Page 24 of Sweet Distraction

CHAPTER EIGHT

Rocket

I don’t remember driving here.

I needed to escape. Needed fresh air and distance from this new reality that I haven’t been given any time to accept. She was just thrown squarely in my face. Somewhere between slamming the front door and getting behind the wheel, my brain just . . . blanked. Went quiet. Like maybe it’s protecting me from myself.

Or maybe it knows I need backup.

So I called the only people who have ever showed up when everything else in my life went to shit.

The band. My brothers from other mothers. What feels at times like the only family I have.

And now I’m in Hawkin’s backyard, sitting around the fire pit with a beer in my hand and a heart that won’t stop hammering against my ribs like it’s begging for someone else to carry the weight.

Vince is here, his legs stretched out and his bottle of beer resting on his thigh. He’s got that same unreadable expression on his face he always wears before he says something that’ll either destroy you or save you.

At this point, I’m not sure which I’d prefer.

Gizmo’s sprawled in a lounger, hands tapping idly on the armrest to a beat he hears in his head. His time here is limited because of plans he’d previously made with his wife.

And then there’s Hawkin himself, the resident but loyal-as-hell shit-stirrer—well, at least when I’m out of commission like I seem to be now—leaning back in an Adirondack chair and looking at me through the flames like he owns the night.

They’re the only family I’ve ever trusted. As much as I hate to admit it, I need them more now than ever before.

That’s why I came here, isn’t it?

“So,” Giz says, his fingers still tapping as he speaks. “What’s with the urgent group text? You sounded like someone important died, and yet all you fuckers are here so clearly that isn’t the case.”

I chuckle, but it’s not a good sound. It’s hollow and sharp and so very similar to the sound of Gizmo’s about this time last year when his life was turning to shit.

And everything turned out okay for him.

Remember that, Rock. It all turned out okay.

I glance at each of them, then drag a hand over my face. “I have a kid.”

Silence. Then—

“Funny, Rock. You’re the last fucking guy here who needs a kid,” Gizmo says and then takes a sip of his beer.

And on a normal day, I’d laugh with him and agree. But it’s not any fucking day. It’s today, and my closest friends are laughing because they think I’d be a joke of a father stings. It shouldn’t.

“Jesus. I thought you were serious for a second,” Hawkin says and barks out a laugh.

Vince studies me over the neck of his beer, his eyes quiet but assessing. “He is being serious.”

One of them snorts and another chokes on the sip he just took, but I’m too busy holding Vince’s stare.

“Rock?” Gizmo asks as he sits forward until I have the courage to look over at him.

I nod. That’s all I give them, but I sure as fuck have their attention now. For the first time in days, I feel like I can finally breathe.

“Like . . . a real one?” Hawkin asks, brow lifted. “Not the ‘I might have knocked someone up’ kind?”

“She’s three.” Fuck, those two words sound as shredded as I feel. “And she’s at my house. Right now.”

Gizmo spits out the sip he’s taking. “Three? Dude. What the fuck?”