everyone. Times like this, Billy wished he could be as smooth as Bobby. The man was good with people—well, people who weren’t Jenny Wawasuck.
Billy stood there, keeping an eye on the door as the smaller kids were introduced to him in a group. Where was Jenny? Surely she wouldn’t let such an offensive act as taking off his shirt in front of a bunch of first and second graders pass. Flashing a lifetime of ink at a bunch of little kids didn’t seem like something Jenny Wawasuck would let stand.
As he started shaking the hands of the bigger kids, the ones who’d be “helping” him build the bike for charity, Billy realized two things. One, Jenny wasn’t going to come out and pick another fight with him, and two—he was disappointed.
One of the kids shook his hand and said, “Hi again, Mr. Bolton.” Billy’s attention snapped back to the present.
The kid looked familiar. Billy didn’t have a head for names and faces, but he knew he’d met him before. “I know you, right?”
“We met at Josey’s wedding,” the boy said with a stammer. “I was an usher.”
“Yeah.” Billy shook his hand again. Probably some sort of nephew or cousin or something. “See you in the shop.”
The kid’s face brightened up. He couldn’t be much more than thirteen. Billy remembered being that age once—although he tried not to think about it too much.
He got to the end of the line and mercifully, Bobby didn’t make them do the whole meet-and-greet thing all over again. Don and Josey began herding the kids into the shop to set up the next shot—Billy explaining how the kids were going to help him—when it happened.
The back door of the school swung open and out stepped Jenny. Billy’s temperature spiked, which didn’t make a damn bit of sense. Now that he could see her in the full light of the morning, he noticed she had her long hair pulled back into a boring bun-thing at the base of her neck. She wore a white-collared shirt under a pale blue cardigan, all of which was over an exceptionally plain khaki skirt. The whole effect was of someone trying not to be noticed.
Billy noticed her anyway, his heart rate picking up an extra few RPMs. She shouldn’t look sexy to him—but she did. Underneath that schoolmarm appearance was a hot-blooded woman with a smart mouth who wasn’t afraid of him. The combination was heady.
She stood on the steps, hands on hips that couldn’t be hidden by her boring skirt, and glared at him. Normally, Billy would either stare her down—he did that all the time—or turn away and pretend he hadn’t seen the disapproval in her eyes.
Instead—and this was insane—he gave her a mock salute, just to make her mad all over again. He couldn’t help himself. What had she thought of all the tattoos? Did they scare her, or had she liked them for the art they were?
“We need you inside,” Bobby said, once again stepping between Billy and Jenny. Over Bobby’s shoulder, Billy saw Jenny make a motion with her hands that perfectly conveyed both her disgust and also her fury before she turned and went back inside.
No, this wasn’t over. Not by a long shot.
Three
Billy needed a drink.
Not that he drank much anymore, but still. A day of having to watch his temper around kids who kept picking up his tools and putting them down in the wrong places. A whole day of Bobby making him say the same thing over and over in different positions. A long day of not building a bike.
Better be a stiff drink.
It was almost over. The kids had, by and large, gone home. Only that one kid, the one he’d met at Josey’s wedding, was still in the shop. Billy had been allowed to take his mike off, and while Bobby and his production crew were still doing things, none of them required Billy to smile for a camera.
What was that kid’s name? Billy thought hard, but he drew a blank. “You’re still here.”
“Yeah, my mom stays late to talk with the pregnant girls.”
Suddenly, the feeling that Billy should remember this kid’s name got a lot stronger. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” The boy looked at his feet and scuffed his toe on the floor. “I’m sorry about the way she blew up at you this morning. She gets like that sometimes.”
Wait—wait a damn minute. Was this kid saying that Jenny was his mom?
No way—not possible. This kid was a teenager. Jenny couldn’t be that old.
Unless...unless she’d been young. The familiar guilt tried to kick open the heavy steel door Billy kept it trapped behind. This kid could only be Jenny’s son if she’d been a teenager. And she’d kept him.
Damn. Fate had a freakin’ funny sense of humor sometimes.
The next question had to be whether or not she was married, because there was no way in hell that Billy was going to keep entertaining thoughts of a married woman. Bolton men were loyal for life. Whatever problems they might have as a family—and Lord knew there were a lot of them—they respected the family, which meant they respected other families, too.
“So where’s your dad?” That probably wasn’t the best way to ask the question, but Billy had never been known for his tact.
The kid shrugged. “Dunno. Gone before I was born, I guess. Mom says we’re better off without him, anyway.”
Two thoughts crossed his mind quick. First, Jenny was available, so he could keep right on thinking about how she looked at him with that passion—okay, passionate fury—in her eyes. Second, though, was that a boy needed a man in his life. Especially a boy on the verge of becoming a man.
“You kids aren’t really going to help me build the bike, you know.”
As if to illustrate this point, Vicky called over, “Okay, wave at the camera, Billy.”
Feeling stupid, Billy waved to the camera that had been installed overhead. He was going to work nights and weekends to build the bike himself, hours of which would be compressed into two-to four-minute segments on the show. The rest would be staged shots with kids.
The rest of the crew went out to the truck, probably to review the footage. Bobby liked to check the tapes. Although Billy would never admit this to the little twit, he thought Bobby was impressively focused on making the show as good as it could be.
“Yeah, I know.” The boy sounded positively depressed. Then he perked up. “I can still help. Mom always stays late for her after-school program, so I’m here a lot.”
Billy worked alone. Even in his shop, he did his own thing while his guys did the assembly stuff. But something about this boy—and his mother—kept his mouth shut.
Billy wasn’t looking to be a father. That ship had sailed seventeen years ago, and it wasn’t going to make a return voyage. But a shop teacher could still make a big difference. Billy’s shop teacher in high school, Cal Horton, had saved Billy’s life on at least three occasions and kept him out of prison twice, which was more than his own father, Bruce Bolton, had ever done.
Yeah, he didn’t have to be this kid’s
