Page 26 of Shortcake
“Need help getting her home?” Addy asked, grabbing the glass of jack and coke and dumping it out before dropping it into the dishwasher.
Wiping her palms against her jeans, she came out from behind the bar, blinking those gorgeous green eyes up at me.
Addy had called me out—and quickly—when I’d tried to blame her for Harper’s drinking. She was right. Nothing about tonight was Addy’s fault.
It was my fault. And Harper’s. In fact, Addy had saved my daughter tonight. I owed her.
I hated owing people anything.
As a cop, that tended to come back and bite me in the ass with all kinds of favors people expected in return. And that was a slippery slope.
I shook my head, eyeing Addy’s small, tight ass as she unlocked and opened the front door for me.
Jesus, it was a good ass.
A young ass.
Too damn young for me.
It was too young for me today and definitely too young for me three years ago. I had stayed awake that night in her Lower East Side hotel room, stroking her bright red wavy hair and even after just one night together, I’d found myself wishing for things I had no business wanting.
I wanted to keep her.
I wanted the fun, playful, carefree girl who had walked right up to me in a bar filled with young, eligible men, and had chosen me.
I wanted, if just for a little while, to get to live just for myself. Not caring for the daughter that was back home. Not stressing about what was, at the time, a new diagnosis for my mother. Not fighting Harper’s mother, practically having to beg her even to come visit her daughter once a year.
I hadn’t had a one-night standsinceMeghan.
Anna, who never wanted to be a mother. Meghan, who gave birth to Harper, then promptly moved back home to London leaving me with a handwritten note and a newborn baby.
That night with Addy, I’d been a different version of myself. A version I hadn’t seen since before two lines showed up on Meghan’s pregnancy test.
I liked that Conrad. I liked who I was with Addy.
But I knew that as soon as the sun went up, I would still be Officer Meyer. The single dad. The caretaker for his sick mother. Father to Harper.
Addy and I couldn’t have ever worked. Not really. But she had given me a gift that night. The gift of fun. Laughter. She made me feel like I was my own person outside of being a parent. She had reminded me that I couldn’t just keep living day to day to merely survive, even if just for that one night.
I tore my eyes off Addy and crossed to my car, hearing her lock up behind us.
“You sure?” Addy asked again. “I don’t live far away. Does she have a car or anything I need to get back for you?”
I paused mid-step to my car, catching a glimpse of Harper’s locked bike leaning against the streetlamp. “Dammit,” I muttered to myself. I shifted Harper in my arms and unlocked my car with the key fob dangling out of my pocket.
“What’s wrong?” Without me asking for help, Addy leaned forward and opened the passenger door for me.
“Nothing. I’m just realizing that she rode her bike here. My sixteen-year-old daughter rode her bike to the fuckingbarand then got trashed.”
I bent down and slid Harper into the passenger seat, pulling the seatbelt across her sternum.
I shifted an uneasy look at Addy, then cleared my throat while rubbing the back of my neck. “Well, uh, thanks again. I’ll come get her bike in the morning.”
“You sure you don’t want me to put her inside the bar for the night?”
“You’ve done enough.”
I meant that to sound grateful, but my voice came out much harsher than I intended. And based on the way Addy’s mouth hardened into a scowl, she took what I said the wrong way.
