A Father's Name(23)

Tyler didn’t look convinced. “Oh.” He paused a moment, as if he’d been processing her words, then asked, “So if I’d been wearing jeans instead of a designer suit when I asked you out, you’d have said yes?”

“It was what it was…. I don’t play what-if games.”

“But what if?” he pressed.

Tucker shook her head. “Still not going to play. I gave up on what-ifs when I had Bart—he didn’t need a playmate, he needed a mother, so I grew up. I don’t deal in the hypothetical, but rather in what is. I became a woman who works in a man’s world. I grew up,” she repeated. “And grown-ups don’t play what-if games.”

Tyler stared at her chest. He didn’t seem the kind of guy to stare at a woman’s breasts, so she spotted what he was looking at. Her T-shirt was a girly pink and had pictures of battered butterflies and read How Could You Tell I Ride a Motorcycle?

“I don’t know that you grew up all the way,” Tyler pointed out.

Tucker shrugged, but felt her cheeks flame. “I didn’t buy the shirt. A customer gave it to me.”

Tyler nodded, his expression serious. “It looks a bit playful to me. Almost as if the person wearing it has a bit of an inner-child left.”

“It doesn’t look playful. It looks tough. Those butterflies are smooshed.”



“They’re still butterflies. And it’s pink. Very pink. That says playful and girly.”

“I still don’t play what-ifs,” she maintained.

Tyler smiled. “Thanks. That’s the first laugh I’ve had in…well, in a while.”

Tucker tried to look stern, but it was hard. She was relieved to see Tyler loosening up. “You’re nuts. I’m a hard ass, and you probably should realize that.”

“Tucker, you can pretend you’re tough, but it’s all a facade. In addition to being a sweet woman who likes to wear pink, you’re a pushover. And you’re a good friend.”

“Sweet?” Tucker scoffed as she finally opened the door and beat a hasty retreat. Sweet? No one had called her sweet…ever.

She glanced back over her shoulder at Tyler. He was still laughing. Well, if thinking she was sweet lightened his load a bit, then so be it. His misperception was a small price to pay to pick him up a bit.

But Monday, she was definitely not going to wear a pink t-shirt.

She had tons of black t-shirts. She’d wear one of those.

Black and tough looking.

Tyler wouldn’t be thinking she was sweet on Monday.

She stopped huffing and thought about Tyler and the baby. She’d found herself a parent at an unexpected moment in her life.

Now he was going through the same thing.



Wanting to help him didn’t mean she was sweet. It simply meant she understood better than most people could.



TYLER SOMEHOW MANAGED to get out of the house on time Monday morning, but it was a near thing. Getting Jace up, dressed, fed and out the door was tough. He was thankful he’d packed the diaper bag Sunday night.

He still didn’t feel right allowing Angelina to throw her day into chaos in order to help him, but he needed this job. He’d put in a call to an agency, hoping to find a sitter, but he didn’t expect to hear anything right away. He could check out daycare centers, but he’d prefer the baby have one-on-one care. For now, Jace at work with Tucker’s help was his best option. His only option.

Once Jace’s regular sitter was home, he could always see if she’d keep watching Jace, though that would mean a half-hour commute to get him to Pam’s in the morning, and then another half hour back to Whedon in time for work. Not a great situation, but for now, it was all he had.

He entered the shop. No one was in the garage, so he walked back to Angelina’s office and knocked.

“Come in.”

He went in and burst out laughing. Angelina was wearing a black t-shirt with a skull and crossbones on it, under which it read Biker—’Nuf Said.

“Do you even ride motorcycles?” he managed to ask.



“Of course, I can ride them. I simply don’t often, and I’ve never owned one. I do paint them, and the guys I do work for have noticed my t-shirt collection and feed my habit.”

He knew the black shirt was in response to his teasing about the pink one and couldn’t resist assuring her that “Skulls don’t make you look tougher. You’re a marshmallow. And if I’ve noticed that after only a few weeks of being here, odds are everyone else knows it, too.”