I was sitting on the couch when I got the call, thinking about everything that had happened over the past month or so. Thinking about Jazz and me, Jazz and Ella, and everything that came with the territory of what I was doing. Of the silly little game I was playing.
Ella was laying on the floor reading a book, and I glanced down at her fondly; I had grown so attached to her since I’d started this babysitting thing, and—after all the horribleness that my day job required me to deal with—there was something comforting about coming home to a beautiful, happy little girl at the end of the day. And she seemed to be growing fond of me—Jazz told me she would ask where I was when I didn’t stay over.
Jazz. Jazz, Jazz, Jazz. What had once sounded like such a ridiculous name to me now thrummed around my head like a drumbeat—I couldn’t shake him, couldn’t shake how he made me feel. Couldn’t shake the image of him, shirtless and barefoot, wandering into this house. How comfortable he looked. How much I wanted to come home to that every day. And shit, what had I gone and done? Ran out of there like my life depended on it. Yeah, that was the best way to express my interest—dashing from his home like he had just pulled a gun on me. Instead of just his guns. God, I was getting cheesy—I needed to get that in check.
I jumped when my phone rang, and I grabbed for it at once—I was used to it going off with emergency calls for me to take for work, but Amanda knew I was babysitting Ella most evenings so she would lay off and let me do my job. Maybe she’d forgotten, or maybe it was some serious emergency? I glanced at the screen, and was surprised when I saw that Jazz was calling. It was early in the evening—he had only left about an hour ago, and I couldn’t imagine what he would be calling about this soon.
“Jazz?” I answered the call, and his relaxed voice instantly relieved the tension from my body. Okay, so it was nothing serious.
“Hey, Mona,” he greeted me. “Sorry to disturb you guys. I was just wondering, could you bring Ella by the clubhouse tonight?”
“What are you talking about?”
“The guys haven’t seen her in a while, and they want to catch up with her,” he explained casually. “It’s not a school night, so I thought…”
“Uh, whatever you want.” I shook my head to myself, not quite believing that I was actually going along with this. “You want to text me the address and I’ll be there as soon as I can?”
“Will do,” he replied brightly. I hung up, and a few seconds later my phone dinged with the location of this place that he wanted me to bring his daughter to.
“Hey, Ella!” I waved at her, and she glanced up at me, obviously still engrossed in her book.
“Your daddy wants you to come up and visit him and his friends. Shall we go and get you dressed?”
Her face lit up, and I knew she wasn’t going to take a lot of convincing.
A half-hour later, we were in the clubhouse of the Desert Marauders—despite their macho name, all of the guys I’d met so far seemed like total sweethearts. Yeah, they were big and scary-looking, but they all addressed me as “ma’am” and they seemed to adore Ella.
“Does she come up here a lot?” I asked Jazz. We were both leaning up against the bar at the far edge of the room, watching as Jazz’s colleagues showered his daughter with attention. He was smiling softly at the scene, and my words seemed to pull him from his little reverie.
“Not often.” He shrugged. “I don’t want it to become too normal for her, you know what I mean?”
“Yeah, I get it,” I said, nodding. “But they all seem to know her pretty well.”
“Most of them have kids of their own,” he explained. “So I think they just see Ella as an extension of that. They love her to pieces, and she likes the attention.”
“Yeah, I can see that,” I remarked, as one of them scooped Ella up and planted her down on the edge of the bar. “You must trust them to let them around her.”
“With my life,” he agreed. “They’re the best guys I know. That’s why they work for me.”
“Why did you pick tonight to have her up?” I asked. “Did they ask you to?”
“Nah.” He shook his head. “I just wanted to spend an evening with her for once. And you too, obviously.”
I glanced over at him, but he studiously kept his gaze on his daughter, as though refusing to acknowledge what had just come out of his mouth. Which was, for the record, totally flirting. He must have known that. Maybe I misread it? God-fucking-dammit, I had never double-checked myself as much as since as I had met this man. He just left me reeling, and I had trouble keeping up with what he did and didn’t mean, what was intentional flirting and what was just coincidence.
“She’s like their mascot,” I remarked, and Jazz nodded, grinning.
“You know, I never thought of it like that before, but I guess you’re right. Maybe we should get her embroidered on our jackets. Change the name of the place.”
“In all fairness, the Desert Marauders does sound pretty scary,” I pointed out with a small laugh.
“I guess you’re right,” he said with a grin and shrug. “But we’re meant to. No use having a protection agency called the Fluffy Bunnies, is there?”
“Well, you would know better than me.”
Jazz flashed me a smile, pushed himself upright, and headed over to Ella. I followed behind him—even though I felt totally safe, I still didn’t want to find myself abandoned in a motorcycle club. The thought was just a little bit…unsettling.
“Hey, honey!” Jazz called out to Ella, and she turned to look at him—for once, she seemed to be enjoying the attention more than she wanted to be with him. She beamed in his direction, and he scooped her up and hugged her tight before he placed her back down on the table. One of the guys, Terry, motioned for Jazz to come closer—and I couldn’t help earwigging on their conversation, even as I pretended my attention was on Ella.
“Do you have any idea who it is yet?” the man asked quietly, and Jazz shook his head.
“No clue,” he admitted, and I could hear the pain in his voice having to come out and say it. It must have hurt like hell, admitting to yourself that you couldn’t find the person who had inflicted such discomfort of your family.
“Have you been looking? Is she okay?”
“Of course I have,” Jazz snapped, the very implication obviously annoying him. “I’ve been doing everything I can to get this sorted.”
“I know, man, I know.” The guy held his hands up, trying to get him to relax. “We’re all just tense, you know, because someone hurt her.”
“No one’s more tense than I am, I can tell you that for sure.” Jazz sighed, looking over at his daughter. “I’m following a couple of leads, but…”
He trailed off, apparently becoming aware that I had been listening this whole time. I quickly wiped any expression of interest from my face and rearranged my features into a neutral façade. The last thing I wanted was to piss these guys off.
Jazz reached out for me, beckoning me closer, and I did as I was told.
“Come on, I should introduce you to these guys.” He smiled at me politely, and I knew he was trying to throw me off the scent. “Only fair.”
He led me in the direction of the cluster of guys surrounding Ella, and began to introduce me around. But his words were ringing in my ears; was he trying to figure this out on his own? Or with the help of these guys? I understood the urge to find out what had happened, but it seemed like letting these men take it in their hands was probably a little too far. They were strong; they protected people for a living—what if they took this just a step too far and ended up landing Ella and Jazz in more trouble than they were already in?
My brain fizzed over the possibilities, and I did my best to ignore them as I plastered a smile on my face and introduced myself to the guys around me. I was a little surprised, to be honest, that I was being given such friendly treatment. I didn’t expect to sit out in the car until they were done or shit like that, but I had assumed Jazz would wave off my being there with an explanation about my babysitting gig. But no, he was making sure that everyone met me, as though he expected me to be around for a while. As though there was something more than the babysitting going on between us.
It was clear that there was a hierarchy here—Jazz was the one in control, with his second-in-command, Declan, following close behind. I had to admit, it was a weird switch seeing Jazz go from caring, adorable single dad into motorcycle club mode. It wasn’t that he turned into an asshole or anything, just that his energy seemed to switch—from playful and goofy to in-control and dominant. I found myself watching him more than was necessary, taking him in from afar as he moved around the room.
Eventually, I could see Ella getting tired and beginning to yawn—even though she insisted she wanted to stay, Jazz and I took her out to the car and put her in the backseat, where she promptly fell asleep. Jazz leaned up on the vehicle, one hand on the roof, and looked at me for second.
“Thanks for bringing her out tonight.” He bowed his head in appreciation. “And thanks for coming yourself. Good to have a woman’s touch around that place once in a while.”
“Anytime,” I blurted before I could stop myself. And that was when it happened—the moment.
It can be hard to put a finger on the second that a relationship goes from ostensibly platonic to really, obviously not, but this time, it was cut-and-dried. I put my hand on top of the car to balance as I went into my purse for my keys, and our fingers touched—we both looked down at the spot where they connected, then back up at each other. My mouth opened, and I found myself leaning towards him, our faces drawing closer, our bodies reaching out for one another…
And then it just stopped. As though reality had come crashing back in to put space between us once more. My breath was coming faster than it had been before, and I could feel my heart rattling against my ribcage. Shit. Did I acknowledge that? Did I lunge for him anyway and just kiss him? But before I could make my mind up about what to do, he was backing away, back towards the clubhouse, away from me.
“I, uh,” he began, and I followed him with my gaze, urging him to say something, to make it real. “I should be getting back,” he muttered. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
And with that, he vanished back inside the building, leaving me alone in the cold outside. I stared after him for a second, and then climbed into the car, sat down, and pressed my head against the steering wheel. Yeah, way to blow that one, idiot.