That Thing Called Love. Susan Andersen

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      CHAPTER FIVE

      JAKE WATCHED UNTIL THE KIDS disappeared through the front door of Nolan’s house. “Well, that went fucking swell.” Blowing out a breath, he put the Mercedes in gear and backed down the driveway. Now what did he do?

      He’d expected to get a little more out of the opportunity Jenny had presented him in the wake of Rebecca Damoth’s frantic phone call than to receive the invisible chauffeur treatment. Grumbling to himself to avoid acknowledging the hollow that had formed in his gut when his son resolutely ignored him, he drove aimlessly around Razor Bay.

      He had to admire the irony. When he’d heard the news about Emmett and realized that this was his final chance to take responsibility for the parenting he’d abdicated so many years ago, what should have been a cut-and-dried decision wasn’t. He hated to admit it, but part of him had been seriously tempted to simply continue doing what he’d been doing. In the end, however, not a damn thing wasn’t an option. He was tired of the guilt. He might be able to shove it aside for blocks of time, but it always came back to haunt him.

      Maybe he was like those chicks who were only drawn to men who treated them like shit. Because the more his kid ignored or tried to avoid him, the more fascinated he found himself.

      Spotting the sign for the public access to the canal at the north end of town, he turned off the road into its long parking area and drove through the lot to the double-wide boat ramp, not stopping until his tires were a few feet shy of the water. The tide had turned but was only about halfway to high. He turned off the ignition and, tapping his fingers on the steering wheel, stared out at the canal.

      Not only was it midweek with most people at work, the day was gray as a bucket of day-old fish guts, the mountains obscured by liverish rain clouds too dense and weighty to push beyond the stratum of those stacked upon them. The parking lot didn’t contain a single vehicle with attached trailer, and Jake had his doubts that even the most intrepid, boat-happy sailor from Bangor—the naval station on the other side of Kitsap—would be hauling a boat down to the launch today.

      He climbed out of the SUV, stepped off the paved launch and walked to the water’s edge.

      It had been windy during the week and a half he’d been in Razor Bay, but today not so much as a breeze stirred. The skies looked as though they might open up at any minute, but for now they were dry. Squatting, he selected a few flat stones from the rocky beach then surged back upright, took a step back with his right foot and skimmed one across the water’s flat, mirrorlike surface. It skipped four times before sinking. He pulled another out of his jeans pocket and let it fly, as well.

      He’d envisioned making at least a little progress with his son by now, but Austin avoided him like a case of the Asian clap. How was he supposed to get to know him if the boy was either impossible to find or faded like smoke in the wind the few times Jake could locate him?

      It didn’t help that he was getting that closed-in feeling Razor Bay inevitably generated in him and, agitation building, he abandoned the lightweight skipping stones and culled some honest-to-God rocks—several with razor-edged oysters attached—from the beach. He hurled them, one after the other, as far as he could throw them. Each made a nice, solid kerplunk, sending up a decent splash as they struck the water.

      That was where his satisfaction ended.

      At the rate he was going, Austin would be thirty before he was ready to move with him to New York. Jake needed to get things moving at a faster clip than he’d managed so far.

      Frustration at his failure to make progress bit deep. Dammit, he was accustomed to dealing with problems in a brisk, competent manner. He spent a good deal of every year in far-off places where situations without easy solutions regularly arose. Yet, when faced with dilemmas, he was the guy you could count on to dig in and find ways to fix them.

      That wasn’t what he’d been doing here. And the hell of it was, whenever he bent his mind toward finding a way to break the ice with his son, instead of working with its usual efficiency, his brain turned into a barren moonscape.

      Tires crunched over the scattering of pinecones that had dropped from the evergreen trees dotting the parking lot, but Jake had no interest in seeing who’d arrived. What did he care if someone decided to overlook the less than ideal weather conditions? Hell, as far as that went, why shouldn’t they? It might be a butt-ugly day, but the canal was calm for the first time since he’d arrived in this godforsaken town.

      Hunkering down on the beach next to the paved boat ramp, he culled a new arsenal of the largest rocks he could find. The mood he was in, he’d welcome the opportunity to lob a boulder or two, but the beach wasn’t exactly littered with those.

      He was aware in a disinterested corner of his mind that the vehicle hadn’t swung around to back a trailer down the ramp alongside his SUV. Instead, a car door opened and closed behind him and, as he rose to his feet to throw the first rock, he heard the gritty sound of shoes kissing sand-dusted pavement. Ignoring it, he hurled another rock, then another.

      “Tourists pay big bucks for access to that water,” Max said from behind him. “They expect it to be there the next time they show up. So keep that up and I’m gonna have to write you a ticket for reef building within twenty feet of the shoreline.”

      Hearing the deep tones of his half brother’s voice gave him the usual screw-you jolt of irritation—but laced this time with a new, unexpected thread of pleasure. He shrugged off the latter as a fluke, since his pleasure receptors and Max were a foreign pairing.

      “Twenty feet?” he demanded, turning to face Max. “Please. I could throw these babies thirty in my sleep.”

      Max’s mouth curved up on one side. “I’m guessing algebra wasn’t your long suit.”

      “True.” His own lips quirked. “Business majors don’t need no stinkin’ algebra.” A degree he’d pursued in order to prove he was the financial achiever his father wasn’t. Not that Charlie Bradshaw hadn’t provided for his family—whoever that might have been at any given moment. But where he had been a middling salesman, Jake had an intrinsic knack with money. More important, he’d had an urge to be more successful than his father. To be better in every way.

      The recollection wiped the smile from his face. Because look how well that had worked out for him. His precautions had failed, Kari had gotten pregnant and he hadn’t stuck around to be a father.

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