“He no Unca Heat.”
“He’s not… oh! No, he’s not Uncle Heath. But he’s sort of his friend.” I look back up at Liam, feeling like an introduction is in order. “This is Carson, Heath Germaine’s nephew.”
“I never would have put that together. I wonder if Shawn knows this guy. I think they were friends in college or something. Hey Shawn!” Liam yells over the table making his teammate cut his conversation short to answer. “You’re friends with Heath Germain, right?”
“Yeah. What’s up?”
“You know this little dude?” He points down at Carson. “This is Heath’s nephew.”
“No shit?” Shawn glances over the table and down at the toddler. “You definitely didn’t get your looks from your uncle, kid. You’re way better looking.”
“My Unca Heat. Gimme tashe.” Carson points at the table and we all look around, completely dumbfounded as we try to figure out what baby talk means.
“Uhhh… what was that?” I ask Carson who sighs deeply, like we’re the ones making this hard.
“Gimme. Tashe.”
“Oh, trash.” Liam seems to have a lightbulb moment, thank God because this could have gone on for a while. “You want to help. Here ya go.” He picks up a used napkin and rolls it into a ball before handing it to Carson. “Here’s my trash. Go throw it in that trashcan right over there.”
Carson happily runs away, tossing his tashe away and coming back for more. Liam grabs another used napkin and hands it right over.
“You don’t have to do that. I can clear the table off for you if it’s too cluttered.”
“No way. I know what’s about to happen.” Carson takes off across the room again and I make a note to empty that bin soon. “My nephew was on self-imposed trash duty for a year at that age. Don’t take one thing off this table. I’m preparing myself to keep Carson entertained for a while.”
I have to admit, the man is a genius.
Kiersten comes into the room, carrying a box full of napkins. I hustle over to her, taking it out of her arms and putting it back behind the bar until we can get to it.
“How’d it go?” she asks, looking around. “He okay?” Her eyes finally find him as he darts back and forth from the table to the trash can. Her chin drops to her chest before looking back up at me knowingly. “He put himself on trash duty, didn’t he?”
“Now where were you when we needed a translator?” I ask with a chuckle.
“I’m sorry he’s bothering everyone. I’ll get him situated with his tablet again.”
I grab her arm to stop her. “Leave him alone. He’s happy and he’s entertaining the guys.”
“The guys?” she asks with amusement.
“The guys on Heath’s football team and apparently the guys on the Slinger’s hockey team, too. They seem solid and they’re enjoying Carson.”
We look over just as Shawn lifts Carson up and tips him over so he can reach for something in the middle of the table. When he sets him back down on the floor, they go in for a fist bump before Carson takes off running again.
Kiersten’s lips quirk up. “Well, he is a good trash man.”
“That he is.”
Now that that’s settled, we ease back into our routine, working around each other as we chat.
“Jaxon will be here soon, hopefully. I’m not in the mood to hear Sweet Home Alabama quoted to me all night long even though I’m sure it’s coming.”
“Never saw it.”
She stops and stares at me. “What? It’s right up your alley. Reese Witherspoon and that guy whose name I can never remember.”
“I remind you of a non-memorable guy in a romantic comedy? I need to up my game,” I joke.
“He’s a small business owner and has rugged good looks,” she replies. “Plus, there is the famous line… you have a baby? In a bar?” She tosses in a thick Southern accent that I assume is character based.
“Ah. Now I see the connection.”
Kiersten’s phone rings and she glances down at it, her face immediately falling. “Oh no.” Looking back up at me she asks, “Do you mind? It’s Jaxon.”
“Go ahead. It’s important if he’s calling.”
As she answers, she scrunches her nose and reaches up to dig her fingers in her hair. I try really hard not to notice what the movement does to her breasts but to no avail. Judging by the looks on some of the guy’s faces across the room, I’m not the only one whose attention she caught. I narrow my eyes in their direction, but they don’t see me.
“Hello? Hey.” Her head drops and I know it’s bad news. “No, it’s okay. It’s not your responsibility. I just screwed up this time. It happens. Yeah. Seriously Jaxon. Stop apologizing. Okay. Yeah. Okay. See ya.”
She hangs and up and sighs, avoiding my gaze and trying to fight back tears.
“Jaxon got stuck at school. He thought he was done but it’s going to be a couple more hours. I’m sorry, Paul. I can’t believe I screwed up this much.”
“Kiersten, stop.”
“I just hate leaving you in a lurch but we both know I can’t keep Carson here with me all night.”
“Kiersten, I’m not mad.”
She blinks back the tears. “You aren’t?”
“No. You’re never late. You never call in. If anything, it’s about time you stopped putting the rest of us to shame,” I joke.
Her lips quirk up, but not quite into a smile. Knowing her, she’s probably not just embarrassed, she’s probably crunching numbers in her head on what she can cut back on if she doesn’t work tonight. Which gives me an idea. It’s probably crossing the line, but right now I can’t find it in me to care.
“You know I live in the back, right? In the apartment?”
She furrows her brow briefly as she watches Carson make yet another trash run. “Yeah.”
“Why don’t I call Tammy in to cover me and I’ll take him to my place when she gets here?”
A mixture of emotions crosses Kiersten’s face—relief, confusion, resolve, and finally denial.
“That’s really nice of you Paul, but I can’t ask you to do that.”
“You’re not asking.”
“I know. But it’s Tammy’s day off.”
“And just yesterday she was asking if I needed her tonight because her husband is working,” I interject. “You know how much she hates to be home alone.”
She nods. We’ve both heard it many times before. There’s nothing Tammy hates more than an empty house and nothing to do.
“But you’re my boss,” Kiersten says, not able to let it go. “Don’t you think it would be weird to be watching one of your employees’ kids?”
I shrug because I don’t actually find it weird at all. “We’re a small business, Kiersten, not a corporation. Things are different here. It’s no stranger than all your friends showing up to do renovations.”
“I think they showed up for the pizza, beer, and sledgehammers.”
“No. They stayed for the pizza, beer, and sledgehammers. They showed up because it was the friendly thing to do.”