As he hung up the phone, he was confident his legal team could get him out of anything he was doing. However, they wouldn’t help him with Ashley.
How deep was her bond with Jennifer?
Jennifer trusted her son to Ashley, which meant they were more than just cousins who never spoke to one another.
But if Matt was denied fatherhood, he’d want a chance tosee his son, a chance he was offering to Anthony.
He turned off the car in front of Jennifer’s front door and lifted his head.
He was doing the right thing.
Hopefully.
He rang the bell and said a small prayer that she might understand, and that he wasn’t ruining their relationship.
Ashley answered and he saw that she had two bags near the front door for the babyas well as a Pack ‘n Play and box of diapers. He picked up a bag and a box as Ashley beamed at him.
Holding the baby somehow made her skin glow. Ashley was already beautiful but she had a special aura around her now.
He hoped that meant she’d gotten over her fear of babies. He didn’t say anything but she held the door and he asked, “Ashley, did you talk to Jennifer?”
He turnedaround and he saw how she held the boy to her shoulder, all bundled in a blue blanket as she said, “No, but I called the hospital. She’s checked in and the surgery is scheduled to start in like ten minutes. Did you call the studio?”
Texting counted and he’d been a dutiful deputy for the producer. “Yes. Brandon is sending flowers from the crew today and we’re all to report at 4 AM for blockingsome of my scenes with Eva as Jennifer is now off the schedule for a few days.”
He patted her arm and she smiled at him like they were a team.
Inside he flinched but he knew how to hold his reactions in check. Matt picked up the Pack ‘n Play thing and the second bag as she said, “I’m sure Jennifer will bounce back. She loves working.”
This was his second movie with Jenniferand he’d agreed, despite the push-back of his family, because of her professionalism.
Otherwise he wouldn’t have gotten near her. He put everything in the trunk and picked up the car seat.
This had no directions. He studied the back as he lifted it.
Perhaps he put the seat belt through the loop? He struggled as it wasn’t easy, but a few minutes later he’d won and the car seatwas in.
He turned around and nodded at Ashley, who left the porch and placed the baby in the seat. He walked around and opened the passenger door. His skin singed as she passed him.
Matt, raised to be a gentleman, closed her door and got behind the wheel. He checked his seatbelt and then asked as they drove off the property, “And how did you get the little guy to sleep?”
She relaxed into the soft leather seat. “I have no idea. I fed him. Do all people in Hollywood have gold-encrusted glass bottles?”
Jennifer had the baby sleeping in a throne-like crib in her living room, which he’d never seen before but he didn’t comment. He glanced at her. Ashley seemed relaxed so he figured the drive wasn’t the best time for confessions. “I don’t know. Maybe.”
She laughed and said, “And I thought Miami rich people were strange.”
“You mean my family,” he replied without thinking. She’d worked for his family and most of them were bankers who drove in black cars made to be sleek and stylish and boring.
Ashley chuckled, but then nodded as she said, “Whoops. Well, yeah.”
He drove them back to his house and said, “No one in my family wentwith gold-encrusted.”
She raised her eyebrow. “And no one I worked with before ever drove a fire truck to their job unless he was a firefighter.”
He tapped on the wheel as they turned onto his property. “My family is rather reserved for all that wealth.”
She pointed to his two-story mansion. “You call the marble floors and original statues and art, reserved?”
