the soil and then placed a plant into the ground.
“No bees, Momma,” Bryson said, his voice firm. “And no bugs.”
“That’s great, baby.” She knew it wouldn’t always be that way. But if this encouraged him to come outside even for just a few minutes a day, they were making progress. “Will you be able to stay for supper, Ryker?”
He sat back on his heels and looked up at her. “Sure. If you have enough.”
“We have plenty,” she said, especially since Bryson wouldn’t be eating all that much of the meatloaf.
“It’ll probably take me another thirty minutes or so to finish the flower beds,” he said as he gestured to the one on the other side of the sidewalk that led to the porch steps. It was a smaller flower bed on that side, but between the two beds, there would be an explosion of color at the front of the house.
She was going to have to take pictures to show Nana. The older woman would be so glad to see that her flower beds were being put to good use. Of course, that would also mean having to reveal that Ryker had had a hand in bringing her gardens to life again.
Sophia knew that Nana wanted her to find a good man, someone to be a father to Bryson, and it wouldn’t surprise her if she started to think that Ryker was an option. He was the only man that Bryson had been even remotely interested in being around so far.
And now, with the flowers? Yeah, Nana would definitely think he might be worth keeping around. But Nana didn’t realize that Sophia wasn’t sure she could let Ryker close enough for a relationship—if that was even something he’d want. She still wasn’t convinced there was any man on earth who wanted to take on the double whammy of a woman with issues and a child with issues.
“I have to go work on the food, Bry. Do you want to come back in?” Again, he hesitated. “You can stay out here, if you want. The door is open if you need to come in.”
“I’ll stay here.”
“Good boy.” She bent and pressed a kiss to his curls. “I love you.”
“Love you too, Momma.”
She glanced at Ryker to see him watching them with a smile. “I’ll keep an eye on him.”
“Thanks.”
Back in the kitchen, she took a moment to compose herself, gripping the edge of the counter as she stared out the window above the sink.
She was happy that Bryson was making these steps forward, but she struggled with the fact that it was coming with Ryker’s help. There was no guarantee that he’d be around to continue to help Bryson, and she certainly didn’t feel comfortable asking him to keep coming around.
He’d already gone above and beyond her request to spend a couple of minutes putting Bryson’s mind at ease about his intentions with Vivianne. From that moment on, Bryson had latched on to him, and Sophia had no idea how he was going to react to seeing Ryker less. But since it was inevitable, she would soon find out.
The sound of bubbling had her turning from the window toward the stove. She drained the potatoes then pulled out the stuff she needed to mash them. Once that was done, she drained the carrots, hoping that Ryker liked slightly mushy cooked carrots because, for whatever reason, Bryson liked that particular veggie to be either raw or cooked super soft. Nothing in between.
The timer on the oven went off, so she took the meatloaf out, then set the table. She wasn’t sure if Ryker would finish in time to eat with them or if he’d eat later, but she went ahead and set a place for him.
Sophia was surprised that she managed to get everything ready with still no sign of Bryson. It felt weird to go this long without Bryson being within arm’s reach. But she could hear the distant rumble of Ryker’s deeper voice followed by Bryson’s softer, higher one, so she knew he was okay.
When she went back to the door, she saw that Bryson had moved over to the other side of the porch. Sophia joined him there and looked over the railing. She was kind of amazed to see how quickly Ryker worked. But then again, he was a professional, so it made sense. But still, something that would have taken her hours had only taken him a matter of minutes.
“Supper is ready,” she said as she rested