The First Taste(30)

“Aunt Sadie lied,” I say.

Bell looks skeptical. “I don’t think so. My teacher says smoking is bad for you.” She pulls on my t-shirt. “Please, Daddy. I don’t want you to put black stuff in your lungs. How will you breathe?”

“We’ll see, baby.” Guilt gnaws at my heart—which is surely blackened by tar as well. “How was school?”

“Fine. Miss Hughes told me she wants you to come in for a conference.”

“For what? Were you bad?”

“No,” she nearly yells, completely affronted.

I pull back, sticking a finger in my ear. “Jesus. Calm down.”

“I was good,” she says. “So good, she wants to give me more work.”

“Great,” I mutter. “More homework for you means more homework for Dad.”

She tilts her head, looking pensive. “Why does my teacher always want to meet with you?”

I would laugh if I weren’t so annoyed. It’s at least the fifth time this school year Miss Hughes has requested a meeting with me, and it always turns out to be stupid shit. I wouldn’t mind hearing her gush about what a great student Bell is if it weren’t a thinly-veiled attempt to come onto me. “Um . . .”

“Aunt Sadie says—”

“Aunt Sadie needs to learn to keep her big mouth shut.”

Bell squeals, wriggling in my arms. “She says Miss Hughes wants to kiss you.”

“Christ.”

“Daddy.”

“Bell-y.”

“A lot of the teachers talk to you. And the bus lady. Do they want to kiss you too?”

I shake my head. “You’re too young to be talking like this.”

“But you always tell me to speak what’s on my mind.”

“I was wrong. Don’t always listen to what Daddy tells you.”

She giggles, and like always, it’s a knife in my heart, but in the best way. She knows exactly how to melt me. “Don’t worry about Miss Hughes, all right? I’ll handle it.” I put her down and take her hand to walk the last block to the garage. When we get close enough, she takes off sprinting.

The guys who work for me perk up for the first time all day. I’m constantly on their asses about being friendlier to customers, and they constantly ignore me. Bell is the only person who can not only make them smile on a dime, but basically turn them to mush.

Pico wipes his hands on a rag. “Hey, boss,” he calls. “You know what next month is?”

“Hmm.” I pretend to think. “Shipment of fan belts?”

“It’s my birthday,” Bell says with exasperation.

Pico frowns. “It is? I forgot all about that.”

“No you didn’t.” She puts a hand on her hip. “You’ve been talking about it for weeks.”

“I just can’t believe you’re going to be ten already.”

She stomps her foot. “I’m going to be seven!”

“Really? That’s it?” He suppresses a grin. “What do you want for your birthday? Anything but a bicycle.”

She drops her mouth open, narrowing her eyes on him. “All I want is a bicycle. And it better not have those dumb training wheels.”

“Oh. That might be a problem.” He shrugs. “Your dad thinks it’s too dangerous.”

She whirls on me. “What?”

I raise my hands. “You don’t even know how to ride a bike.”

“I’ll learn. My friends already know how, so it can’t be that hard. I’ll do it right now if you want.” We laugh, but she keeps a stern expression. “I’m serious. I can do it.”

“We’ll see,” I say, exchanging a smile with Pico. He and I are custom building one for her and storing it at his place. Bell’s never been one to ignore details, and I know what she wants down to the color of the stitching on the seat. Once Bell flits off to bug another one of my guys, I nod at the Chevy Pico’s working on. “How’s it coming?”

“Fed up setting the timing. Can you try?”

“Yeah.” I take his place under the hood and aim the timing gun at the engine.

“Ready for next month?” Pico asks.

“Will I ever be ready for a backyard full of twenty kids under ten?”

He chuckles. “The kids aren’t who you should be worried about. You’ll have your hands full juggling twenty moms.”

I give him a look. “Don’t you start in on me too. First it was Sadie. Then Bell just gave me the third degree about why her teachers flirt with me.”

“Poor baby.”

“Yeah, I am. I just want to be left alone.”

“Fuck you,” Pico says. “You could have any chick in town, even the married ones, and you have to be a dick about it. You’ve got Denise Jackson, Prom Queen runner-up, wrapped around your finger, and you don’t even care.”

“Want some advice?” I say, only half listening as I work. “Don’t try so hard. The girls’ll come to you.”

“Yeah right. It’s that easy. My sister says you’re disturbingly hot, but I’m just disturbing.”

I shake my head. “I have to agree. Rev the engine.”