Unconditional (20 page)

He wanted something more. He wanted her to marry him but after asking her pretty much every day for the past month, he was beginning to wonder if she was going to say no to him forever.

There was a little sound from the baby monitor. A hiccup and a sigh. It reminded him why she kept saying no.

It wasn’t that he ignored the baby anymore. He said hi and everything. Sure, he tended to show up late, after she was already in bed, but that was because he worked late.

Stop being a prick. You’re lying to yourself. You’re scared out of your mind that you’re going to resent that kid.

He didn’t want to. He wanted to be okay with her because being okay with Emily meant he could have Ashley, and he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that he wanted her more than anything. The last month and a half had been a calming time. He felt more like himself than he had in years. He was willing to do just about anything to get her installed in his house. If she really wanted to work, he’d get her a job with his company once she got her degree. He’d even give on the whole adoption thing, though he wondered if he would ever be ready for that. He still wasn’t sure what he could give to any kid.

But he couldn’t get her to move in with him and he couldn’t get her to marry him. His sub was stubborn.

A little cry came through the monitor.

He sat up and stared at it. That was just a warning cry, as he’d come to know. First it started with little snuffles and then the short warning shout, and then that kid could blow down the house.

Ashley sighed and turned over again. “Just another five minutes.” Her hand came out as though trying to hit some alarm clock that wasn’t there.

She was dealing with midterms. She’d stayed up half the night studying and then he’d made love to her twice before he let her fall asleep. She had a philosophy final in the morning. If she got up with Emily, she could be up the rest of the night.

He didn’t even have meetings tomorrow. He had a lunch with Ryan but that wasn’t until noon.

Another sharp cry came from the monitor. Ten seconds. He had ten seconds, twenty at most, before the Emily bomb went off and Ashley was up and awake.

He should let it happen. He could pretend to be asleep. She wouldn’t say a damn thing to him. She would just get up and deal with her baby and never say a thing to him about helping out. Yes, that’s what he should do.

Except he loved her and she was never going to marry him if he didn’t get used to that kid. She was his sub. He owed her his help and he’d been selfish about giving it to her.

He gritted his teeth, pushed out of bed, and shut off the monitor. He had no idea if Emily would even accept comfort from him. He pulled on pajama bottoms and shrugged into a T-shirt. He closed the door behind him. It was a stupid plan. What the hell did he really know about babies?

She was crying pretty freely by the time he stood outside her door. He stopped, staring at it like it was the gateway to hell.

She’s a baby. That’s all. If John Michael had lived, you would have been a pro at this by now.

It was odd but suddenly that thought didn’t pierce him the way it had once. It wasn’t a knife through his heart. It was an ache and it always would be, but there was more distance now. Talking about it had done something odd to him. He’d kept it inside because he thought any acknowledgement would hurt, but telling Ashley about his lost son had the opposite effect. It had been a slow drawing out of the poison that had infected his system for years. Somehow, in the telling of his story, he’d found himself lighter, freer than he was before.

And ready to go into battle with the demon behind that door. Because she kind of sounded like a demon now. She was in a full-on rage and Emily Paxon didn’t do little mewling cries. Nope. She was a screaming baby warrior when she got going.

He opened the door. He couldn’t leave her like that, and Ashley needed some sleep. He just had to man the fuck up and deal with his issues. He’d faced down angry investors and tycoons who threatened to ruin his career. He was known as the Dom to deal with the most difficult of subs because of his deft touch. How much worse could a baby be?

Emily was sitting up, her little face red from her cries. She was dressed in footie pajamas with pink and yellow fairies on them. She turned the minute the door opened, her blonde and brown curls reaching her ears. Her round little face was streaked with tears, and they stared at each other for a moment.

It was an odd standoff. He looked down at the baby and Emily looked up at him, her blue eyes wide.

Were babies like snakes? His dad always told him that snakes were more afraid of him than he was of them. Maybe babies were the same way.

And then she sniffled again and those little arms came up, reaching for him, her fists opening and clenching as though to tell him to hurry it up.

She cried, a loud, impatient sound that promised so much more if he didn’t meet her needs and very quickly.

She wasn’t going to be a sub. Not that one. She was a full-on Domme in footie PJs.

He put his hands under her arms and lifted her. It was natural from there to carry her up to his chest and cradle her against him, his forearm under her highly padded backside.

He sniffed. She didn’t smell awful and her butt wasn’t squishy, so she didn’t need a change.

“Okay, what do you need so we can both get back to sleep?” He tried to look down at her, but both her arms had gone around his neck and she laid her head down on his shoulder. Her tiny hand came out from around his neck and started to pat his chest while she babbled on.

They weren’t going to get anywhere with verbal communication. He’d watched Ashley walk her sometimes, bouncing her while she sang. He didn’t sing. Mostly.

She began to cry again so he started up. His mother had sung to him. One of his earliest memories was her singing the Beatles’ “Blackbird” in the middle of the night when he was sick.

He patted her back and started in on the song feeling like the biggest idiot in the world.

What did she need? He sang the song because he had it memorized, but his mind was working as he walked back and forth with her.

He’d spent nine months waiting on John Michael, waiting to be a dad because he’d had such good parents, parents who loved him, who supported him. They were his blood, but the very blood they had given him had cost him his child. His very DNA was damaged. Didn’t that mean something? Didn’t that mean he was damaged in some fundamental way?

He’d wanted that kid so badly. Unlike his friends at the time, he hadn’t wanted to go to clubs and party. He’d wanted to build a business and a family. He’d wanted what his parents had, to give his kid what his parents had given him.

A good childhood. A sense of morality and honor. To teach his kid how to live a life.

None of that had a damn thing to do with DNA. None of that had anything to do with blood or biology.

He wouldn’t have loved John Michael because he looked like him. He would have loved John Michael for what he was, and his father would have had everything to do with that.

Emily’s hands came up, brushing across his face. He stared at her. She was so serious. She touched his cheek and wiped away the tears he hadn’t known he was shedding. Emotion welled up in him as she leaned forward and put her mouth on his cheek in a messy baby kiss.

Like her mother had taught her. Ashley would kiss her boo-boos to make them better.

Something broke inside him, and the tears that had been bottled up came out in a rush of pain and ache and something that felt fresh and new.

This sweet little girl had lost her father before she’d even been born. He’d walked away and then he’d died and there was no chance for her to know him.

He’d lost his son a short time after birth, with no chance to teach him, to learn from him.

But he could teach Emily. She would never have his eyes or his smile, but she could have his ambition, his drive, his willingness to help a friend. And she could make him see the world in a whole new way. She could give him a second chance—to be a father, a husband, a better man than he’d been before.

He held her tighter and realized that if he deserved a second chance, everyone did.

He bounced her as he walked down the hall to the living room where his phone was. There was a call he had to make, and he wasn’t sure of the reception he’d get. “Will you help me, baby girl? If they give me hell, you just start crying and then I’ll have an excuse to get off the phone.”

He dialed the number. It was late in California, but the woman he was calling had always been a night owl.

Of course, she might take one look at the number and refuse to answer.

She picked up on the first ring. “Keith? Is something wrong?”

He wiped his tears away. Damn, she sounded good. “Hey, Mom. I have a problem.”

Now she would give him hell for not calling, a lecture on how he couldn’t just call out of nowhere. “What’s wrong, honey?”

Something eased inside him because he finally understood. She was his mom. She would always answer his calls not because they shared some mystical DNA. They shared something far more important. They shared a lifetime of memories and while he thought they’d been wrong, he couldn’t live his life in judgment and anger anymore.

He had a daughter after all, and teaching her forgiveness was important.

A daughter who looked at him and then threw up all over him.

“Uhm, what do I do with a sick baby?”

There was only the briefest of pauses before his mother started to teach him again, this time about how to care for his own child.

* * * *

Ashley grumbled a little as she rolled out of bed. Too early. She needed afternoon classes. Her boyfriend liked to keep her up late with all that crazy sex stuff.

God, she had to stop calling it that.

She yawned and glanced at the clock. She had about an hour before she really needed to be in the car headed to daycare.

She never slept this late. She turned to the baby monitor. She never slept this late because Emily never slept through the damn night. A little panic hit her.

It wasn’t surprising Keith was gone. He often left before the sun was up. Oh, he said it was because he needed to get to work, but it was really because he was a coward, completely afraid of a nineteen pound toddler.

Why had he turned off the monitor? She checked the plug. Sure enough it had been taken out of the socket. What had happened?

She plugged it back in. Surely he wouldn’t have unplugged the monitor. He was typically careful about it.

She marched down the hall. How much had Emily cried before finally falling back asleep? Had she been hungry? Wet?

Gone? Her crib was empty. Empty. Had Jill come over? The alarm hadn’t beeped.

Oh, god, where was her baby? She ran into the living room to get her phone, panic starting to take over. Had the Reids taken her baby? What the hell would she…

Emily was asleep, cuddled on Keith’s chest. He was in the recliner, his feet up, his face relaxed. Emily wasn’t in the PJs she’d put her in. They were lying on the floor along with a ton of baby stuff. It looked like Keith had tried everything. There was a pile of diapers, wipes, and PJs that had…ewww. Someone had gotten sick in the night.

And Keith had taken care of her.

She stood there looking at them, tears in her eyes. He looked tired and she was pretty sure there was a little vomit on his shirt. His eyes opened and he yawned.

“Hey,” he said quietly. He didn’t move an inch and kept his voice at that “don’t wake the sleeping monster” level she often used herself.

Yep, he definitely had baby vomit on his shirt. And maybe in his hair.

God, he’d never looked sexier to her.

How did she broach the subject? Because he looked really comfy with a baby he hadn’t even been able to look at the day before. “You look like you had a rough night.”

“It was okay. Something upset her stomach. I didn’t wake you up because she didn’t have a fever. My mom said she didn’t have to go to the ER if she didn’t have a fever and she didn’t seem dehydrated. Should I have taken her?”

He’d called his mom? He hadn’t talked to his mom in years. “No, she’s right. Sometimes babies just throw up. She seems to be sleeping fine now. The best remedy can be just holding her and comforting her.”

“She plays in her own vomit, Ashley. I gave her three baths.”

Ashley laughed long and hard because he sounded so horrified. Welcome to parenthood, Keith Langston.

Emily stirred and Ashley picked her up. Keith had done his time.

He stared at her for a moment while she settled her very well taken care of daughter on her shoulder.

“You did a great job, Master.” It was more than she thought she could hope for. “I didn’t think I could love you more, but I do.”

“Then marry me.”

He was tired and dirty and so beautiful in that moment that she was sure no woman on the planet had ever gotten a better offer. “All right.”

He suddenly looked way more awake. He nearly jumped out of the chair and stood with her. “Seriously? You’re saying yes?”

All she’d ever needed to know was that he could accept Emily. “Yes.”

He reached around, drawing her close, the baby between them. He made a little circle of their bodies. “I was being stubborn. I was afraid. You can forgive me?”

Oh, there was nothing to forgive. “You just needed a little time.”

“I needed you.” He kissed the top of Emily’s head. “And her. I want to adopt her. I can give her my name.”

He could give her a father, one who would love her and never leave her because that was who he was. “Yes. Yes. Yes. I know you like to hear that word, Master.”

“I think I like husband more.” He held her close, nestling the three of them together.

She kissed him. “Then yes, my almost husband. But, babe, you’re going to have to take a bath first.”

He grinned, looking younger than she’d ever seen him. “Then put her down to sleep. God knows she needs it. And I need you. Meet me in the shower. Just because we’re getting married doesn’t mean our contract is altered. You’re still mine.”