the door for me, his fingers grazing my backside as he helped me settle into the passenger seat. He crouched down, tucked my hair over my ear. "That doesn't mean you know everything."
I smiled to myself as he rounded the vehicle. I hadn't intended to like this guy. Not this much. I'd wanted a job and I'd wanted to be better than a hard pass. There were obvious reasons for these intentions too. I was in no condition to grow feelings for anything more sentient than a spice rack. Plus, it was clear he'd recently stepped out of some sort of fucked-up situation. I didn't need the whole story to understand everyone's shock at me being someone other than the notorious Millie.
However, the deep, dark, true reason I didn't plan on liking him—or anyone—this much was I didn't know how. I knew how to handle my boss, whomever that was at the moment, but that was more a matter of topping from the bottom than anything else. I could do that now. I could muddle along, anticipating his moods and managing his office and melting into his arms, but I didn't trust myself for anything else.
Inside the small cabin of the Porsche, our game continued in earnest. I rested my hand on his knee as I bent to retrieve my purse. He ran his hand down my arm as he glanced out the rear window. I passed my hand over his when he reached for the gearshift, a thick groan tumbling out of him in the process.
"Are you gonna survive?" I asked, my hand returning to his as he scrunched his eyes closed. "I'm not sure driving a stick shift is on your list of approved activities for a few more days."
He flexed his hand on the knob and choked down another groan. "All good."
Though I didn't entirely believe him, I kept that to myself. We'd know within a couple of minutes of city driving whether he could manage and that gave me the opportunity to ask him the question I'd stored away since commandeering his kitchen. "Do you have a grocery service?"
Ash barked out a laugh as we emerged from the underground garage and into blinding summer sunlight. "Yeah. It's called Diana Santillian Is A Busybody. Great service but the fees will kill you."
Because I truly did not understand, I asked, "What does that mean?"
"It means my mother takes it upon herself to leave her home on the southeast coast of Massachusetts, drive to Boston, and stock my kitchen with whichever items she believes I need."
Again, I truly did not understand. "Why?"
"You're asking for some long-form history if you want the answer to that, Zelda," he said with a chuckle.
I gestured to the highway entrance on the other side of the intersection. "We have time."
At first, he didn't respond. He squinted at the traffic, took a sip from his stainless-steel water bottle, plucked his wallet from a back pocket and dropped it in the center console. Then, "The food is the byproduct, it's not the primary driver here. We grew up as free-range kids, probably more than others from our generation. We were allowed to wander and roam and make our own kinds of trouble. Encouraged, even. My parents were all about us exploring without them hovering while we did it. And it wasn't just traipsing through forests. It was everything. We were responsible for our schoolwork, for dressing ourselves to get out the door on time, all that stuff. And that autonomy took different forms in each of us. It still does. But the problem with growing free-range kids is—as far as my mother is concerned—they turn into independent adults."
It was amusing to me, in a gravely bitter kind of way, how Ash and I both knew independence at early ages but his was the result of intentional parenting and mine was the result of, well, neglect. I'd been clothed and fed and sheltered but neglect had dimensions. It had shades.
"It's fascinating, if not a bit cloying, how my mother is so much more concerned with looking after us now," Ash continued. "She'll plan her entire week around preparing meals for me, Magnolia, and Linden and delivering them to us while also bringing paper towels and dish soap and whatever else crosses her mind. She'll figure out what we're eating—and not eating—as a method of checking in on us. And maybe it's my adult view on the matter. Maybe my mother did hover when we were kids and