Total pages in book: 69
Estimated words: 66516 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 333(@200wpm)___ 266(@250wpm)___ 222(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 66516 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 333(@200wpm)___ 266(@250wpm)___ 222(@300wpm)
“You said four?”
“Yes. In room A34. Do you want to meet in front of the school or do you know where the A building is?”
“I think I can locate a classroom.” Jason furrowed his brow and tried to decide if he was being overly sensitive. The answer was probably yes because Angela wasn’t the type to be intentionally mean, even when it was warranted. Jason knew that firsthand. “I’ll meet you there,” he said more calmly.
“Thanks, Jason.”
Angela shouldn’t have to thank him for attending a meeting about his daughter, one of the few things Kristen had ever asked him to do. He dragged his fingers through his hair and sighed. “No, thank you,” he said sincerely. “I appreciate you reminding me. I would have forgotten.”
“No problem.” Angela paused but didn’t hang up, so he knew she wanted to say something else.
“What?” he asked.
“If you’re not busy after the meeting, I’m sure Kristen would love to go out to dinner with you. She’s planning to go to the basketball game at the school, but that doesn’t start until seven, so there’ll be time for you to grab a bite in between. I’ll be picking up Donny, so it’d be just the two of you.”
When had he last spent one-on-one time with his daughter? Jason couldn’t remember, which meant it had been too long. And an early dinner wouldn’t impede on his plans for the night.
Jason’s nerves were wound tight and his skin felt too stretched. Abe had left him a message a few days earlier, and Jason had been planning to call him back when he finished his shift. He was good for a few hard fucks and hoped Abe was free that night so he could stop by and burn off some tension between the sheets. He also hoped Abe didn’t have plans the next morning, because Jason wasn’t scheduled to work all weekend and the thought of sleeping with Abe in his arms again made his belly warm and his chest ache.
“Dinner sounds good,” he said. “Should I drop her back at the school when we’re done?”
“Yes. She’s spending the night at Ilia’s, so her mother will take them home after the game.”
Jason didn’t know who Ilia was, but he assumed she was one of his daughter’s friends. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll see you at the school in a few hours.”
JASON ARRIVED at his daughter’s school on time—five minutes after four was close enough to the meeting time to count, just like going five miles over the speed limit was close enough not to result in a speeding ticket. Unfortunately, the school campus was larger than he had anticipated, and the buildings weren’t arranged in any obvious order. He double-checked the text Angela had sent him with the room number and once again saw that it was A34. After making another lap around the school, he finally came upon the A building all the way in the back corner.
His phone rang at that moment, and he notice the time when he looked at the screen.
“I’m about to walk in, Ange,” he said as he stomped toward the door. “It’s not even a quarter after yet.” He grabbed the doorknob and turned it as he pulled. “And I can’t be held responsible for the flawed design of this school. How can you trust these people to educate our daughter if they don’t understand the order of the alphabet?”
“There he is now,” Angela said.
It took Jason a moment to realize her voice wasn’t coming from the phone. He glanced up and saw Angela, Kristen, and a man whose back was to Jason sitting around a triangle-shaped table. A half-dozen of them filled the room instead of desks. He would have worked up some sort of barb about the new learning environment, but his daughter spoke first.
“Mr. Green, this is my father, Dr. Garcia,” she said. “Dad, this is Mr. Green.”
The teacher stood up and turned around to welcome him. The warm blue eyes and free smile were already familiar, but they left the moment Abe laid eyes on Jason, replaced by wide eyes and a furrowed brow. Jason much preferred a sleepy, sated Abe or a mindlessly aroused Abe, or even a laughing, teasing Abe to this concerned, confused version.
“Your father?” Abe said, his voice scratchy.
“Jason Garcia,” Jason said, forcing himself to step forward and reach his hand out for a shake instead of pulling Abe into his arms and kissing away that worried expression. His family was in the room. This was no place to act on his predilections. “It’s nice meeting you.”
Abe’s jaw dropped, and he blinked at an unusually rapid clip. He didn’t react to Jason’s raised hand.
“I’m sorry I’m late,” Jason said as a peace offering.
“Mr. Green?” Kristen said. “Is everything okay? You look a little pale.”
Jason didn’t correct his daughter by saying that Abe’s porcelain skin always gave him that appearance and that he was beautiful, especially when he was naked and tangled with Jason’s own dark body. Upon closer inspection, though, Jason realized Kristen was right: Abe did look a little pale. Immediately, Jason dropped his gaze to Abe’s chest and tried to count his breaths per minute.