse when she kept insisting on calling her on her birthday to tell her about all of her presents, but I wasn’t ready quite yet to talk to Chayse which was why we couldn’t call her. I’ve never seen my daughter more pissed at me. She yelled, threw a fit, hit me when I tried to comfort her, then demanded I fix it because she just knew Chayse is supposed to be her mom. I promised her I was doing everything I could to get her back and told her she could help me come up with nice things to do for Chayse. That was the only way I could get my daughter back on my team.
It was actually Penny’s idea to move her birthday party to Chayse’s dad’s house. What better way to show her we want her than by celebrating as a family with all of Penny’s family. It was so simple, but such an amazing idea. I called her dad and thankfully he was on board. He said they all had planned on being at Penny’s party, but weren’t sure exactly where everything stood, so this would be perfect.
I started a text chain with my family, hers, and Reid and Landon. They helped plan the thoughtful gifts and the timing so some of the gifts would be delivered exactly when it would be best. Her sisters helped distract her Sunday so that she wouldn’t be anywhere near her dad’s, and we could all get the best birthday put together.
Penny and I thought tirelessly on what we could get Chayse as the perfect gift to welcome her to our family. We didn’t want anything cheesy, but we also wanted to make sure it didn’t seem like I was proposing. At least, not yet. I had every intention of making Chayse my wife, but we had plenty of time to get there.
Reid was the one who came up with the idea we decided to go with. He had a friend who had a jewelry business who did custom jewelry. His work was beautiful, and we decided to go with matching bracelets with our initials on it. Mine is a cool thick leather strap with circular metal pieces that has the first letter of our names stamped on it. Penny’s and Chayse’s are colored leather in a braid pattern and have the same metal circles with our initials on them. The best part is he said we could add to them whenever we want. Penny absolutely loves hers and hasn’t taken it off since we picked them up Friday after her swim lesson with Landon. Penny helped me wrap Chayse’s and has been impatiently waiting to give it to her.
I’ve been a nervous fucking wreck since the moment I woke up, but I’m also excited and hopeful to put this misjudgement behind us and move on together as our little family. Land and Reid have been a huge part of the party set up since the girls were all out on the hike. Thankfully, they hit the trail pretty early and decided to head to their dads and start their cookout in the early afternoon hours.
