I gritted my teeth. “Nathan will be late for school.”
“I don’t mind being late,” he piped in. “Especially if you get to eat donuts, Mom. You never eat enough of them, and they’re really good.”
Bless his soul.
The little traitor.
I gripped the box, hating that I actually really wanted another one, especially the one that looked like it was peanut butter custard. Peanut butter was my ultimate weakness.
And my son.
And it turned out, the steely glare from a stranger.
I sighed, shoving the rest of the donut in my mouth, snatching the peanut butter one from the box and stomping into the kitchen to place the box on the counter.
It was in there that I finished the two donuts, to calm myself down and so Lance didn’t see the fact I was almost as messy as my kid when it came to eating donuts.
I also did not want to admit how good they were and how much my stomach and soul needed them.
After cleaning myself up, I walked into the living room and studiously avoided Lance’s eyes, focusing on Nathan and the charade that was leaving the house.
But now, Nathan was not able to be used as a distraction.
“I’m sorry about the… pee pee comment,” I said, face flaming. “It was just something I told him about motorcycles because I don’t want him to be anywhere near one, so I thought that it might be a good motivation for him to stay off it,” I blurted. “Not that there’s anything wrong with motorcycles,” I said quickly. “It suits you.”
Lance didn’t say anything.
I decided I needed to stop talking about motorcycles and dicks.
“I’m not sure how this works,” I said, moving to the more practical version of having him in the broad daylight, when panic wasn’t running through my bloodstream. “The whole security thing,” I expanded.
In broad daylight, with Nathan back and talking about pee pees, the need for it seemed a little obsessive. I didn’t need to reach far back into my memories to realize that any extra protection I could get for Nathan I would take.
“I’ll take him to school, have a discussion with his teachers, of course, and then I’ve got work. I do the breakfast rush, and then the afternoon, usually I pick up Nathan and he comes to hang out with me at the diner. Or my friend Karen takes him.” I glanced over to the house next door. I’d already fielded countless texts from both women as they noticed that I was absent, we were supposed to have dinner. I knew they were worried, and I was selfishly happy that neither of them were morning people so I didn’t have to face them just yet.
I also didn’t think I could have Nathan away from me for that long, even though I knew that both of those women would protect him with their lives. They’d come to love him like he was blood over the past three years we’d been neighbors. I also had a sneaking suspicion that they now had enough money to move to a much nicer neighborhood but stayed mostly because of Nathan and me. Also because Karen hated packing.
I was selfishly happy about that too.
No matter how much I loved and trusted the both of them, I couldn’t have Nathan away from me. I had been trying to stave off anxiety all morning, Lance and donuts were a good distraction, but it was going to be hard as all hell to drive away from that school.
“I’ll be at the school all day,” Lance said as if the terror had leaked into the voice I was so sure sounded calm and collected.
Although accepting help from anyone was hard for me, my shoulders sagged with that knowledge. It was unexplainable, I barely knew this man and I was trusting him with the most precious thing on this planet. But he had proved himself in regards to Nathan. And despite the darkness surrounding him and his aura, there was something else too, a strength, a comfort, something I couldn’t explain and definitely not verbalize without sounding certifiable.
So instead of protesting or talking about his aura, I just nodded, glancing to the bike. “As much as it suits you, I think the school is gonna notice a man sitting on a motorcycle watching outside. And I really don’t want to be the reason you get arrested.”
“Luke’s meeting us at the school,” he replied, voice tight as if he was pissed at having to explain himself to me. I guessed someone who looked like him rarely had to explain himself, he just had to flex a bicep, narrow his eyes and all of the world would likely do his bidding. “He’ll keep watch while I follow you to work, then we’ll switch out when I get back to school.”
“You don’t need to follow me to work,” I protested. “I’m not the one that needs to be protected here.”