Page 43 of Taming the Boss

Though I barely knew her, the mere idea of Maddie getting hurt from something so easily fixable as faulty brakes or tires had my chest tightening.

I cleared my throat. “Thanks for checking in with me.”

Dare waited a beat, and I sincerely hoped he caught a clue that I didn’t want to discuss her. “No problem. We had an unexpected influx of customers due to everyone wanting to take summer trips yet not planning ahead, so the shop was swarmed today. Maddie’s car might take a bit longer than I originally planned. Any other issues, I’ll give you a heads up first.”

“I appreciate that.”

“I’ll be in touch when it’s done.” Then the call disconnected.

I shut my eyes and thunked my head against my headrest as thunder cracked overhead. I’d been on the phone far longer than I’d intended.

So much for shopping with Maddie and Owen.

Chapter 10

“Hey, Owen, the rocket pops are on sale since the Independence Day holiday will be here soon.” I grabbed a cart and let him pick out a couple boxes of the popsicles from the freezer case at the front of the store. He set them carefully in the cart and I smiled. “Do you like fireworks?”

He cocked his head and seemed to think it over. “What’s that?”

God, what kind of mother did he have? No movies, no cartoons, and no fireworks? Jude didn’t seem to know anything about entertainment himself, so I couldn’t expect him to be any kind of expert there. But Owen’s mom had no clue, either?

Some people were just not natural parents, I supposed. No natural aptitude and no inclination to learn. Though sometimes it seemed as if Jude wanted to learn.

Yet other times, he seemed to have no interest whatsoever.

I glanced toward the set of doors at the front of the store. Where the hell was he? He’d gotten some call, fine, but we had cold things in our cart and couldn’t wait forever to shop. Owen was already getting antsy.

“People set them off for holidays like the 4th, which is coming up soon. You know, to celebrate. Fireworks make a lot of noise and send trailing colorful sparks through the sky. I’ll show you a video online so you know what to expect for when we go.”

“Online?”

“Yeah. So you can have an idea what it’s like.” I scooped my fingers through his thick, messy hair, rewarded when he turned his face into my shirt as if he was embarrassed but happy. I made sure to keep touching him to make up for all that Jude wasn’t doing. I had an odd feeling he didn’t skip casual touches to be mean, but because he didn’t know any better.

I wanted to help both of them get used to such things.

Even touching, huh? I just bet.

My cheeks grew hot but I just kept walking through the different aisles, pointing out stuff to Owen as we went. Things we’d talked about earlier, as well as new things I happened to see. He was so interested and excited about everything, and I kept encouraging him to get whatever he liked.

Of course without Jude with us, I wasn’t entirely sure how I was going to pay for a full cart of groceries when the only credit card in my wallet was practically charged to the max. But maybe we could squeak through with the good karma I was hopefully building up.

And if not, Jude could come back and bail us out.

He couldn’t have gone far, even if he was hiding after his phone call to avoid more shopping.

We went through every aisle, grabbing all the stuff we’d talked about before we’d started shopping, along with some staples to make some quick casseroles I’d recently discovered. Plus, ingredients to make things like pancakes. Owen was most fixated on the toaster waffles, however, so we ended up getting three different kinds.

Four, when Owen saw chocolate chip peanut butter ones in the front freezer on our way out.

I grabbed those too and did some quick calculations in my head as we picked a checkout lane, hoping like hell I’d missed a BOGO sale so we didn’t get embarrassed at the checkout by my declined card.

No, Jude had not returned. And no, he hadn’t texted me to explain since he did not have my phone number.

On that note, had I even included it on my resume? Logic would assume yes, but with my hurrying at the end after updating it, I could not be sure I had.

No wonder he hadn’t called me.

Sure, give the dude who dumped his son on you an out just because he has toned forearms, beautiful blue eyes so dark they sometimes look black, and full, sensual lips meant for kissing…and other things.

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