by Karina Bliss
The baby started to cry and he followed Lily to the kitchen. “She wants you.”
“No, she’s gassy. Try a change of position. Rocking helps. Here,” she left the coffee pot, “I’ll show you.” She cradled the baby so she faced the floor, her little belly pressed against Lily’s forearm, and rocked her. The crying stopped. “Now you try.”
With a sigh, Moss took Grace. Lily bit back a sarcastic remark. He was protecting himself against feeling too much, too fast. She had to make allowances. “Position your arm here.” She moved his hands into the right position, the first time she’d touched him since the day they’d brought Grace home. She’d forgotten how good he smelled, the warmth of his skin.
Grace started to wail. “I haven’t got your knack for this,” he said, offering her the baby. Grace burped, a big sound from such a small frame. His expression was so startled that Lily laughed.
He grinned sheepishly, almost shyly, then caught himself. “I need to call a cab or I’ll be late for my meeting with Lincoln.”
Lily cheered up. “To formalize permanent custody?”
“We’re talking through the options.” He gave her the baby.
An idea struck her. “How about we drop you off? Me and Grace?” Lily, you’re a genius.
“What?”
“She’s clean, fed, and ready for a nap. And I haven’t been out of the house in days, except to the doctors. A little drive will do us good.”
“I don’t think—”
“It’ll be fun,” she insisted. “And way quicker for you than waiting for a cab. Just let me throw a few things in a bag.” She walked out before he could protest further, determined to make some change today. However small.
Within ten minutes she had Grace strapped into her car seat and a reluctant Moss in the passenger seat. The baby wasn’t happy about being restrained, but her cries stopped when Lily started the engine.
After a couple of miles, she’d fallen asleep.
Moss glanced over his shoulder. “She’s out cold.”
“She got used to twenty-four hour attention while she was sick and now she’s out of a routine. Putting her in the car might help get her resettled,” Lily smiled wryly, “or we’re creating a rod for our back.”
Traffic was heavy on the freeway and she concentrated on driving. It was enough that he was breathing the same air as his daughter. Slowly, slowly, catch the daddy.
“So, tell me,” she said casually, when the congestion eased, “how are you feeling about everything now?”
Silence.
Glancing over, she saw Moss hooked up to his iPod. She took a deep breath, counted to ten, and then touched his arm. He removed his headphones.
“I’m hoping now Grace is well, you two can hang out together.”
“Yeah, the schedule is still all over the place.”
Screw this. “Dimity said she might be able to find you some free time.”
“Have you two been discussing this behind my back?”
She pulled up alongside Lincoln’s building. “She wants to make it easier for you to get to know your daughter.”
Moss scowled as he removed his seatbelt. “I told the band nothing changes as far as my professional commitments go, and now I’m telling you. We’re keeping the realms completely separate. This is my problem to solve, not theirs. And not yours.”
Calling your daughter a problem is the problem. “I understand that becoming a father is a huge transition but the longer you leave making a start, the harder you’re making it for yourself. We—”
“I didn’t hire you for counseling,” he interrupted sharply, then rubbed his temples. “Look, I just need you to keep Grace happy until I sort something out long term.”
“You don’t have to solve every logistical problem immediately. You have me for the next two months, at least.”
“So she gets dependent on you and then you leave? I’m not the only one who needs to consider her long-term interests.”
She was bewildered. “What exactly are you trying to say?”
His expression shuttered. “Nothing.” He opened the passenger door. “I don’t know when I’ll be home. If there’s anything you need for Grace—”
“Buy it.” He communicated that every day. She tried to inject humor in her next question. “How much is an hour of your time?”
“More than you can afford this week.” He got out of the car and bent to meet her frustrated gaze. “Look, I do appreciate what you’re doing, and I’m doubling your pay to compensate.”
Hush money. It crossed her mind fleetingly. Sleep deprivation was making her paranoid.
A wail went up from the back seat. The car had stopped and Grace was awake.
“Thanks for the lift. I don’t know when I’ll be home. Dimity’s got me scheduled for something.”
Lily frowned. “She said you had the whole day—”
The passenger door slammed and he was gone, leaving her with a crying baby.
Chapter Twenty
In his hurry to get away from her, Moss had left his cell in the car. Lily found it a couple of hours later when it buzzed as she was unloading groceries from the trunk.
Seeing the caller was Lincoln, she answered. “If it’s important,” she told him after they’d exchanged pleasantries, “you can try Dimity’s cell. She’ll know his schedule.” Maybe something had come up unexpectedly, as it often did. She was choosing to give Moss the benefit of the doubt.
“It’s not urgent. Just tell him that Carol has set up an appointment with the adoption agency for Monday at ten a.m.”
“Adoption agency,” she repeated stupidly, instinctively going to check on Grace, who was asleep in her car seat. Moss, what have you done?
“The one he and I talked about earlier… Lily, you still there?”
“Got it,” she said calmly, dropping the baby blanket over the open car door so Grace’s tiny right arm was in shade. “You have a good day.”
Tossing Moss’s cell into one of the grocery sacks, she left the trunk open for ventilation and carried them inside. She needed a minute alone to process this. After dropping the bags on the kitchen island, she crossed to the window where she could see the car and pummeled the countertop with her fists.
How could Moss do this to Grace? How? Without even trying to get to know his daughter, without talking it through with Lily. Who knew his challenges, his unspoken fears better than she did? Who’d been busting a gut trying to make it easy for him—making no demands, giving him space, being understanding.
Whirling on her heels, she dug in the grocery sack for his phone and threw it clear across the room. It bounced and skittered across the hardwood floor. Screw damage-proof covers.
Tears prickled, and furiously she blinked them away. Crying felt like giving up. And Grace needed her to think, to plan. To be her advocate. But how? She returned to the car. The baby was still asleep. Resisting the urge to snatch her up and cover her small face with desperate kisses, Lily quietly unbuckled her car seat and carried it toward the house, only to have Grace woken by the rumble of Seth’s approaching SUV.
As usual, the drummer’s first focus after letting the dog out of the back seat was Grace. “Hey baby girl, miss your Uncle Seth? Hell yeah you did. It’s been what, six or seven hours since I last adored you?” Removing her from her car seat, he cradled her close to his body. “Aunty Dimity reckons you smiled at her last week and I’m calling bullshit. You’re saving your first smile for me, right? I’m your favorite.”
Lily patted Madeleine hello. If Moss would spend one tenth of the effort Seth did.
“And how’s your gorgeous nanny?” He looked at her and his wide grin faded.
Angrily, she removed her glasses and wiped away the tears that had forced their way through. Crying isn’t helpful, remember?
“What’s wrong?” he demanded. “Have you been sprung?”
Her focus had changed so completely since Grace’s arrival, it was a moment before she took his meaning. “It has nothin
g to do with the sex tape.” She replaced her glasses. “With me.” That she could have handled. She held out her arms for Grace, needing to hold her close. “I just found out that Moss is looking at adoption.”
“Fuck. I hoped I’d talked him out of it.”
“You knew?”
“He told me when he came home from the hospital.”
But not me. Lily didn’t need to ask why; Moss figured she wouldn’t understand. The irony was that she did. Completely. Which didn’t mean she’d accept it without a fight.
The dog was scratching at the front door for entry; together they walked toward the house.
“I thought if we all helped as much as we could, gave him support, that he’d reconsider,” the drummer said heavily.
“The only thing we’ve done is enable him to keep a safe distance.” She couldn’t hide her bitterness. “He doesn’t have to engage with Grace because one of us will always step in. All we’ve done is give him a buffer.”
“His concerns about raising Grace are justified.” Seth was always fair. “Parenting’s a tough gig even without the temptations that comes with a rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle. You saw how Kayla and Jared struggled last year—the pressures nearly cost them their family.”
“Because fame went to Jared’s head.” Lily shifted the baby to her other shoulder. “That isn’t Moss’s issue.”
“No, his problem is letting people care about him,” Seth said bluntly. “He’s my best friend, but he only lets me in so far and no further. He’s changing, but is he changing enough to give this little girl what she needs? I hate to say it, but he has a lot of good reasons to consider adoption.”
“Maybe he does,” Lily conceded. “But we won’t find out until we take away all the wrong reasons he’s doing this.”
“Yeah.” Seth looked doubtful. “And how do you suggest doing that?”
“Right now I only have the first step,” she admitted, watching Madeleine scamper inside.
“Which is?”
“I’m kicking you out of your house.”
* * *
Lily sat in the Honda outside a downtown nightclub reapplying the lipstick she’d chewed off on the drive here. She wore black leather jeans, a cutaway halter top, and a towering pair of knee-high boots. “Wrangling clothes,” said Dimity when Lily had phoned to ask permission to raid her wardrobe.
They didn’t know her here, and wouldn’t let Lily in, not in her usual uniform of sweats, jeans and T-shirts. So she’d armed herself in designer brands that drew attention to her assets post Stormy—ass and legs. Her dark-blonde hair fell in a smooth curtain around her face, courtesy of a hair straightener, and she wore full makeup for the first time in months.
Blotting off the excess lipstick carefully with a tissue, she returned the tube to her silver-studded leather clutch bag and clicked it shut.
When she and Zander had broken up he’d told her they weren’t good for each other. He was right. She’d never challenged his selfishness and arrogance, never told him how he was hurting her, or the other people who loved him. Looking back, she could see she’d probably stunted his growth. I definitely stunted mine. She didn’t do that anymore—stop herself from doing what she believed to be right. One final glance in the mirror and she opened the door, ready for battle.
As she locked the Honda, she said a little prayer. Lord, make me strong for the sake of that little girl, and this man who won’t bend for her. She had one simple goal. To break him. For his sake, for his daughter’s, this charade had to stop.
There was a long queue to get in and she waited patiently to be vetted. It had been easy tracking Moss down—his cell’s texts had revealed his plans tonight. Ahead of her, the bouncer turned away a group of three women. Overexcited, overweight, and dressed in department store brands, they’d had no chance of getting inside. As they walked by, subdued and embarrassed, Lily resisted the urge to tell them they’d had a lucky escape.
This club was everything she hated about her old life. It was all about being seen, being lean, being current, being cool. Beauty and wealth canceled out every sin, particularly when combined with youth. She may no longer have the lips and the tits but she still knew how to trigger a man’s fantasy of domination and power with a seductive smile. She used it on the bouncer, a thug in Armani, who looked her over like she was meat.
He nodded her in.
When she’d dropped Moss here the first time, she’d asked why the hell he wanted to come to a place that prided itself on snobbish exclusivity.
“Because they let me in.”
It was a dumb reason then, and it was still a dumb reason.
Inside, Lily kept moving, scanning every corner of the dimly-lit club. She went to adjust her glasses and remembered she was wearing contacts. Moss was in a throng of people at the bar. He was lining up shots, egged on by two women who were virtually indistinguishable from one another in their sparkly, hand-clapping beauty.
She stood a moment, letting the anger fill her, drawing it deep into her lungs along with the expensive booze and perfumes and cheap bullshit that scented the air. Assessing Moss’s state with a clinical eye. Drunk, definitely, but she could sober him up with a douse of cold reality.
As she started toward him, someone stepped into her line of vision. A big man, blond and handsome with a crocodile smile and coke-dilated pupils. “Wanna play?”
“Thanks but I’m—”
“Taken,” Moss stepped between them. “So fuck off, Luke.” He still held the shot, untouched. Bourbon by the smell of it. “What’s wrong?” he demanded, as his friend shrugged and returned to the bar. “Has something happened to Grace?”
Lily let him suffer, one beat, two. Giving him time to remember that he cared and how much, no matter how deeply he buried it. “She’s fine. I left her with Kayla and Jared.”
“So why are you here?”
“To pick you up.” She smiled, deliberately ambiguous.
“Moss, c’mon, we’re waiting for you.” Ignoring Lily, one of his ‘dates’ placed a manicured hand on his arm.
Lily removed it. “Sorry, we’re leaving.”
The woman looked her over, and smiled. “I share.”
“I don’t,” said Lily.
“Here.” Moss drained his shot and handed the sleeve-hanger some bills. “Get us another round. I won’t be long.”
Lily folded her arms. “Why the hell didn’t you tell me you’re considering adoption for Grace?”
The bastard didn’t even blink as he steered her toward the exit. “Because I knew you’d react this way. Go home, we’ll talk tomorrow.”
“No.” She yanked her elbow free of his hold. “I’m done being understanding. Grace isn’t some female you can shrug off, she’s your daughter.”
His jaw set. Without a word, he took her elbow and pulled her toward a darker alcove, semi-private if you discounted the couples making out in its recesses. “I take my responsibilities to her very seriously,” his tone was no less combative for its lowness, “which is why I’m giving her up for adoption.”
“Before you’ve attempted to be her father.”
“Why try when I know she can do better?”
“That’s a cop-out.”
He barked a laugh and stepped away. “Why are you surprised? You dropped me off at clubs, you ferried me home with stray women, you saw who I am. Expecting any different is fucking deluded.”
“Yes, I saw all that.” She wasn’t letting him create distance this time so she moved until they were inches apart. Now they looked the same as the other couples getting lost in each other. “I also saw you work your ass off at your job, the real one of making music, not the piss-Dimity-off one of playing a dickhead rock star. I saw you with a black eye from trying to contain a drugged-out street kid. I saw you help a pregnant teenager when everyone else was ignoring her.” She touched his forearm, all anger gone. “I see your yearning, Moss. And how hard you pretend you don’t need connection.”
He recoiled. “Jesus
, all this from one kiss.”
The words were a blow Lily wasn’t expecting; she dropped her hand.
His gaze was hard as jade. “You don’t want a man like me, and yet you’ll inflict me on that baby? Where’s your head at, woman? No, don’t tell me…” His mouth curled in a sneer. “Despite everything, you still want to believe in happy-ever-afters. Well, real life isn’t like that, Lily. Wake the fuck up and stop being that naive dreamer.”
She refused to flinch. “You’re deflecting,” she said. “You think if you make me uncomfortable you’ll win this. I’ll back off. I won’t do that. This is too important.”
“And that’s where we agree. This is too important to screw up. Which is why I’m giving Grace to people who aren’t damaged, who know how to do normal. And a father she can be proud of.” He swallowed. “Who can make her believe that all things are possible and nothing will ever break her. That’s a hell of a lot more responsible than pretending I can give her a good life or be a fit parent. I know my limitations.”
“No, you’re accepting your limitations.” She paused, trying to find the right words, and became conscious of the moans of a couple dry-humping not twelve feet away. Oh, for God’s sake. Dragging Moss into the main thoroughfare, she trapped him against the wall. “You told me not to let ten sordid minutes with Travis Calvert define the rest of my life. Stop letting your past define yours.”
He shook his head and she caught his face between her hands, pinning his gaze.
“You have so much to offer her, Moss, so much. And yet you act as if your love is worth nothing, as though it’s something you’re ashamed to give, because you’re someone who isn’t perfect, who is damaged. As though damaged can’t do any good. I don’t understand why you cling to being a loner when life keeps giving you people who care about you. And people to care for.” Even as the passionate conviction in her voice expanded inside her chest, she knew she wasn’t reaching him. His expression remained opaque, closed to her.
“Let’s be clear.” Carefully, he placed his hands on her shoulders and moved her away. “I don’t love her, and I don’t want to love her. That’s your job until I find someone to adopt her.”
