Page 28 of The Wedding Driver
They were another constant reminder that he had to suffer through another day without his darling Lisa. He’d rather enjoy the evening where he knew he’d be closing his eyes and perhaps the one person he loved the most would visit him in his dreams.
The sound of rubber scuffing the pavement caught his attention. He turned his head toward the lake.
Jared and his oldest daughter, Caitlyn.
“Good morning, Foster,” Jared said. “I’m surprised to see you here.”
Foster glanced over his shoulder at the carriage house. He wasn’t quite sure what to say. His daughter was in college, but still, he was leaving a woman’s home bright and early. That generally only meant one thing.
“Are you really, Dad?” Caitlyn asked with a grin. “You and Mom both commented last night when you saw his car here how thrilled you were.”
Jared tilted his head and arched a brow.
If Foster were his kid, he’d be running for the hills right about now based on that look.
“What?” Caitlyn gave the look right back at her father. “That’s what you said.”
Jared tossed his keys toward his oldest child, who had to be close to twenty at this point. “Get in the car, if you want to go see your boyfriend before I ask to have him transferred across the state.”
“You wouldn’t dare.”
“Then stop testing me because as I told you last night, I’m in no mood.” Jared pointed toward his truck. “Now go.”
“Fine.” Caitlyn shook her head. “What good is being an adult if I still get treated like a child,” she mumbled.
Jared sucked in a deep breath and closed his eyes until the roar of his engine turned over. “I promised my wife I wouldn’t lose my temper with her this morning. I want to know what happened to my sweet baby girl who thought her daddy was the bomb.”
Foster laughed. “Sorry. I shouldn’t find that funny.”
“She’s so much like me it’s nuts. Stubborn as all get-out and she digs her heels into the ground just like I do. I know at the end of the day she understands, but she’s so pissed because all of her friends are going on this trip for a week, but her boyfriend is doing an internship at my station and I can’t give him the time off or he won’t get the credits he needs. She doesn’t seem to understand why, even though Calvin does. He didn’t even ask me; she did. She doesn’t comprehend I can’t bend the rules just because of her.” Jared leaned against the fence by the parking area near the carriage house. “I gave him a long weekend, but that’s not good enough for my daughter, and my thinking is she should be damn grateful that we’re letting her go away at all considering her attitude. It’s tough because I like her boyfriend. He’s going to make a great state trooper and I hope he asks to be at my station because I’d fight for him.”
“That puts you between a rock and a hard place.”
“Tell me about it,” Jared said. “Sorry she called you out. That feistiness she gets from her mother, but that’s no excuse for her embarrassing you to get to me.”
“Don’t worry about it.” Foster never got to that stage with Lisa. When she died, she was still the apple of her father’s eye. She would race to the door to throw her arms around her daddy when he came home from work. He could do no wrong and she loved him with all her heart.
He loved her more, but he’d failed her miserably.
Jared was the best parent Foster had ever met. His kids were generally quite respectful and didn’t get into any trouble.
Well, nothing too horrible.
“I’ve seen her and Calvin a few times at the pizza joint in town. They make a cute couple,” Foster said. “Young love. When you’re in it, you don’t see anything else.”
“I know and when she goes back to college, it gets hard for them, though we’re letting her take her car this year so she can go back and forth, making it easier on them since he goes to school up here. He’s got one more year before he heads to the academy. Unfortunately, right now my daughter’s car is in the shop, so dad becomes the uber driver since the boys need their car for work.” Jared ran a hand over the top of his head. “I thought it was rough when they were all under the age of ten. But this adult and teenage thing is killing me.”
An image of Lisa filled Foster’s brain. He wondered what she would have looked like as a teenager. Would her hair have gotten darker like his? Or would it have stayed more of a lighter brown like her mother’s? Would she have been tall like him? Or on the shorter side like Victoria?
As if Jared knew what Foster was thinking, he reached out and squeezed his biceps. Jared had been one of the first troopers to respond to the fire the night Lisa died. He stood next to Foster when they pulled Lisa’s body from the rubble. After that moment, the entire night became a blur. Foster lost his shit.
Jared had always been kind to him and offered his ear, but Foster never took him up on it. Instead, Foster shut down.
Until recently.
“Do you have a few minutes? I’ve always wanted to talk to you about something, but never had the chance.”
“What about Caitlyn and her boyfriend?” Foster asked.
