Page 10 of Entirely Yours
What?! I thought you said there were three!!
Uncle Hank needs to find his own place
You know how much I rely on him to watch Chloe
Move up here please??
Mags
Hell no, it’s too fucking cold
I stick my tongue out at my phone before closing it and rolling myself off the floor. Hyping myself up, I shake all of these negative thoughts off, knowing they won’t get me anywhere. “Fine, we can do two bedrooms! No big deal, I’m totally fine with that. C’mon, let’s start bringing stuff up.”
I swing the front door open and stop dead because the man walking out of unit 2A looks a whole lot like…
“Jules?”
The man, who I’m now realizing is definitelynotJules, raises his eyebrow and points to himself.
“I’m Ben,” he says, slowly giving me a once over. But when he smiles, his dimples pop the exact same way Jules’ did. “And you are…?”
I stare at him, dumbstruck, long enough that Dad comes around me, shoots a weird look my way, and puts his hand out to Ben. “Hank Rose,” he says. “This is Thea.” He points his thumb toward me. “And that’s?—”
“I’m Chloe!” my four-year-old shouts, cutting Dad off.
Ben holds his hand up for a high-five, and I realize his arms are empty of the tattoos that mesmerized me a week ago. Chloe jumps up and hits Ben’s much larger hand right in the center.
“Nice to meet you guys,” Ben says. “I just moved in across the hall with my brother, Gabe. We’ll have to have youover sometime.”
“Can we be best friends?” Chloe asks. “Mom says I’ll be able to make lots of friends in Sassyass.”
Ben chokes on his spit at that. “Damn, why have I never thought of calling it that?”
“Language,” Chloe says—her stern voice makes me wonder if that’s how I sound when I get mad at Dad for his language.
Ben surprises me by taking a deep bow. “My apologies, milady. Here’s a penny for repentance.” He holds his hand out with an invisible coin clutched between his fingers.
All three of us stare at him until Chloe bursts out laughing. “You’re funny! You can call me Princess Chloe, and I really prefer real bills for pettance, whatever that is.”
“Chloe!” I chide, finally getting my voice back.
But Ben just laughs and says, “Sure thing, Princess Chloe. Listen, my mom would probably kill me for not giving you all a proper Sassafras welcome, but I’m already late for a meeting. I’ll stop by and check in later tonight, okay? It was nice to meet you, Princess Chloe, Hank—” He pauses giving me one more assessing look. “Thea.”
And then he’s off.
As soon as Ben is down the stairs and out of sight, Dad asks, “Who is Jules?”
“No one,” I rush out. “I met him on my last night at The Dusty Barrel. Ben looks a lot like him. Just caught me off guard, that’s all.”
“Whatever you say,” Dad replies. “C’mon, you,” he directs at Chloe, and off they go to start unloading our things.
There’s something about Ben that is so familiar, it’s going to drive me nuts. I take one last look at the closed door to apartment 2A, kicking myself again for not leaving my number when I left that hotel room.
Too late now.
Several hours later, almost all of our things have been moved into our new space. Chloe quickly got bored with carrying small items from the car to the apartment and eventually found the box with her Barbie’s. I set our old family iPad up on the floor of the living room and started streaming Bluey to help keep her occupied.
Even though I’m exhausted, I start to make a grocery list but quickly determine that will have to be a tomorrow activity. “Dad, you okay if I go down to the bar and see what food options they have? I also want to go peek in the studio really fast.”
