Loving You by Maureen Child Read Free Book Online

started walking toward his first-period class. “Man. It’s all gonna happen, isn’t it? I mean, you’ve got the lawyer and everything. You’re really doing it.”
    â€œTold you I was gonna,” Jonas said, and swallowed back the tight ball of nerves that seemed permanently lodged in the middle of his throat.
    For two days now, he’d been waiting. He didn’t know if he could last much longer. For so long, he’d thought about doing this. About setting everything into motion. And now that he finally had, there was only one thing that worried him.
    What if his father didn’t want to be found?

C HAPTER 4
    â€œSo,
talk
. What was he like?” Molly Watson, friend and co-operator of Castle’s, tapped her foot. She tipped her head to one side and her perfectly cut midnight black hair stayed in place. Tiny points and wedges of hair flattered her small face and made her look like a mischievous pixie. Impatience had her drumming her blood-red nails against the arm of the chair as she waited for more information on Tasha’s mystery man.
    At eight-thirty, there was still a half hour before the first customer arrived and things started hopping in the shop. Tasha glanced around. Not much had changed in here since Mimi’s death. And there was familiarity and comfort in that. It was still a three-chair shop, which meant they were busy enough to keep ahead of the bills and small enough to stay cozy.
    Shifting her gaze back to Molly, Tasha sighed. They never scheduled customers before nine in the morning, giving themselves that extra half hour to catch up on the bills or to chat or even to do each other’s hair. This morning, though, the conversation was strained and Tasha couldn’t shake the weird sensation of impending doom that kept tugging at her insides.
    Ridiculous.
    Everything was fine.
    Even if Tassel Loafer came back, which she was pretty sure he would, she would handle it. She’d get through it—just as she’d gotten through every other rotten situation in her life. Atta way, Tash, she told herself silently. All she had to do was remember all of the other crap she’d managed to survive.
    And now she had more motivation than ever—because it wasn’t only her own life at stake here … it was Jonas’s.
    Sitting at her workstation, directly opposite Molly, Tasha wondered if she should have said anything at all about Tassel Loafer. Maybe she should have kept the weird visit from a stranger to herself.
    In the old days, she would have. But her life was different, now.
She
was different, now. She didn’t have to carry all of her burdens alone anymore. She had friends. Like Molly.
    â€œAre you gonna tell me what he was like or not?” Molly prompted.
    â€œHow do I know?” Tasha finally said. “I got rid of him as fast as I could.” Though God knew, he hadn’t been easy to get rid of. But then, guys like him—gorgeous and charm personified, rich, too, judging by the clothes—probably weren’t used to hearing the word
no
very often.
    Molly was not appeased. Dangling one foot off the chair, she gave herself a push against one of the pink cabinets and sent the chair into a slow spin. When she came back full circle, she stopped the spin with a slap against the counter and said, “At least you could give me a clue about what he
looks
like.”
    Tasha didn’t even have to dredge up her memory to describe him. Hadn’t his image been dancing across her brain all night? She shifted uncomfortably in the chair as she pictured his eyes, dark and filled with frustration. “He looked,” she said, “like temptation.”
    â€œMmmm … sounds promising.” Molly waved a hand at her. “More.”
    â€œTall,” she said. “And gorgeous, in an I-know-I’m-great-try-not-to-faint-at-my-feet sort of way.”
    â€œIntriguing,” Molly murmured, then tipped her head