“We’re ready.” She left the door open and he spotted a pair of beach bags leaning against the wall. One big and pink, one small and blue.
We? What the hell? The last thing he wanted was a fight, but he couldn’t allow this to happen. “I came to pick up Hawk. Not you.”
She raised an eyebrow.
“Broderick won’t be there,” he said.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Like she didn’t know. She propped her hand on her hip and scowled. God. She looked like her mother when she did that.
“I have friends out there, Jordan. Let’s not make this hard.” He scrubbed his chin with one hand.
“I don’t see why I can’t go. Hawk’s my son.”
Hawk, picking up on the tension, went quiet and ran behind his mom. This was exactly what Asher did not want. He didn’t want to fight with her in front of Hawk and he didn’t want her pissed at him, driving a bigger wedge between him and the child he should be bonding with.
“Can you just let me take him for the day?” He unclenched his jaw to force out, “Please?”
“What is he begging to do?” Emily swept in from a huge window-lined living room full of floral furniture and wispy curtains.
“He wants to take Hawk on a boat trip, which I agreed to, but I did not agree for him to bring along Gloria.”
He wasn’t going to respond to that.
“My friends and their families are out there,” he told Jordan’s mother with as much patience as he could muster. Hard to believe, but of the two of them, Emily was the reasonable one.
“And Gloria,” Jordan put in. She narrowed her eyes. “I don’t approve of her being around my son.”
“I swear to—” He looked at the ceiling and swallowed the rest of that sentence. It wasn’t easy to figure out a kid-friendly way to say, She is none of your fucking business.
“You’re going to have to trust him, sweetheart,” Emily cut in, her tone curt.
Jordan snapped her head around to look at her mother while Ash stood, speechless and stunned.
Emily, unfazed, continued. “Asher is Hawk’s father. Gloria seems like a nice woman. You’ll have to trust his judgment.”
“Trust a rock star who sleeps his way around the country?” Jordan bit out.
Hawk shrank away from his mother’s tone while Asher’s blood pressure skyrocketed. Nice to know this was the way she talked about him to his son when he wasn’t around.
“Jordan Bethany Trudeau.” Emily stepped closer to her daughter, her voice low and lethal. “Do not be crass. Keep in mind while you’re throwing stones from your glass house that you also climbed into bed with this man.”
Asher gave Hawk a tight smile and hoped to hell his kid wasn’t picking up on anything that would traumatize him in his later years.
“Really, Mom?” Jordan stomped away, flipping her hair over her shoulder. Hawk followed, calling, “Mama,” and Asher felt his heart chip at the corners.
He blew out another breath and pulled his hand over his face. Fuck. This was going as well as he’d expected.
“I didn’t mean for…” He shook his head as he tried to think how to end that sentence. “Any of it.”
And wasn’t that the truth.
“I love my kid,” he reiterated.
“But not his mother.”
“No.” He didn’t love Jordan. Love had nothing to do with anything that happened between them. Ironic considering he felt the genuine pull of love toward his son.
“Look, Mr. Knight, I feel like you’re both trying to do the right thing, here.” Emily looked in the direction Jordan had stomped off in a huff. “You more than my daughter. It’s fair for you to spend time with Hawk. And she should let you and stop trying to mandate when and how. Your lives are separate but together and that’s the biggest challenge. I love my daughter and my grandson, and I want what’s best for them both. Unfortunately, the best thing for Hawk is not the best thing for Jordan. The boy needs his father.”
“I agree.” Which is what he was trying to do. Spend time with his son. He’d be damned. Emily got it.
“But you can’t keep showing up like a part-timer.”
Okay. Maybe she didn’t get it. He pulled in a deep breath.
“Jordan and I are raising this boy,” she said, “and you’re getting to go out and show him the fun side of life. There is another side. Getting him to eat. Sleep. Dealing with tantrums and his recent fascination for the word ‘no.’ If you expect him to respect you as a father, you need to start being one to him.”
“I have asked Jordan to let me have him overnight and the answer is the same every time. She doesn’t trust me. She doesn’t know me.” Asher felt his ears turn red. God, he was pissed. “I don’t know what kind of game she’s playing, but she wasn’t invited to my house last Saturday. And I sure as shit didn’t expect to see her at my party, making out with my friend, then getting into a catfight with Gloria.”
“I beg your pardon?” Emily’s brow creased. “Saturday? Making out? She told me she went to her friend Leanne’s house on Saturday and they went to a fair and then a concert that evening.”