Page 77 of Merritt and Her Childhood Crush
But Isabelle is different. Isabelle is Hunter’s.
“What do you do besides dressing up on game day?” I ask.
“All kinds of things,” Isabelle says, her face lighting up. “We go from classroom to classroom and then to the gym and the library and there are teachers in every room with different games. My favorite is the matching one. Because I’m the best at it. I remember better than everyone else.”
“Izzy,” Hunter gently chides.
“What?” she says, a little indignantly. “I didn’t say I was the smartest this time. Just that I’m best at matching.”
“Just so long as you’re only tellingmeyou’re best at matching, and not telling all the other kids.”
Isabelle rolls her eyes. “I don’thaveto tell them. They see me win. They all want me on their team.”
I find my lips curling up in a smile. Isabelle is absolutely endearing. Precocious and vibrant. And already, I’m looking for ways she’s similar to and different from her father. Hunter would have faded into the wallpaper before wanting to compete with a team on game day. I didn’t need to go to school with him to know this.
And yet, I see Hunter in her intelligent eyes, and even somehow in her sass, which isn’t a characteristic readily visible on the surface with Hunter. But it’s there.
It’s not bad if I’m just completely ignoring what parts she might have inherited from her mother, right? Because I don’t want to think about Cassidy. Even if she’s married to a new man and having his baby.
Great. Now I’m thinking about Cassidy.
I clear my throat. “Is the matching game like Memory? The one where you turn over the little tiles looking for a match?”
Isabelle nods. “Just like that, but the tiles are this bigger.” She stretches her arms out to either side. Her blanket falls to the porch and Hunter arranges it over her shoulders again. “They spread them out on the floor, and they fill up a whole classroom with all the desks pushed to the sides. Memory is a little kid game, but it’s fun like this.” She perks up and looks at Hunter. “Can we play a game with Merritt?” She turns her attention fully on me. “Do you want to play?”
I look at Hunter. I have literally zero places to be, so I’d love to play a game, especially if it means catching a peek of the inside of Hunter’s house.
But I don’t know the rules here, about dating or whatever, with a kid. And I don’t want to impose.
Especially when Hunter got a look of panic in his eyes at even the hint of me coming inside his house. I really hope this isn’t some Bluebeard’s secret room kind of thing.
“It’s a nice day,” Hunter says easily. “Why don’t we play out here?”
Thwarted again.What is this man hiding? I shove the macabre thoughts of Bluebeard and a room full of skeletons right out of my head. Isabelle can go inside, so obviously, there isn’t anything dangerous or weird. Except, does that mean it’s just ameproblem?
“On it!” Isabelle calls, jumping up from the porch.
“Hey, hey, slow down,” Hunter says. “You’re still sick, Izzy.”
She stops at the door. “I don’tfeelsick.”
“Because I gave you medicine. Better still take it easy, okay?”
She frowns. “So we can’t play?”
“We can still play. Just slow down. No need to run like Vroom’s chasing you. And one game, then it’s back to bed with you.”
“Okay, Daddy.”
Hunter’s eyes stay on his daughter until she disappears through the front door, two of the three dogs hot on her heels.
“You’re good at this,” I say, motioning toward the house. “Good withher.”
He shakes his head, laughing lightly. “Sometimes it doesn’t feel like it. Parenting is a little like being thrown into a pit of vipers. Or, like a pit with one viper, whom you really love and want to take care of but …” He stops and runs a hand over his beard.
I grin. “That analogy got away from you a little bit, didn’t it?”
“It did.” He chuckles. “Point is, I felt like I got tossed in and am still fumbling around trying to find my way.”
