“There were no adults at the party tonight, Tara. It was a free-for-all. And your son was shit-faced drunk.”
Tara’s eyes widened. “Oh.” Then her eyes narrowed. “Oh. Son of a bitch.”
“Yeah.”
She leaned forward and clasped her hands together. “How bad?”
“Pretty bad. I tossed him in the shower and cleaned everything up. He should sleep it off now.”
She laid her hand on his. “I had no idea this was going to happen. I’m so sorry you had to deal with it. And your truck. Good Lord.”
“My truck is washable. And your kid is going to be sick as hell tomorrow.”
She inhaled and sighed, then stood and ran her fingers through her hair. “I can’t believe Tim would have a party like that without his parents being around. Where were they?”
“Cabo, according to reports.”
She wrapped her arms around herself. “Jesus. Wait till Coach finds out. And I’m sure he’ll find out. Were there girls there, too?”
“Quite a few. Underage. Hell, they were all underage.”
“Oh, Jesus. Thank God you got him out of there before the cops showed up. He is in so much trouble. And I was nowhere in sight.” She sat on a chair, looking lost and devastated.
“It’s a rite of passage, Tara. You couldn’t prevent this from happening.”
She shot an angry glare at him. “Rite of passage, my ass. Lots of kids make it through their teen years without getting stinking drunk. I need to pay more attention to where I let my son hang out. If I wasn’t—”
She stopped herself, but he knew what she’d been about to say. “You think if you weren’t with me, you’d be able to keep your thumb on Nathan’s every move? Come on, Tara.”
She lifted her chin. “I don’t know. Maybe. Between seeing you and the hours I work at my job and Nathan, it’s getting to be too much. I knew this was going to be a problem. I have to put Nathan first.”
She was angry and hurt and scared, and he had to give her time to think. The last thing he wanted was to come between her and her child or argue that it wasn’t his fault that her son had made a stupid decision. “I’ll get out of here so you can get some sleep.”
“Okay.”
She walked him to the door and held it open but caught his hand before he walked out. “Thank you for being there for him tonight.”
“Anytime.”
He walked to his car, feeling like somehow he’d been the one who’d done something wrong tonight.
But he hadn’t. Had he?
TWELVE
TARA KNEW SHE WAS BEING UNREASONABLE. AND, quite possibly, a total bitch.
But what had happened with Nathan—who was now grounded—scared the hell out of her. Drinking and hanging out at an unsupervised party at fourteen could have ended badly in ways she didn’t even want to begin to think about. Unfortunately, all she’d done for the past three days was think about all the possibilities. And she had heard from Nathan’s coach, who’d been apprised of the party, though he hadn’t said by whom. He intended to have a long talk with Tim about it, and there would be sanctions. She almost felt sorry for Tim because she was certain Tim’s parents were going to be livid when they found out the entire football team—plus girls—had been over at their house drinking.
And none of what had happened had been Mick’s fault. In fact, she was grateful he’d been the one to step in and pluck Nathan out of that situation. Had she been the one to walk into that house, she’d have likely flipped out and embarrassed her son. From what Nathan told her—as much as he could remember—Mick had been calm and had taken Nathan out of there without a scene. Tara would have most definitely caused a scene. She was certain shrieking would have been involved. And she’d have probably called the parents of every kid there, which would have mortified Nathan, who probably would have never spoken to her again. She was so glad Mick had been there and acted rationally on Nathan’s behalf.
But had she thanked him profusely? No. She’d basically blamed him for it. Not directly, of course, but indirectly she’d pointed the finger at Mick for all her failings as a mother.
God. She let her head rest against her arms and just shut it all out for a few minutes.
“Thinking of ending it all?”
Her head shot up, and she gaped at Maggie, who leaned in the doorway to her office. “Pondering it, especially if you’re bringing me some new catastrophe. I’m full up at the moment.”
“No crisis to report, but Jenna called while you were on the phone earlier, and she has final RSVPs for the anniversary party so I have your head count, plus she wanted to go over place settings and something about the caterer.”
Oh, hell. The anniversary party for Mick’s parents was coming up this weekend. And Nathan’s birthday was this weekend, too. She laid her head in her hands and closed her eyes, wishing she could be anywhere but here.
Maggie shut the door. “Want to tell me what’s wrong?”
“Everything.”