“It was tonight, and we skulked in the back so she wouldn’t see us,” Mia continues. “Anyway, when they introduced Cale’s band, they said it was one of his last shows in town before they moved to New York.”
“She wants to follow him to New York.” The words are so ridiculous, they feel strange coming out of my mouth. She’s been dating him less than a year. “What the hell is she thinking? She is not taking my daughter out of state, and she certainly isn’t doing it over this asswipe.”
“I told you, don’t worry,” Hunter says, but he looks concerned.
“Where?”
“Where what?” Mia asks, but the quiver in her voice says she knows what I am asking.
“Where is Lauren? Right now. What club? Where is that shithole playing his bullshit music at?” Neither responds. “You can tell me or I can Google it. I’m sure they have a website.”
“It’s a bar called Skippy’s,” Hunter confesses, and as I start to Google the address he starts to panic. “But, Griffin, going there and losing your shit on her, in public, is actually going to give her a case for custody. She’ll make it seem like you’re stalking her, she’ll have witnesses to testify that you have anger issues. You will be handing her a case.”
“Fuck!” I bellow and shove my phone back into my pocket because he’s right. I don’t want him to be, but he is. “This can’t be happening. Why would she do this to me? To Charlie. We have a great relationship. Our daughter has finally adjusted to the divorce, and she’s going to try and rip her away from me?”
“It’s selfish, and I will make that case,” Hunter promises. I stare at him, unable to speak or move or think of anything but the gut-wrenching possibility that Charlie might move to New York.
“I’ve got to go,” I mutter, running an aggravated hand through my hair as I turn and storm back toward my car parked across the street.
“Griff, donotgo to that bar!” Hunter calls out.
“I won’t,” I bark back before getting behind the wheel and slamming the door—hard.
I drive around aimlessly for more than an hour and then to Lauren’s house. Hunter said no bar. He didn’t say no contact. Here it will be her word against mine in whatever we say to each other. I park across the street and just sit there and wait. Rosa’s minivan is in the driveway, and about an hour later a beat-up black Mazda Miata pulls up beside it. That rocker douchebag is driving. Lauren gets out of the passenger side, and I get out of my car.
“Hey!” I call, and she spins to face me, shock all over her face.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
“Are you thinking of moving to New York?” I ask bluntly.
More shock—not shock at the question but shock at the fact that I’m asking it. I know the difference, because this expression is tinged with guilt, and I take that as a good sign. She might actually feel just a little bit bad about ripping my daughter away from me.
“Get out of here, dude,” her piece-of-shit boyfriend says as he gets out of the car and walks toward us. “Her life is none of your business now.”
I turn toward him, shoulders back, fists clenched, jaw locked. “Listen, Cale…which is a fucking vegetable not a name, by the way. Everything that affects our child is my business for the rest of her life. That’s how it works. If you don’t like it, get back in the little fucking shitbox car and get the fuck out of here.”
“You’re a piece of work, man,” he hisses back, but he doesn’t challenge me. He turns to Lauren. “This isn’t my jam. He’s killing my post-show buzz. I’m going back to the bar.”
“Cale!” she calls in protest, but he gets back in his car and drives away, peeling the tires like the small-dicked douchebag he is. When his car is nothing but taillights at the end of the block, she turns to me with tears in her eyes. “You being here is stalking. I’m telling my lawyer!”
“And I’ll say it never happened and bring up that you show up uninvited at my place too.” I shrug. “You want to play dirty, I’ll play dirty too. You are not taking Charlie to live in New York.”
“We’re over. You can’t control my life anymore,” Lauren argues back. “I get to have my own life and be happy. Cale makes me happy. He has to move to New York because it’s better for his career. I want to go with him.”
“Then go. Leave Charlie with me,” I suggest desperately. “She can visit you on holidays and in the summer.”
“I can’t leave her!” Lauren cries, tears now brimming in her eyes.
“And neither can I!”
“Then move to New York,” Lauren replies, and I’m waiting for some kind of hint that she’s kidding or being sarcastic, but her hazel eyes are dead serious and her expression is flat.
I’m blown away. “You want me to move to New York?”
She folds her arms across her chest and huffs. “If you care so much about seeing Charlie every week, then that’s your only way. Because I am moving to New York.”
She turns and storms up the front path to the door. I follow. “I have a job. A career! And a life here!”
