Written on My Heart Page 13

  “Um.” I take a step toward her. “Is something wrong?”

  She slowly pulls her head up and looks at me with large blue eyes. Springs of curls have escaped her ponytail and frame her freckled face. I don’t have a lot of experience with kids, but I guess her to be around nine or ten. “Every year we have to draw a picture of our family.” She taps the blank page on her lap. “It’s stupid and I hate it.”

  “Where is your family?” I ask, slowly lowering myself into the chair beside her. Despite what I told Em, I really like kids. And this one, with her little lips jutted into a pout, looks too miserable for me to just ignore.

  She shrugs and points to the curtain. “Dad’s in there. I’m just waiting for Grandma to pick me up.”

  I fight to keep from frowning. I may not know anything about good male role models, but I’m pretty sure taking your daughter with you when you get a tattoo isn’t exactly quality time.

  Still, it’s not my place to judge. “Why is the assignment stupid?”

  She shrugs and gazes down at her notebook. “Everyone in my class has a real family with a mom and a dad—though Olivia’s got two dads. And all of them have brothers or sisters and stuff. All I have is my dad.”

  I’m not sure what to say to that. Comforting others has never been a skill of mine. Where I come from, words are used to hurt, never heal. This, above all else, is why I’m sure I’d make a horrible mother. How could someone who’s spent her entire life broken know the first thing about mending? Still, I want to help, even if that means just sitting beside her. I motion to her notebook. “Can I draw with you?” She shrugs and I rip a sheet of paper from her pad, place it on a stack of tattoo magazines, and pull a green colored pencil from the box in her backpack.

  I settle back against the vinyl chair and begin drawing a field while the girl beside me watches. Something about the smell of the paper and the feel of the pencil between my fingers transports me back to my early childhood days. The days when I was happy—the days before him.

  After sketching several stems, I grab a pink pencil and add daisies to my drawing. Daisies have always been my favorite flower. They’re not delicate like tulips and roses, which need constant care and perfect conditions to flourish. Some even consider them weeds. I’ll admit they may not be the prettiest flower out there, but there’s no denying beauty in their strength.

  “You know,” I say as I shade the petals, “I don’t think it’s the size of the family that matters, but the amount of love the family members have for each other.”

  She plucks a blue pencil from the box and begins outlining a figure on her own paper. “What do you mean?”

  “Well,” I trade my pink pencil for yellow and draw a sun. “I had a mom and a stepdad. He wasn’t very nice to me at all.”

  The girl gasps. “That’s so sad.”

  The tip of the yellow pencil snaps off in the center of my sun, startling me. Immediately, I suck in a deep breath and relax my grip. “Yes, it was. The point is, I don’t think more family always equals more love. I would have been so much happier with just my mom, who did love me, as I’m sure your dad loves you.”

  She nods and finishes drawing an oval face. “He does love me. He works a lot, but when he’s home he plays games with me and reads to me. We have a lot of fun.”

  I smile, happy there are actually decent fathers out there. I’ve never known one, but it fills me with hope to know they exist. “And you mentioned a grandma, too.”

  The girl grins. “Yeah. She’s really nice. She takes care of me when my dad can’t. She helps me with my homework and takes me shopping for clothes. She also cooks, which is good because Dad never does.”

  I laugh, and she does, too. “Your dad sounds like a pretty cool guy.”

  “He is. You would like him.” There’s a mischievousness to her grin. “He doesn’t have a girlfriend, and you’re really pretty. I bet he would take you to a movie if you asked.”

  A strangled choke escapes my throat and I set the yellow pencil aside. The conniving little cupid! “I’m sure your dad is really great, sweetie, but I’m not dating at the moment.”

  “Why not?” She sits grinning at me, blinking her long lashes innocently.

  “I…uh…” How the hell do you explain emotional baggage to a ten-year-old? “I just got a lot of stuff going on right now.”

  “What kind of stuff?”

  “Well, I just moved, and I’m trying to get a handle on my finances. Then I’d like to focus on my writing and maybe college—” The girl scrunches her eyes, as if trying to make sense of my words. “Besides, you’d need someone in your life who can take care of you. I can barely take care of myself.”

  She tilts her head. “Take care of me? I’m not a baby.”

  I fidget in my seat. This conversation is going to become incredibly awkward if I don’t find an out and fast. I point to a fourth figure on her paper. “Who’s that?”

  She glances her drawing of a girl with short, blond hair, and her face lights up. “Oh! That’s my aunt. She’s really silly and fun,” she says, laughing. “When she watches me she always lets me stay up late.”

  I cheer inwardly that the distraction worked. “Sounds to me like your family is pretty awesome.”

  “Yeah.” She grins down at the drawing of herself with her family and smiles. “They really are.”

  I can’t help but smile. I’m almost tempted to peek behind the curtain to see who the mystery guy is that Lane’s working on. After all, I can think of a worse dating prospect than someone who’s so obviously a good father.

  But then I immediately realize the fault in that logic. I could never date a man with a kid. What if things got serious? What the hell do I know about raising and caring for child? And what if my toxic upbringing infected me somehow? What if I’m destined to hurt my kids the way I was hurt?

  The knife-edge of panic twists inside my chest, and I climb to my feet. I can’t do it. Getting involved with someone with a kid would be the absolutely worst thing I can do. I know this now. Maybe on a subconscious level, I’ve known the truth all along—that I’m broken beyond repair. That the real reason I’ve never had a serious relationship is because I’m like my stepdad, and I’m not capable of love.

  The thought crashes into me, and I waver on my feet. That can’t be true. I love Hank, don’t I?

  The girl is watching me curiously. I force a smile and hand her my drawing. “This is for you.”

  Her grin widens as she takes my completed picture of a sunny field of daisies. “You’re pretty good. Not as good as my dad—but good.”

  I’m still shaken from my epiphany, but I laugh. The girl is adorable—all the more reason to get as far away from her and her dad as fast as possible. “I appreciate your honesty.”

  “But I really do like it,” she adds quickly, folding it and tucking it inside her notebook. “I’m going to put it up in my room.”

  I shrug. “You do whatever you want with it. It’s your drawing. I just wanted to thank you for letting me draw with you. I had fun.”

  “Me, too.” She grabs a red pencil and returns to her sketch, a smile on her face.

  I stare at her a moment longer. I was about her age when my mom married my stepdad and everything changed. Between the endless rules, locked doors, forbidden rooms, and massive amounts of chores, drawing became a thing of the past for me.

  But at least I had my notebooks. I’d been fed so much poison during my time in that house. If I hadn’t been able to bleed it out onto the pages of my battered journal, there was no way I would have survived.

  But this girl, with her colored pencils, funny aunt, loving grandma, and dad who can’t cook, well, she’s going to do more than survive. She’s going to live.

  I push the door open and step outside, making a mental note to buy myself some colored pencils. Because from now on, I am going to do more than survive, too. It’s my turn to live.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Lane

  The guy in my
chair opens his clenched eyes. “Something the matter?”

  It’s only after he asks me that I realize I’d turned my needle off and haven’t moved in the last couple of minutes, haven’t even breathed. All that stopped the moment I heard Ash talk to Harper. “Hang tight.” I set my tattoo machine aside and strip off my gloves, leaving his old tribal tattoo nearly covered by a dragon in flight.

  The door chimes, and I know Ash is gone. The only question is how much information she took with her. The thick curtain dividing the rooms blurred their conversation into muffled words. Does Ashlyn know Harper’s my daughter? Does it even matter, since I vowed to not get involved with her?

  Not that the vow’s been working.

  Each night I visit Ash’s apartment before I go home. The apartment’s been empty for so long it was in desperate need of repair. As Ash’s landlord, I have a moral obligation to make sure everything is in working order. The only problem is, now I’m running dangerously low on things to fix. So I might have purposely pulled the towel rod anchor from the wall and stripped the screw out of the kitchen cabinet hinge just so I have a reason to come back tonight.

  I’m not proud of the fact. But it’s obvious that somebody hurt Ash. She seems so vulnerable, and she’s all alone up there. I wouldn’t be living up to my dad’s name if I didn’t check on her.

  At least that’s what I tell myself. Because it’s easier than admitting there’s an invisible cord that pulls me up her stairs at the end of each night, that the tug in my chest eases just a fraction when she opens the door and smiles up at me.

  I stand and make my way to the lobby.

  “Where you going?” the guy asks.

  “I’ll be right back.” I push through the curtain. It’s not like he can’t use the break. He’s had more tears rolling down his cheeks than a toddler with a skinned knee.

  Harper looks up at me as I enter the lobby, a pencil poised over a drawing on her lap. “Hey, Dad.”

  “Hey, Angel.” I force a smile, hoping my face doesn’t betray the unease rolling through me. “Just thought I’d check on you.”

  She frowns at me. “Why?”

  “Can’t a dad miss spending some time with his girl?” My muscles are coiled, tense. I sit beside her, stretching my legs in front of me. “Besides, Grandma’s running late and you’ve been sitting out here by yourself for a while.”

  She shrugs. “Just doing my homework.”

  I look at her drawing and mentally cringe. The yearly family portrait. I know from past experience it’s one of Harper’s most dreaded assignments. She’s never made her longing for a more complete family a secret. In the beginning I tried. But good women my age who are accepting of a guy with a kid are few and far between. The breakups that followed left Harper devastated, and that’s when I decided dating wasn’t worth putting my daughter through hell. Which is exactly what I need to remind myself now—and why the conversation about Ash can wait.

  “Family portrait, huh?”

  She nods, shading in what looks to be a pink daisy—one of several drawn in patches around our feet.

  “Want to talk about it?”

  “What about?” She places the pink pencil back in the box and grabs a yellow.

  “Well, I know you sometimes feel bad that you don’t have a mother or brothers and sisters like the other kids in your class.”

  She shakes her head, drawing a sun above our heads. “Not any more. That girl talked to me.”

  I lean back, surprised. This assignment has bothered Harper for years, and I’ve never seen her handle it so well. “What did she say?”

  She shrugs. “She told me it doesn’t matter if you have a mom and dad, it just matters if you have love. Some families—even with moms and dads—don’t take care of each other. That’s really sad.” She looks at me. “You, me, Grandma, Aunt Em, we all love each other. So we have the best kind of family.”

  Ash did the one thing I’ve been trying to do since the moment Harper was born—she convinced her my love is enough. I won’t forget that. My throat tightens to the point I almost can’t squeeze the words out. “The very best.” I smile and smooth her curls back with my hand.

  She returns to her drawing. “I like that girl. She’s nice.”

  “She certainly seems that way.” I think again about Emily’s warning. Whatever Ash’s issue with kids is, it can’t be that she doesn’t like them. Otherwise why spend time with Harper trying to make her feel better?

  “Too bad you can’t ask her out.” Harper shakes her head sadly as she finishes shading the sun. “She has too much going on right now.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “I asked.”

  I nearly choke. “You asked her out for me?”

  She sets the pencil down and makes a face. “No. I’m ten. I don’t know how to ask people out.”

  Apparently that’s not the case. “Harper, did she ask your name? Did you tell her you’re my daughter?”

  “No. Why?”

  I sigh, relieved. If Ash told Harper she doesn’t want a relationship, and I feel the same, there’s no need to complicate things further. Especially given Ash’s unknown issue with kids. Besides, what guy wants to be known as the dude who has his ten-year-old daughter ask girls out for him? Pathetic. “I can’t date, either. I’ve got my own stuff going on, honey.”

  “What stuff?” She folds her arms across her chest and levels her gaze with mine.

  She’s ten and I’ll be damned if I don’t flinch. Sometimes I think she has more of me in her than I’d like to admit. “Stuff! Like a business to run and a family to take care of.”

  She sighs and goes back to scribbling. “If everybody who worked and had families to take care of didn’t date, there would be no more married people.”

  Ropes of irritation wind around me. There’s nothing quite like being psychoanalyzed by a ten-year-old. Since I know better than to argue, I stand and kiss the top of her head. “I got to get back to work.”

  She nods without looking up.

  “Tell Grandma to give you—”

  “My vitamins and allergy medicine,” Harper cuts in, rolling her eyes. “Got it, Dad.”

  Clearly I’m not the only one irritated. Throwing my hands up in defeat, I retreat into my studio. I’m not sure what I did to piss off God in a past life, but it must have been something bad for Him to surround me in this one with women who, no matter what I do, I can’t ever seem to make happy.

  I sit back down on my stool, put on a fresh pair of gloves, and pick up my machine. Inhaling deeply to loosen my strained muscles, I start the needle and place it against the guy’s arm. For a big guy, he sure squeaks like a girl. I ignore his moans as I continue with the dragon, thankful I have my work to get lost in.

  Still, as hard as I try, I can’t stop thinking about Ashlyn—and the way she sat with Harper and made her feel better about her assignment. She didn’t have to do that—she could have walked past her, like so many other women coming through my shop. Somehow, whatever shit she’s had to endure in life, it didn’t harden her, or bury her kindness behind a wall of scars—like it did me.

  As I shade the scales down the dragon’s spine, I try to push all thoughts of Ash from my mind. But I can’t. I can hear her muffled laughter upstairs, feel the pull of her through the drywall and wood separating us.

  I accidentally dig the needle in a little too deep and the guy yelps. I grab some gauze to wipe away the blood, biting on my cheek to keep from smiling. At least I have my job. With all this pent up frustration, I don’t know how I’d make it through the day if I didn’t get to make people bleed.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Ashlyn

  “Two walls down. Two to go.” Emily tips her beer back and takes a long swallow. “I have to admit, I think the place is actually starting to look livable.”

  I grin from my perch on the couch and take a swig of my own beer. Hank is sprawled across my lap, staring miserably at the fries I refuse to share. Feeling slightly guilty,
and with a mental promise to give him extra treats, I scratch under his chin and lean back to admire our work. It’s taken a couple hours, but half of the apartment’s walls are now a light-green sage color.

  I read online green is supposed to create a feeling of comfort and calm, and I feel as if the new paint is doing just that. Well, the paint coupled with the cool breeze wafting through the open windows. I sink deeper into the worn couch, feeling more at peace than I can ever remember feeling before.

  “Should we keep going?” Emily asks.

  I nod, gently pushing Hank off my lap before grabbing another fistful of fries and cramming them in my mouth. My neck is stiff and my muscles ache from the painting and furniture moving. Still, I’m eager to get the painting done. My stepdad refused to let me hang posters or pictures, saying they’d damage the walls, and changing the eggshell color was out of the question. I guess that’s why I’ve been in such a hurry to paint. The more personal touches I add to this apartment, the more it begins to feel like mine. “Let’s do it.”

  Before I can stand, there’s a knock at the door. I glance at the clock on the oven. My heart skips a beat when I realize it’s a little after ten. He’s right on time. Every day this week Lane’s come up to the apartment after he closes the shop. The first night he fixed the leaky faucet, the next he changed the air filter, and the third night he rewired a faulty switch. The fourth and fifth nights he installed a garbage disposal, and last night, despite my protests that it was unnecessary, he replaced the lime-crusted showerhead with a brand new one.

  Each time he’s come over, he’s set about his work with few words to me. The same goes for when I’m working in his shop balancing books and organizing his schedule. We’ll say hello and maybe mention the weather, but that’s the extent of our interaction. Logically, I’m relieved an invisible boundary has formed between us. He’s involved, and I’m renting his apartment. The complication of anything more would be a disaster. Still, my body mourns the memory of his touch, which plays through my mind whenever he’s near.