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Max—for some reason standing to walk around and around the table—shrugged, a gesture Eddie recognized as one of his own. His brothers were right. It was annoying as hell, especially when he needed to get an answer and none was forthcoming.
Eddie popped a slice of carrot into his mouth then wiped his hands on the towel hanging from his belt. Checked the microwave clock. Almost eight. It would be another twenty minutes before they ate. And, if history proved correct, a good hour until Max was done with his math, reading and spelling.
He’d picked up Max from practice only to be three blocks from home before realizing he had nothing to make for dinner. They’d turned around and hit the grocery store—an errand that should have taken only a few minutes but had somehow dragged into half an hour thanks to Max racing all over the store.
Where the kid got his energy after skating around hell-bent for leather for two hours was beyond Eddie. That last time, when Max had taken off in the frozen food aisle, Eddie thought for sure he’d have to call the cops to hunt him down only to corral him—and the box of cupcakes in his hands—by the deli.
Max had been working on his math since they’d walked in the door twenty-five minutes ago. Eddie would like to blame the long time frame on the amount of work needed to be done but Harper only gave the kids a few addition problems to solve, told them to copy their spelling words and read from their assigned books.
He could blame her for other things, though. Such as him having to stand over his kid to make sure Max not only did his homework but also did it correctly. For Eddie worrying about what would happen if he let either of those things slip.
“Here,” Max said, shoving his math paper at Eddie when he reached his side.
Eddie picked it up, his chest tightening at the sight of the messy answers. “Double-check these,” he said, pointing to three problems that were incorrect. Three out of the five. Damn.
Sitting on the edge of the chair, his tongue caught between his teeth, Max erased the number he’d written in for the first problem. Frowning, he mumbled to himself. “Twenty-three?” he asked, looking so hopeful Eddie wished he could manipulate the formula for math just to make his kid right.
“Try again. What’s six plus six?”
Max swung his foot, his heel hitting the chair leg. Thump. Thump. Thump.
Should Eddie be worried it took Max so long to figure it out, that he didn’t know it automatically and had to count on his fingers?
Another reason to damn Harper. For making him doubt everything his kid did.
“Twelve.”
“Right. So when you take the six of sixteen and add six, the answer is twenty...” When Max remained silent—other than all that thumping—Eddie held up all the fingers on his left hand, the pointer finger on his right. “Sixteen...seventeen,” he said, folding his pointer finger down. “Eighteen.” The thumb on his left hand. “Nineteen.” Left pointer finger.
“Twenty.” Max folded Eddie’s middle finger down. “Twenty-one.” Ring finger, then pinky. “Twenty-two!”
“Good job. Now rework the other ones.”
While Max figured out the remaining problems, Eddie put their burgers on the grill, tossed frozen French fries into the oven and threw together a salad.
“Done,” Max said, digging into his backpack.
“This one is still wrong,” Eddie told him, tapping the incorrect answer.
With a weary sigh—as if Eddie was the one making this process last so damn long—Max slumped into his seat clutching his handheld video game. “I don’t know it.”
“You didn’t even look at which problem it is.”
He scanned the paper then shrugged.
“Nineteen plus eight is twenty-seven,” Eddie said, erasing the wrong answer. He held out the pencil but Max had his head bent over his game, his hair in his eyes.
Eddie wrote in the correct sum, doing his best to imitate his son’s handwriting.
And he could only imagine what kind of fresh hell he’d catch if Harper found out about it. Too bad. She didn’t get what it was like, being a single parent, trying to do it all on her own. Besides, he’d make up for it by going over Max’s addition flash cards with him this weekend. Twice.
“Put the game away and get your reading book out,” he told Max. “You can read to me while I get dinner on the table.”
Eddie grabbed plates, silverware and napkins. When he returned to the table, Max was still hunched over his game, his fingers flying across the buttons.
“I said, put the game away.” Max didn’t so much as blink. Eddie set the plates on the table with a sharp crack. “Max. Maximilian.”
Nothing.
He plucked the video game from his son’s hands.
“Hey,” Max said, jumping up and reaching for it.
Eddie easily held it out of reach. “You can play later. After you’ve done your reading and we’ve had dinner.”
In a full pout, Max flopped onto the chair, crossed his arms. “I don’t want to read it. Mrs. Kavanagh gave me a baby book.”
“She wants you to read a book about babies?”
Max rolled his eyes. “It’s a book that babies read.”
“Must be gifted babies. Reading before they can even talk.”
Another eye roll, this one worthy of a kid twice his age. “It’s a kindergarten book.”
“If it’s the book Mrs. Kavanagh assigned you to read, that’s what you’ll do.”
“I want to read Heroes of Olympus.”
They’d just discovered the series over the summer and were on the third book. But there was no way Max could read a book at that level.
Impatience and sympathy battled inside of Eddie with irritation giving them both a run for their money. Big-time. He dug deep so that patience won in the end. He was tired. They both were. Add in hungry, and the fact that one of them was a kid, and you had the potential for a major breakdown. One Eddie didn’t have the time for.
“If we get everything done by nine,” he said, “everything being dinner, your homework and your bath, I’ll read you two chapters of The Mark of Athena before we go to bed. Deal?”
Chewing on his thumbnail, Max nodded. Slid his book—Pie Rats Ahoy!—out of his backpack and opened it. “B...b...”
Eddie covered the second half of the word with his thumb. “Sound it out.”
“B...beh...”
“Be,” Eddie corrected, switching to cover the first two letters. “Now this part.”
“Wuh...” Max shook his head. “Ruh...”
“Ware. Now put them together.” He covered the second half again. “Be.”
“Be.”
Covered the first part. “Ware.”
“Ware.”
“Be,” Eddie said, drawing the word out as he slid his finger under the letters. “Ware. Beware.”
“Beware. Tuh...huh...”
Eddie curled his fingers into his palms, his nails digging into his skin, but he kept his voice mild as he read over Max’s shoulder. “Remember when t and h are together like that, they make a th sound.”
Max nodded. “The...there...”
“Good.”
“There wa...war...”
“Were. There were...”
Fifteen minutes later, their fries were rapidly cooling on the counter and their burgers overdone. And Max was only halfway through a learn-to-read book about a bunch of pie-stealing rats.
“Let’s eat,” Eddie said, taking the book from Max and setting it aside. It took every ounce of self-control he possessed not to rip the damn thing into confetti. “We’ll finish this after your bath.”
“You said we could read The Mark of Athena.”
“I said if we got done by nine.” Not likely now, not with half a book to go plus Max’s spelling homework.
Max’s eyes welled with tears and Eddie’s heart broke. Not because his kid was disappointed—disappointments were a fact of life, one you couldn’t hide from or protect your children from. But because Eddie knew exactly how Max felt.
Damn it, he hated that his son had to struggle. Knew all too well what Max was going through. The frustration. The self-doubt. But worse was the wanting—wanting to do better. Wanting to be smarter.
Unable to do either.
“We’ll read one chapter before you go to bed,” Eddie promised. “No matter how late it is.”
“Okay.” Grinning, Max lunged at Eddie, wrapped his arms around Eddie’s neck. “Thanks, Dad.”
Eddie held on tight. He didn’t want to let go. He wanted to keep his kid in his arms where nothing bad could happen to him. He wanted to promise him it would all be okay, that he’d be okay.
His cell phone buzzed.
“Put your stuff away and wash your hands,” he told Max then picked up his phone. “Hello?”
“Eddie,” a familiar female voice said. “Hi. How are you?”
He bit back a vicious curse. And wished like hell he’d never turned his cell phone on.
CHAPTER FOUR
“HEY,” EDDIE SAID, lowering his voice. Luckily, Max was busy washing his hands and had no interest in his dad’s phone call.
“I hope I didn’t catch you at a bad time.”
Tucking the phone between his shoulder and ear, he dished fries onto Max’s plate then his own. “We were just sitting down to eat.”
“At eight-thirty? Isn’t that a little late?”
He pressed his lips together, squeezed the spatula handle so hard, he was surprised it didn’t snap in two. Who the hell was she to question how he did things?
“We had a busy day,” he managed to say in a reasonable tone.
“Of course,” she said quickly as if trying to appease him. “Did you get my messages?”
Messages? There had been more than the one she left with James?
He grunted in affirmation as he motioned for Max to sit and start eating. “What did you need?”
He could picture her on the other end of the line. Even though it was late, she was probably still at her fancy office, her hair pulled back. When they’d been married, she’d often worked twelve-, fourteen-hour days, put in time on weekends and holidays. She’d had no time and little energy for anything or anyone but work.
Not even her own son.
“Actually,” she said, “I’d like to talk to Max.”
Eddie turned his back to Max, who now watched him with a frown. Must have picked up on Eddie’s tension. “Like I said, we’re just getting ready to—”
“I’ll only take a moment of his time. I promise.”
Your promises don’t mean much.
He kept that thought to himself.
“Your mom wants to talk to you,” he told Max, holding out the phone.
Max took it. Eddie couldn’t tell if the flush staining his son’s cheeks was from pleasure or nerves.
“Hello?” Max said.
Eddie plated up his dinner, tried not to listen in on the conversation. Not that there was much said on Max’s part other than a few yeses, noes, okays and uh-huhs.
After a few minutes, Max said goodbye and passed the phone to Eddie. “She wants to talk to you again.”
Eddie set down his burger. “Yeah?”
“I’d like to visit Max,” Lena said without preamble, obviously taking the hint that Eddie had no desire for pleasantries or to drag this conversation out longer than necessary.
His stomach churning, he stood, covered the mouthpiece with his hand. “Finish eating,” he whispered to Max before walking into the living room. “Is that what you talked with him about?”
“No. I wanted to run it by you first.”
Thank God for small favors. She had no business saying anything to Max about visiting before she had Eddie’s permission.
