My Loser Daddy is a Big Shot novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: The Back Seat
Cavan, a night driver with his daughter in the back seat, picks up a crying CEO, fights off two men chasing her bag, and hears her say: marry me.
The woman in the navy gown got into the back seat without checking the license plate.
Cavan Keegan noticed that, and he noticed the mascara running down her face.
"Where to?" he asked.
"Anywhere that isn't here," she said.
She had pulled the door shut so hard that the whole Corolla shook.
Beside her, his daughter lifted her head from the booster seat.
"Hi," said Posy. "I'm seven. This is my dad's car, but it's also my bedroom sometimes."
The woman stared at her.
"I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't know there was a child."
"The sitter quit," Cavan said. "She's asleep by ten. She's a very strong liar."
"I'm not asleep," Posy said. "Why are you crying?"
Cavan pulled away from the curb of the restaurant, where a row of black cars waited for guests in expensive coats.
The woman wiped her cheek with her wrist.
"My uncle told sixty people tonight that I'm a spinster who can't run a company," she said. "He did it over dessert."
"What's a spinster?" asked Posy.
"A woman with no husband."
"That's not bad," Posy said. "I don't have a mom and I'm fine."
Cavan's hands tightened on the wheel.
The woman looked at Posy, and for a second her face went soft and strange.
"I'm Ingrid," she said.
"Cavan," he said. "Where am I driving, Ingrid?"
"My building is on Washington Avenue. North Loop."
He glanced in the mirror and saw headlights two cars back.
They had been there since the restaurant lot.
Gray sedan, no front plate, two men in it.
He turned left onto a side street, and the sedan turned left.
He turned right, and the sedan turned right.
"Ingrid," he said, in the same voice he used to ask about her seat belt. "Did your uncle send anyone with you tonight?"
She went still.
"Why?"
"Because two men have followed us for six blocks."
She turned all the way around in her seat.
"That's his security," she said. "They want my bag."
"What's in the bag?"
"Papers. My father's trust. The company. Everything."
She held the leather case tight against her chest.
Posy pulled her purple backpack up to her chin.
"Daddy, are those bad guys?" she asked.
"Maybe," he said. "Put your head down, Posy Bean. Count the crayons in your bag."
"There's eleven."
"Count again."
The sedan surged forward and slammed into the Corolla's rear bumper.
Ingrid screamed once and covered her mouth.
Cavan did not speed up.
He took the next corner, rolled into the alley behind a closed bakery, and killed the engine.
The sedan cut across the mouth of the alley and stopped, blocking it.
Two men got out, big ones, in dark jackets.
"Stay in the car," Cavan said.
"You can't go out there," Ingrid whispered. "They'll hurt you."
"They'll try."
He took off his jacket and laid it over Posy's knees.
Then he got out and shut the door softly behind him.
"Evening," said the taller man. "Tell the lady to hand over the case, and you can go home."
"I'm only the driver," Cavan said.
"Then drive."
The man reached out to shove him.
Cavan caught the wrist, turned it, and the man went down on one knee with his mouth open and no sound coming out.
The second man swung a fist.
Cavan leaned back two inches, let it pass his jaw, and drove his elbow into the man's ribs.
The man folded and sat down hard against the dumpster.
The first man came up with a knife.
Cavan took it from him.
He tossed it onto the roof of the bakery.
Then he put the man face down on the wet concrete with a knee between his shoulders.
"Who sent you?" he said quietly.
"Go to hell."
"Wrong answer."
He pressed a thumb into a nerve under the man's ear, and the man yelped.
"Mr. Sandvik," the man gasped. "Torsten Sandvik. He just wants the papers."
"Thank you," Cavan said.
He let the man go, took both phones out of their pockets, and snapped the cards in half.
"Go home," he said. "If you follow us again, I won't be a driver."
The men limped to the sedan and drove away without their headlights on.
When Cavan turned around, Ingrid stood outside the Corolla with her hand over her mouth.
Behind her, through the glass, Posy sat with a juice box and watched him.
"Daddy," she called through the window. "You're not supposed to do that in front of customers."
"Sorry, Bean."
Ingrid took a step toward him.
"Who are you?" she asked.
"I drive nights," Cavan said. "I got lucky."
"That wasn't luck."
"It's mostly luck."
She looked at the alley, at the two dented dumpster lids, at the man's shoe left behind.
Then she looked at the old Corolla with its cracked dashboard, and at the worn jacket on the child's lap.
"Are you married?" she asked.
Cavan blinked.
"What?"
"It's a simple question. Are you married?"
"I'm a widower," he said slowly. "Why?"
"Because my grandfather's trust says my shares go to the eldest grandchild who is married on November sixth," she said.
"If I'm not, my uncle keeps the company in eighteen days."
"He'll run it into the ground, and every person who works there goes with it."
She held out her hand.
"Marry me," Ingrid said.
In the car, Posy rolled the window down an inch.
"He's available," she said. "He even does laundry."
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