Colorado 02 Sweet Dreams (48 page)

I looked at Jim-Billy. “She was joking,” I whispered. “Then I messed it up.”

“She’ll be okay, darlin’,” Jim-Billy whispered back.

“I’m gonna get Tate to call Bubba and get his ass home,” I declared and Jim-Billy shook his head.

“Jonas is home which means Tate is home which means Bubba is g-o-n-e,
gone
. Even if Tate calls him, Bubba won’t be back until Sunday night.”

I felt my eyes get wide. “Always?”

“Yup.”

“But, Tate can’t come down to help if Jonas is here.”

“No, but he can if there’s trouble.”

I felt my lips thin.

I liked Bubba. He was funny and he was sweet and he called me gorgeous in a way that I knew he thought that was true. He wasn’t as good a bartender as Krystal, Dalton and Tate but he knew his way around the back of the bar. He was slow because he saw no reason in life to go fast.

But I didn’t like him taking advantage of Tate or causing Krystal pain.

“Uh… Laurie?” Jim-Billy called and I focused on him. “It is what it is and has been goin’ on a long while. Leave it be.”

“But –”

“Darlin’, listen to Jim-Billy, leave it be.”

“I –”

“Ace!” I heard, jumped and turned to the door.

Tate stood there. I’d been so caught up in Krystal and Bubba I hadn’t been paying attention. My legs started trembling again and I didn’t move a muscle.

“Babe, you gonna stand there starin’ at me or you gonna come meet Jonas?” Tate called.

“Go get ‘im, tiger,” Jim-Billy encouraged, I licked my lips, looked at him, nodded and walked on jellied legs toward Tate.

“Um…” I started when I got close. “Did everything go okay?”

“No,” he answered.

“What happened?” I asked as I made it to him.

His hand came up and curled around the side of my neck. “Tell you later.”

“Hey, Tate!” Krystal called and Tate’s head swung to her. “Laurie’s off. Wendy’ll be in in half an hour to finish her shift. She’s got the weekend.”

I stared at Krystal then I looked at Tate to find he was grinning down at me.

“Good news, Ace,” he said.

“I can always, you know, paint another room or something while you do boy stuff,” I offered.

“How ‘bout we do boy girl stuff, the clean kind durin’ the day, the dirty kind at night?”

I did
not
need him talking nasty prior to me meeting his son and therefore hissed, “Tate!”

He grinned, slung an arm around my shoulders and propelled me to the door. “Come meet Jonas.”

It was the time of judgment, I couldn’t delay and I couldn’t run so I wrapped my arm around his waist and let Tate take me to his son.

He was standing, shoulders leaned against the passenger side of the Explorer, a video game in his hands, his dark head bent to it.

“Good news, Bub,” Tate called, “Lauren’s got the rest of the day off.”

That was when his head came up and my step stuttered.

He was the spitting image of Tate. There wasn’t a hint of Neeta to be found. He was the most beautiful child I’d ever seen in my life.

Then he smiled at me and my heart turned over.

“Hey Lauren,” he said.

“Um… hi Jonas,” I replied and Tate stopped me in front of his son.

“Dad said you made me a cake,” he told me.

“Red cake, white frosting,” I replied and his head tipped to the side.

“Red cake?” he asked.

“Um… it’s really chocolate but I dye it red. I don’t know why, it’s just, that’s what the recipe says so that’s what I do.”

“It got Moist Factor Five Hundred?” he asked and I knew they’d been talking about me, more than a little, more than likely a lot.

My heart started beating very fast and very
hard.

“Yes,” I answered.

“Dad said that’s the bomb,” Jonas informed me.

“The, um… master of Moist Factor Five Hundred works over there,” I pointed to La-La Land, “at the coffee shop. He shared the secret of his success with me.”

Jonas took a step forward and twisted his torso to see beyond the truck to where I was pointing. Then he straightened and looked back at me.

“Cool,” he replied.

“Yeah, um… cool,” I reiterated.

He grinned.

My heart turned over again.

“You look just like your Dad,” I whispered and his back went straighter, giving him at least another inch.

“Be just like him, when I grow up,” he stated proudly.

“A football star?” I asked.

“Nah, a bounty hunter,” he told me.

“They carry guns and hunt dangerous fugitives,” I informed him something he probably knew and I probably shouldn’t remind him therefore I clamped my mouth shut after speaking.

“Yeah, why you think I wanna be like my Dad?” Jonas asked.

“Perhaps you can consider alternate future employment,” I suggested, “maybe an accountant.”

Father and son burst out laughing.

I looked up at Tate. “I wasn’t being funny.”

“I know, babe,” he replied, still chuckling. “That’s why it was hilarious.”

I looked back to Jonas and stated somewhat haughtily, “An accountant would not make his girlfriend worry while he was away at work.”

“Yeah,” Jonas shot back with a smile, “but he also wouldn’t have a milf girlfriend either.”

I felt my eyes round as Tate said in a father’s warning tone but still I could tell from his voice he was smiling huge, “Bub.”

 “Dad, seriously, she’s milf,” Jonas returned.

“Think it, boy, don’t say it,” Tate replied.

“Right,” Jonas muttered but he was still smiling at me and his smile was unrepentant.

Jonas had called me a milf. I knew what that meant and I didn’t know what to do with it.

Seriously, Tate from head to toe.

“I think I need a latte. Does anyone need a latte?” I asked then didn’t wait for them to answer. “No? Okay, you boys go on and do father and son stuff, toss a baseball, build a barn, whatever. I’ll get a latte and meet you home for dinner.”

Jonas looked at Tate. “They have smoothies?”

“We’ll find out,” Tate answered and my eyes darted to him because he was moving me toward the sidewalk and, I knew, La-La Land.

Jonas fell in step beside me.

Not Tate.

Me.

I looked down at him and I knew in a couple of years if I was still around I wouldn’t be looking down anymore.

“Are you tall for your age?” I asked.

“Yep,” he replied.

“Tallest kid in his class,” Tate put in.

“Do you play sports?” I asked Jonas.

“Yep,” he answered then he observed, “You’re tall. Did you?”

“I was a cheerleader,” I shared and both father and son laughed again. “What’s funny?” I asked into their laughter.

“Milf,” Jonas said under his breath and Tate chuckled anew.

“Cheerleading is considered a sport,” I informed them snootily.

“You flip around in a short skirt with your panties showing,” Jonas informed me back.

My eyes narrowed on his grinning face. “How old are you again?”

“Ten,” he answered.

“You act fifteen.”

“Thanks,” he replied.

“That wasn’t a compliment,” I explained and his smile got broader telling me he took it as one anyway.

We crossed the street and were a door away from La-La Land when I clarified, “Just because the subject has come up,” I looked down at Jonas, “
repeatedly,
a milf refers to a mother and I’m not a mother therefore I cannot be a milf.”

“You’re Dad’s girlfriend. If a dad’s girlfriend is hot, she’s always a milf,” Jonas told me.

“Is that a rule?” I asked.

“Yeah, one I just made up,” he returned.

“You can’t just make things up,” I told him.

“Sure you can,” he retorted. “Anyway, a girlfriend could turn into a stepmom and a stepmom is a kinda mom so she can also be a milf.”

Tate pushed the door open, held it for Jonas and I to precede him and he muttered as I went by, “He’s got you there, Ace.”

“Tate, we’re talking about
milfs,
” I shot back.

“He’s still got you,” Tate said on a grin.

“Milf? What? Where? Who?” Shambles called from under the counter, he popped up and he looked at me then Tate. “Petal! Dude!” Then he looked at Jonas and shouted, “Groovintude! Is this Little Dude?”

“Shambles, meet Tate’s son, Jonas,” I introduced.

“Hey,” Jonas greeted.

“Little Dude! Hey back, you want a smoothie?”

Of course, Shambles had smoothies.

I sighed. Tate chuckled again. I turned and glared up at him.

“Yeah, can I have –” Jonas started and Shambles lifted a hand.

“Let me rock your world,” Shambles requested.

“Cool,” Jonas smiled.

I walked to the counter. “When you’re done with Jonas’s smoothie, rock my world too.”

“Got it,” Shambles said then his eyes moved from Tate to Jonas, he leaned in to me and advised in a stage whisper, “Petal, talkin’ about milfs in front of kids…” he trailed off and shook his head.

I pointed at Jonas and exclaimed, “He brought it up!”

Shambles leaned back, his eyebrows up. “He did?”

I tipped my head back and asked the ceiling, “Can we stop talking about milfs?”

Jonas ignored me by declaring, “She is one.”

I tipped my head down to glare at Jonas.

“Big Dude is right, he’s got you there,” Shambles muttered and went to the blender.

“Where’s Sunny?” I asked in an effort to change the subject.

“Bringin’ down the sun. We had a quiet afternoon so she headed out,” Shambles answered.

“Lauren said you’re the master of Moist Factor Five Hundred,” Jonas put in.

“Little Dude! I
so
am!” Shambles fairly shouted and looked at me. “Did you try it?” I nodded. “Was I wrong?” I shook my head. He looked at Tate. “You?”

Tate’s arm slid along my shoulders and he tucked me into his side. “Outstanding.”

I was pretty sure he meant the frosting, or, more like the mess created by the frosting and the way we cleaned it up.

I didn’t inform Shambles of this.

“You wanna try Moist Factor Five Hundred?” Shambles offered Jonas. “I got plenty.”

Jonas didn’t even look at his father before he replied, “Nah, thanks. Lauren made me a cake and I don’t wanna ruin it.”

My heart turned over again and my eyes flew to Shambles who was mid-scoop of something he was putting in Jonas’s smoothie and his eyes were on me.

I didn’t know many children but I’d never known a child to turn down a treat, not even when their accepting might ruin something nice someone had done for them.

Shambles tore his eyes from mine and went on scooping, muttering, “Good call.”

I curled closer to Tate but my eyes moved to Jonas who was watching Shambles make his smoothie.

Then in my ear, I heard Tate ask softly, “What’d I say?”

I looked at him and nodded. “Just like you.”

His arm gave me a squeeze and his hand lifted so his finger could slide along my jaw.

“Yeah, baby,” he whispered, “just like me.”

I melted deeper into Tate and Shambles broke the moment when he called, “What about you, Big Dude? Am I rockin’ your world too?”

Tate dropped his hand and looked at Shambles. “Knock yourself out.”

I felt something funny and I looked down at Jonas. When I did, his eyes darted away. I could only see his profile but, even so, I saw he was biting his lip to hide a smile.

He’d seen Tate touch me; he’d probably even heard what we said.

And he liked it.

I relaxed into Tate and bit my lip to hide my own smile.

* * * * *

I was making Rice-A-Roni when my cell rang. I went to the opposite counter, grabbed my phone, saw it said “Krys Calling”, touched the button and put it to my ear.

“Everything okay, Krys?”

“It’s Jim-Billy,” I heard. “And that’s what we wanna know about you.”

“Sorry?”

“Is everything okay?”

“Who’s we?”

“Krystal, Wendy, Dalton, Nadine, Amber, Jonelle,
everybody
. So?”

“Jonelle?”

“Yeah, and…
so?
”

“Jonas called me a milf.”

Silence. Then a loud cackle of laughter.

Then, not into the phone, I heard Jim-Billy saying through a voice suffocated with mirth, “Jonas called her a milf.”

Then I heard more laughter in the background and Jim-Billy back at my ear.

“Everything’s okay,” he declared.

Then he disconnected.

I rolled my eyes, touched the button and put the phone down. Then I smiled at it on the counter.

Tate and Jonas walked in from outside and Jonas went right to the cake and stuck his finger in it, swiping off frosting and then putting his finger in his mouth.

This was the third time he’d done this.

“Keep doing that, honey, you’ll get cake and no frosting and what good is that?” I warned (also for the third time).

“Maybe you can make more frosting?” Jonas suggested.

“No, but I can cut the cake so you get the non-frosting bits and Tate and I get the yummy with frosting bits.”

“Yummy?” Jonas asked, his eyes dancing.

“You’ve tasted the frosting,” my head tilted to the cake, “and you’ve come back for more. You know it’s yummy.”

“No one says yummy,” Jonas informed me.

“I do,” I informed him back.

“You’re hot but you’re also a little goofy,” he returned and grinned.

I looked at Tate. “Can you ask your son to stop calling me hot?”

“Calls ‘em as he see ‘em, babe,” Tate replied, grinning like his son.

“He’s
ten
,” I reminded Tate.

Tate shrugged.

I looked between them both and I did this twice.

Then I went back to the Rice-A-Roni and I did this wondering if Tate fathered a child or he’d been cloned.

* * * * *

Dinner consumed, we were eating cake and ice cream (and I hadn’t given Jonas the non-frosting bits because I was a pushover) at the dining room table when Tate’s phone rang.

I noticed Jonas’s head twist quickly when it did and I also noticed his body get tight.

My eyes moved slowly to Tate to see he was looking at the display on his phone, his face hard, then he looked at me.

“A minute, babe,” he said, pushed his chair back, tousled Jonas’s hair and walked to the sliding glass door, flipping his phone open, putting it to his ear and answering with an impatient, “Yeah?”