Page 49 of Heated Takeover

“We probably need to get going,” Natalie says, breaking me from the memory. My eyes fall on her, and Jamie starts fussing in response. He is only four years old, and I think he is getting tired.

“But Mommy, we hardly did any rides,” he whines.

“We did a couple of rides,” she says calmly, yet I can hear the tiredness in her voice. She’s done and ready to be home, shoes off, curled up on the couch with a glass of wine. “And we did face painting, twice, and balloon animals and games and cotton candy and a million zillion other things that a lot of other kids didn’t get to do,” she goes on, but Jamie isn’t having it.

“But we didn’t do the Ferris wheel,” he says, pointing up at the Ferris wheel.

Her expression drops. It’s the same drop I feel in my stomach as I look up at it. As I remember.

“Jamie, we can do the Ferris wheel some other time,” she says, taking his hands and attempting to pick him up. But Jamie jerks away from her hard and plants his foot in a defiant stomp.

“You always say that, and we never go on it! Never!” he shouts.

“Jamie,” Natalie bends down in front of him. “It’s really high. Very high. I don’t know if you’re ready for–”

“I’m not a baby!” Jamie nearly screams. “And I wanna go on the big Ferris wheel! I can do it! I’ll show you!”

With that, to the surprise of both of us, Jamie takes off running, vanishing almost immediately into the crowd.

“Jamie!” Natalie shrieks, taking off after him. I follow instinctively, and we weave in and out of people, nearly running over others, in search of a boy half the size of everyone else.

“Jamie!” she calls again. “Jamie, come back! We’ll go on the wheel! Just wait for Mommy. Jamie? Jamie!”

Her screams are frantic, and as we dart in the direction of the wheel, I start to call out to him too.

“Jamie! Come back, and we will take you on the Ferris wheel,” I say.

Eventually, we get closer to the Ferris wheel, and there’s Jamie, standing near the line, staring up at it in awe.

“Oh thank God,” Natalie lets out, and I feel a wave of relief flood over me as well. We jog over to him, and he is unaware that we are even there at first. But Natalie grabs him, scoops him up, and hugs him. When she does scold him, her voice is a shaky, frightened version of her mom voice.

“James Ash Blythe, don’t you ever do that again. Do you understand me? Not ever! You scared Mommy to death!”

Natalie keeps going, and Jamie is crying. Natalie is on the brink, and I am just standing there. Staring. My brain is locked on one word.

Ash.

His middle name is Ash.

As I stand in front of the Ferris wheel, five years since the last time we were here together, my eyes fall on the four-year-old. The four-year-old whose middle name is the same as my nickname. The name I first gave her and the name she first called me by. I suddenly feel like I need to get the hell out of here, and now.

“I’m glad you found him. I have to go,” I say, taking off into the crowd.

“Marcus?” Natalie asks, but I keep going. Not looking back. Not thinking about all the question marks in my brain. I just go.

Chapter 19

Natalie

“What do you know about budgets?” I ask Dylan as I walk into her cubicle and sit in the spare swivel chair she has. It’s lavender and fuzzy; it serves no purpose. She just liked two chairs she found on Wayfair and couldn’t choose, so she got both.

“Depends on what we are budgeting,” she says. “If you’re asking if I can budget the amount of money I spend at the grocery store so that I can afford the throw pillows I want at World Market, then I’m your girl. Now if you’re asking if I am good at budgeting for stocking stuffers for all nine of my bratty nieces and nephews, not so great. Pretty sure they’re all getting socks again this year.”

“Event budgets,” I say, my attention locked on the screen of my tablet.

“Is that even your job?” she asks.

“Yes and no?” I ask, sliding my glasses back up the bridge of my nose. “I mean, it was Janice’s job,” I say.