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“No. Nova is… well… her father is friends with Savage, next door, and she was looking for a summer job while she decided what to do,” I finally explained.
“That girl has a killer instinct. Nova is a household name around here,” Nancy drawled, and I looked shocked. “What? I’m hip and up with everything. Nova and Falcon Blackelk are pretty famous. They’ve been in newspaper articles.”
“Why ask if I hired Nova from an agency?”
“I didn’t know if she was planning child care full-time. To waste talent like they have would be a terrible thing. Every time they win a tournament or contest, they hit the paper. Despite not being native to our city, we’ve kind of adopted them as our own. That Rage MC has quite a few famous people attached to it. There must be something in the water,” Nancy pondered.
“Rage do?” I replied, surprised. As tired as I felt, I was getting a lot of information from Nancy, which made me more comfortable leaving the girls with Nova.
“Oh yes, well, Phoenix Michaelson is self-explanatory. If you haven’t heard of her, then you’ve been in the Alaskan wilds.” I had to agree with Nancy there. “Then there’s L. Smithson, who’s married to a brother. Thomasina Mae Blake, Artemis, the bounty hunter, and then the kids. Carmine and Tye play professional baseball and hockey… lot of famous names in Rage MC,” Nancy said.
“Wow,” I murmured, shocked.
“Oh, there’s more. Anyway, how are you poppet?”
“Okay,” I replied automatically.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes,” I answered with a smile.
Just after I moved in a year ago, Nancy had found me in a weak moment as I broke down into floods of tears in my backyard. She’d offered comfort, and I’d confided the entire dirty story to her. Since then, Nancy had held my secret and checked up on me regularly, and we’d become good friends. It was nice having somebody—especially another adult—I could trust.
Nancy was seventy-two, married to Mike with kids and grandkids that kept her busy. She loved cooking and knitting and was always baking cookies. Which Nancy did believe in adding cannabis to when she thought people needed chilling out. I’d zoned out for hours the first time I’d accidentally eaten one. Luckily, I had hidden them from Harper and Isla, or who knows what would have happened. Now I checked there was nothing relaxing in the food Nancy brought me.
Nancy was over twice my age and lived more daily than I did in a year. Seriously, I needed to take a leaf out of her book and embrace life more. It was finding time that hindered me because all I did was work. And I was working more than usual because I had to pay Nova. The girl wasn’t exactly expensive, but I still had to pay.
“Lordy, you’re zoning out. Go take yourself off, put those kiddies to bed and get a good night’s rest,” Nancy ordered, interrupting my wayward thoughts.
“Sorry,” I said, feeling guilty.
“For what? Being a single, hardworking mother of two. Get on with you. There’s nothing to apologise for. This old body holds a lot of respect and love for you,” Nancy replied and began walking away.
Nancy was right. Some sleep would help wonders. Plus, I had tomorrow off, which meant I got to lie in!
???
I blearily opened my eyes and scowled at the clock that brightly proclaimed eight in the morning. What the fuck? Confused, I closed my eyes and wondered why the hell I was awake. Once again, the lawnmower’s chug echoed. It was eight on a Sunday! You had to be kidding me!
Irate now, I climbed out of bed and peered out the window, momentarily arrested by the sight that greeted me.
Savage was mowing his grass in cut-off jean shorts and nothing else.
I swallowed hard at the beautiful view. Of its own accord, my gaze traced his tattoos and the way his muscles flexed in the bright sun. Savage already had a thin sheen of sweat covering his body, and I licked my lips. Several female neighbours across the road were watching him from their porches. And honestly, who would blame them?
Then I scowled, remembered how early it was, and threw open my window.
“Savage!” I shouted.
He didn’t hear me, so I repeated it louder.
“What?” he called back, switching the mower off.
“It’s eight in the morning,” I said pointedly.
“And you’re still in bed?”
“Rude! You know I’ve been working fourteen-hour shifts. This is my one lie in.”
