Wild Wind A Chaos Novella - Kristen Ashley Page 0,60
so she could catch Haley’s eyes and she shared, “I asked him if he minded if I watched. He said he didn’t. But he was weird about it when we talked about it, so I think he would.”
“Then you two need to have a conversation about why that would be. Because there is a good deal of history behind that Club that’s concerning, but they’re beyond that. So unless he thinks you’ll be judgy.” She kept Archie in her arms even as she shrugged and concluded, “And I know you two are new, but the one thing he has to know about you is the last thing you are is judgy.”
That was such a nice thing to say.
“Thank you for telling it like it is,” Archie said.
Haley looked cute and kind of embarrassed when she replied, “My pleasure.”
Their hug couldn’t have been different than one from her mom—and make no mistake, Archie did not forget an iota of what a hug from her mom felt like.
But her mom was tall and thin, not average height and rounded.
Her mom wore Tom Ford perfume.
Haley wore Chloe.
But dang, how did Archie miss that, when her dad found someone to love, he’d given the same thing to Archie?
“I can’t wait for you to meet him, I think you’re really gonna like him,” Archie told her.
And Haley looked her dead in the eye when she replied, “If he’s anything like his father, I know I will.”
Yeah, she had to watch that movie.
This meant ditching the shop so she could watch during the day because Jagger had her nights.
She gave Haley a squeeze, Haley squeezed back, and when they let go of each other and turned to Andy, they saw his eyes were bright with tears.
“Such a lovable lug,” Haley said softly.
She was so right.
Archie went to her dad, kissed his cheek, got another hug, and felt like a loser bitch that she’d made him wait this long to witness his two girls connecting.
She’d make amends later, starting tomorrow night.
Now she had to get to the theater.
She’d already blown off a pickup from Jagger, who wanted them to go to the movie together.
And by the time she hit the Chez Artiste theater, she was cutting it close to the movie starting, and was five minutes late for when they agreed to meet.
Jag was waiting for her with the concessions he’d already bought.
And Archie felt that sleeping dragon shift when Jag saw her, and she knew he wanted to ask why he couldn’t pick her up and why she’d barely made the screening time.
Giving him permission not to share, she’d somehow taken away his ability to ask.
She didn’t push about something important, and he was returning the favor—with everything.
But she hadn’t asked for that favor.
More, she didn’t want it.
After giving him a greeting kiss, she grabbed her drink and the nachos, he had the popcorn and his own drink with the Milk Dud box poking out of the back pocket of his jeans, and they hit the theater.
They were seated and settled before she leaned to him and shared, “I had to pop by my dad’s. I needed to talk to him about something and it ended in me bonding with Haley. Also realizing I’ve never really bonded with Haley. That’s a longer story I’ll tell you after the movie.”
“Cool, cool,” he muttered, grabbing a chip loaded with ridiculously yellow cheese and more jalapeños than she’d be able to deal with, and she liked it spicy, and shoving it in his mouth.
“Baby,” she called.
He looked to her.
“You know you can ask me anything, right?” she queried.
“Yeah,” he said, going back to the chips and turning again to face the screen as he chewed.
She caught his jaw and brought him to face her again.
“I’m serious, Jag.”
“I didn’t think you weren’t.”
The lights dimmed, and since they couldn’t get deep into this during a film (not to mention, she was a trailer girl), she let his jaw go and went after her own chip.
But she couldn’t focus on the trailers.
Because somehow, she’d messed up.
Now she needed to figure out how to fix it and evidence was suggesting going right to the source, that being Jagger, wasn’t the way she could do that.
It was clear he was a get and give kind of guy.
She gave him headspace, and he was determined to return it no matter that she didn’t need it.
And that was all kinds of sweet.
But that didn’t negate the fact she didn’t need it.