Page 10 of Property of the Woodsman

“Oh,” he groans and glances back and forth between me and Jen quickly, “you have company.”

I reach out my hand, and I’m met with soft palms. Soft, sweaty palms. “Atlas.”

“Atlas,” the man repeats as he nods and stares at his ex-wife before returning his gaze to me, “that’s an interesting name. Are you here doing some kind of work on the house, Atlas?”

“No,” Jen says, tucking her arm around my waist. “This is my,” she pauses and glances down at her son, “friend. He’s coming to the wedding with me Saturday, so I figured he’d stay here tonight.”

“To the wedding?” the ex says slowly while he stares toward me with a downturned expression. “Really?”

“Yes, really,” Jen continues. “Why are you saying it like that?”

“No reason,” he says, straightening himself. “Can you watch Jackson tonight?”

She reaches for her son and offers him a hug and a kiss on the head. “I’m always available for Jackson, but what happened to the plans you guys made? I thought you were taking him to a football game in the city today?”

The scrawny man in flannel nods his head slowly. “I can’t. Em got us tickets to a Post Malone concert in the city last minute.”

“On a work night? Thought you hated going out after dinner on a work night.”

“Well,” he shakes his head, “she likes the music, and we’re—”

“We’d love to take Jackson tonight,” I interrupt, “but we have plans.”

“Plans?” he repeats as though he wants me to tell him what said plans are, though I don’t have a clue. I’m going to need to come up with a better script for the wedding to make this whole thing as legit as possible.

“Plans,” I say again. “Sorry about that.”

The man glares at me and nods, Jackson now climbing the maple tree in front of the porch like I did when I was a kid.

“Okay,” the man shrugs, “maybe Em’s mom is free. I’ll check with her.” He hollers back to Jackson, “Come on. Your mom is busy tonight.”

“Hey,” I step forward and grip the man by the arm, “don’t do that. Don’t make this her fault.”

The man narrows his brows toward me then toward Jen. “Who the fuck is this guy?”

She shifts slightly. “He’s not wrong. You’ve done this to me almost every weekend you’ve had him since the divorce was final. I swear you take advantage of the fact that you know I’ll do anything for that kid.”

“You’re jealous,” the asshole snaps. “Jealous and bitter of my life with Em. You know she’s trying, right? She shows up to games, bakes for the team, sits with Jackson all night when he can’t sleep. Why won’t you give her the time of day?”

Jen draws in a deep breath and lets it out slowly as her shoulders roll back.

Man, this guy is asking for me to loosen up his teeth for him.

“I think it’s time for you to go.” I step forward, my hand on the small of Jen’s back in comfort.

Reed doesn’t look in my direction. As expected, he continues to intimidate the woman in the room instead. “I don’t want this fuck around our kid.”

Jen laughs and hugs her son as he barrels into her at hyper speed. “I’ll come pick you up on Sunday, okay? We’ll spend the whole day fishing at the little creek on the back end of the property. That sound good?”

Jackson grins and runs to the car that his father is already pacing toward. I figure this is a win, but by the way Jen has crossed her arms and turned away from me, I gather that’s not the case.

“You okay?” I land my hand on her back as she stays still, a chill autumn breeze surrounding us.

“I think you should go.”

Sunlight catches in the corner of my vision as she talks. “What?”

“Yeah,” she glances toward me as the electric car backs up in the gravel driveway, “I hate drama, and this is drama.”