Page 51 of One Last Shot

Stella nods her head vigorously, her curls bouncing up and down. “Let’s try that,” she says.

Beside me, I can feel Sasha move away like he’s giving me this moment with Stella. But I don’t want him any further from me, even though that’s exactly where I should be keeping him. “Hey, Top Chef”—I wink at him—“watch and learn.”

Ten minutes later, I’ve successfully made four cats and four bunnies, several sizes and shapes of hearts, and have pancakes that can (barely) pass for a horse, a dog with droopy ears, and a pig.

“Not bad,” Sasha says as we sit down to eat. “But you probably do this all the time.”

“Yep, I definitely don’t go out to brunch with friends on weekend mornings. I just stand in front of my stove mastering animal-shaped pancakes on the off chance that a kid is going to ask me to make them.”

His gray eyes are focused on me and his lips move into a smile, even though he looks like he’s trying to stop that from happening. Then he turns toward Stella. “Want me to cut those up for you?”

“I want to try myself,” she says.

We eat in silence for a minute while Stella works on cutting her pancakes.

“So, what do you have planned today?” Sasha asks me.

“I might go to lunch with a friend, then I think I’m going to go to the salon and get a blowout.”

His lip quirks. “A what?”

“A blowout. You know, where they wash your hair and blow-dry it?”

“Can’t you just do that yourself?”

“Yeah, but it’s more relaxing and fun to go to the salon and do it there. Besides, you can’t even imagine how hard it is to blow-dry all this,” I say, pointing at my curls, “straight.”

“I wish I had straight hair,” Stella sighs.

That has alarm bells going off in my head. “Why’s that?” I ask.

“Everyone else has straight hair. I want to be able to brush mine when it’s dry and have it be all shiny and pretty like Harper’s.”

“First of all, your hairisshiny and pretty. And second, do you realize how lucky we are to have beautiful curly hair? Lots of girls would trade you their straight, boring hair for your beautiful curls.”

She appears to think about this for a moment. “I still wish I could have straight hair for a day.You’regoing to have straight hair ...”

I glance at Sasha, wondering if it’s okay to ask to take her with me in front of her. If they have other plans, I don’t want to interfere.

“Hey, Stella,” I say. “Could you do me a big favor?”

She nods.

“I left my phone in my bedroom and I’m waiting to hear back from someone. Could you run and get it for me? It’s on my nightstand.”

She jumps up like she’s delighted to help, and the second she’s out of the room, I whisper to Sasha, “I was coming out here earlier to ask you if I could take her with me.”

His blank look makes me think he doesn’t understand.

“You know, so we could get our hair done together?”

“You want to spend the one day I’m here all day, with Stella?”

Now I’m not sure whathemeans. Does he feel like I’m taking Stella away from him? Or is he asking if I’m choosing her over him?

“You could have the whole day off,” he says, “to do adult things. And you want to take Stella to get her hair done because ...?”

His eyes are turning a darker shade of gray again, but I’m not sure why.

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