Page 14 of The Irresistible One
She looked up from her computer. “Are you going home?”
“I’m going to pick a fight with a four-year-old.”
She laughed. “Excuse me?”
“Ellie’s getting bullied, and I’m about to fuck some shit up.”
“Go get ’em. No one messes with my girl.”
I held the doorframe and said, “Once I get Ellie home and settled, I’ll finish the report, and we’ll get the rest of thefamily to jump on a call.” I rubbed my tongue over my front teeth.
“Are you forgetting we have Walker and Alivia’s restaurant opening tonight?”
My brother and his girlfriend had opened a place. It had completely slipped my mind that the entire family was scheduled to be there to celebrate.
“This is bad timing, Eden.”
“We have no choice. We have to go. All of us.”
I nodded. “All right. But I’m still going to work on the report when I get home. Shit, this is going to be a long night.”
She pinched the sides of her upper nose. “It’s going to be a long forty-something hours.”
“I’ll see you later.”
I took the elevator to the garage, where Paul was parked, and I got into the back seat. “We’re off to gymnastics. You know the address, right?”
“Sure do.”
I removed my phone from my pocket and caught up on some emails while Paul expertly navigated the traffic, somehow getting me to Ellie’s gym a few minutes before her class started.
“I’ll be back,” I told him, and I rushed toward the door, heading for the mats, where the parents and kids were congregated.
As I neared the crowd, I scanned the group of four-year-olds, all wearing jackets and bags, most of them standing with some form of guardian. Ellie and Michelle were in the front; neither of them saw me.
My height gave me an advantage, not that Abby was difficult to spot. Her pink backpack had her name printed at the top. And there was a woman with her arm around Abby’s shoulders. I assumed it was her mother, given that they both had bright blonde hair.
Showtime.
Just as I was approaching, the mom raked her fingers through Abby’s long locks in an attempt to put them into a ponytail. The position, the movement—they gave me a peek of the mother’s profile.
The small, sloped, freckled nose.
The pouty lips.
No.
It can’t be.
But, oh fuck, it was. Wasn’t that just my goddamn luck?
The mother must have sensed me because she looked over her shoulder, glancing in my direction.
My feet had halted the moment I recognized her, my mouth still open from when it had dropped. “Sophie …”
Her chest rose and fell. “Colson …”
I nodded toward the pink backpack. “You’re Abby’s mother?”
