Knocked up, by her best friend's dad.(11)

His eyebrows furrowed and his lips thinned. I knew how he felt about only learning in an automatic. “I’ll teach you. We have at the most six months to do the rest of the hours. That should give us plenty of time to get the hours for you to do the test.”

Shaking my head, I gripped my door rest. “No. If I don’t have money for lessons, I definitely won’t have money to buy and run a car. I don’t want you to teach me.”

“Why not?”

“For starters, you’ll want me to learn a manual. I’m happy with automatic.”

“If you learn manual you can drive any car. If you learn automatic that’s all you’ll be able to drive. It’ll limit you.”

We’d had this argument before. When I was seventeen and I finally got my L’s. “I’m comfortable in an auto. It’s a moot point anyway as I don’t have money for a car.”

“I’ll buy you a new car.”

I shook my head. “Hell no. No way. I’m not having you buy me anything. I don’t want you to spend money like that on me. I don’t need or want it. I have gone nineteen years without a car and I can go longer until I can afford to buy myself one.”

“Yes, I know you’re miss independent, but you’ve never had a child before.”

He was starting to piss me off. I wanted to stop talking about this. I wasn’t going to let him buy me a car full stop. “My parents have done fine without a car.”

“Bullshit!” I flinch at his shouted response. “Do not bring your shitty parents into anything. They didn’t bring you up. You brought yourself up, so don’t bring them into this.”

He was right and it pissed me off more. I had brought myself up, with help of my friends' parents. “Fine. If I agree to you teaching me, in an automatic, though, will you change the subject?”

I fucking hated the smug grin that spread over his face. “Sure.”

“Okay then, you can teach me in an automatic.” I made sure I repeated the automatic part, because that was something I wasn’t budging on.

“Tomorrow, I’ll pick you up from work, and we’ll have your first lesson. What time do you finish?”

“Seven, but because I’m leaving for my appointment at four, and will be gone for about two hours. I’m working until nine to make up for it.”

“Please tell me you weren’t going to bus it home at that time of night?”

“Fine, I won’t.” The nursing home I worked in was in a good area so I didn’t expect I would have any trouble.

His growl didn’t mean good things for me. “No more. It’s bad enough you've been catching a bus at what, like seven-thirty by the time you get to the bus stop?” I nodded. “No. No more. I’m picking you up. You work four days? What about TAFE?"

“I have TAFE Tuesday morning, and go straight to work. The same on Thursday, and I have TAFE all day Friday.”

“So, you work four days but two are half days?”

I shook my head as he pulled into a park close to the front of Hogs Breathe restaurant. I paused in answering as he cut the engine and got out of the car. He came around, and I opened the door before he could, but he helped me down. I slid my arm into his held-out elbow, and we made our way to the restaurant. Adam had a booking so we didn’t have to wait and were seated quickly with menus.

“So, work?” he asked when our food and drinks were ordered.

“I work four days, but Monday and Wednesday I work ten-hour days not including my half an hour lunch break. And I start twelve-thirty and finish at nine on Tuesday and Thursdays.”

“Please tell me you haven’t been catching the fucking bus at nine o’clock at night?”

“Fine, I won’t.” Again, I repeated my previous reply. The bus stop was barley a five-minute walk from the nursing home, and I’d had no problem since I’d started working there over a year ago.

“Fuck, Hannah. Does Jamie know you’re catching the bus by yourself at that time?”

“What do you think?” Jamie didn’t know, but I wasn’t going to let Adam know that or admit it. Jamie thought a friend from work dropped me home. I was sure if he knew he’d come and pick me up, but I didn’t want him to waste his time and petrol doing that, when I was okay with busing it.

He knew his son too well. “No he bloody doesn’t," he growled. "You know how I know, because if he knew, he would be picking you up. I brought him up better than to leave you alone to walk late at night like that. Hannah, catching a bus at night is dangerous to do on your own. I will be picking you up from now on, and if for some reason I can’t make it, I’ll make sure Jamie or one of my parents are there. No more, Hannah.” He reached over and grabbed my hand and held it with his own.

I knew he wasn’t going to give up until I agreed, and the worry in his gaze had me caving. “Okay. No more late-night bus rides.”

“Good.” He leaned down and kissed my knuckles. I felt flutters in my chest. This was why I loved this man. He was so loving and caring.

“You said you had someone quit, and a guy cut back hours? Are you busy? You going to replace the man you lost?” His garden and landscaping business did really well. I knew he had a good reputation, and had some big contracts with housing developments and two building companies.