I nodded, unable to speak for the tears clogging my throat.
“I’m sorry if any of this upsets you.” Bill fretted his hands. “We talked a lot about not upsetting you or Mika.”
“No,” I answered. “I can’t speak for Mika, but I’m happy to know Mom will have someone to turn to when Dad’s gone. I’m just shaking my head because only Dad would try to control everything like this. Even after he’s gone. I’m surprised he’s not trying to get me to break up with Han too.”
Bill tilted his head to the side and gave me the funniest look.
“What?” I asked.
“Don’t you get it? He never tries to tell you anything because you’re just like him. At least that’s what he told me when he asked me to teach you how to surf at a competition level instead of squashing your dream like a lot of Army dads would have. And you know, only one woman has ever been able to tell him what to do. When Letty told him it was time to ask her to marry him after four months of dating, he couldn’t jump on that plane fast enough.”
I laughed. “What? I thought he asked her! They never told me that part of the story!”
“Of course not. Letty told him not to,” Bill answered with a big laugh. But then he sobered to add, “So I suspect when he heard that a guy somehow ‘made’ you—Jasmine Matapang Hayes marry him, he’d figured you’d found the same kind of love he had, and there was no fighting you about it.”
My cheeks warmed. “Wow, that was some talk. He told you about that too?”
“Well, I mean, I had a lot of questions, considering you showed up married to the same guy who bought my surf business.”
My heart jolted. “Wait, what? I thought you said a corporation bought the camp.”
“Yeah, and he’s one of that company’s owners. I know, because he came to the contract signing himself and one of the conditions of the deal was that I had to run the place until next August when he was planning to transfer ownership of the school over to another party of his choosing—I’m assuming that’s you.”
“What’s wrong?” my mom asked when I came back to the picnic tables fuming.
“Nothing,” I lied to my mom. I mean, how could I even begin to explain all the stuff I’d just learned? “I need to get home.”
“Hold on, I have to give you something for that husband of yours first,” Mom said.
I felt like a race car, raring to go as I watched her walk over to her purse. So many questions were spinning around my head. How could Han keep this from me? Even after everything we’d confessed and shared over the last few days?
Mom returned with a stamped flower print envelope, and on the front, it had Mr. and Mrs. Han written out in her pretty cursive over the address which she’d insisted I give her at Mika’s Christmas party so that she could come visit sometime.
“It’s a thank you card for the walker,” she explained
“Seriously, mom? You already wrote a thank you card?” I asked. “It’s just us.”
“Well, I don’t want my new son-in-law thinking we’re rude,” mom answered, lifting her chin proudly. “And I always keep some thank you cards stamped, locked, and loaded in my purse.”
A lifted an eyebrow. “Just in case you have a thank you card emergency?”
“Exactly!” Mom answered with a cheery smile. “Oh, my little Jazzy, you know me so well.”
Yeah, anyone who’d ever met our parents would have no problem understanding why Mika and I could best be described as cheerful hard asses. Half sunshine and half drill sergeant.
I found myself still laughing at my mom’s Filipina Miss Manners antics as I walked to meet Bui at the car. Just him today.
I’d asked Han to put me back down to one guard since Victor and Phantom had successfully ousted the old 24K Dragon and installed a new one back on the East Coast. And, you know, this being a family picnic with several former soldiers in attendance. My husband had reluctantly agreed, which had felt like a future relationship win for us.
But that didn’t mean Han was entirely off the hook. I whipped out my phone to send him a strongly worded text message.
35
HAN
JASMINE: You bought Bill’s surf school for me???? WHAT THE HELL?
Jazz’s question appeared on Han’s phone with an angry buzz, and the last bit was written all in caps.
Han grimaced.
Apparently, Bill had put two and two together after Han sent him a private message about meeting them at the car. And then he added it up for Jasmine.
“Everything okay, Boss?” Chen, who was sitting on the other side of the dining room table, asked.
“Jasmine just found out I bought her a surf school,” Han admitted with a weary expulsion of breath.
