by K. M. Scott
She sighed heavily and turned to look down the hallway as the bathroom door opened. “I swore to myself I’d wait him out. I hate that you two now have to do the same. I wish you didn’t have to do that like I have.”
As I thought about the one way I knew that would save us from having to wait Robert out, Serena returned to the table with a much cleaner smelling child and handed him back to Alita.
“Sorry that took so long. It was a bit of a mess. For someone who only eats one thing, he sure does have a variety of things happening in his diapers.”
Alita held Cayden in front of her and pressed kisses onto his belly. “Who’s Grandma’s messy little boy?”
He giggled each time she did it, and Serena said, “Cayden is Grandma’s messy boy!”
Soon, Cayden opened his mouth to yawn big, a sign it was nearly time to go. “We better get moving to get home,” I said, unhappy that we had to leave but knowing we should.
“Already?” Alita asked, hugging the baby to her. “I wish these visits didn’t go by so quickly.”
“We’ll come again soon, Mom. I promise,” Serena said with a smile as she grabbed the diaper bag from the back of her chair. “Cayden needs to get to sleep, so he wouldn’t be much fun to be around in a few minutes anyway. I see crying in our future if we don’t get him home soon.”
Kissing his nose, Alita smiled. “I wouldn’t care if all he did was cry. I’d still love to be with him.”
We all got up to head toward the door, and after kissing Cayden and Serena goodbye, she turned to me and whispered, “Remember what I said about him. Never let your guard down.”
“I won’t. I’ve learned that lesson before with him. Stay safe, and don’t let anyone in. If you run into any problems, just call the number you’ve been using, okay?”
She kissed my cheek and pulled me to her in a hug I hadn’t expected. “Thank you for everything, Ryder. I sleep better at night knowing you’re taking care of those two precious souls.”
As she stepped back, I tried to reassure her. “I will always protect them, Alita. You and Michael too.”
“Stay safe and bring them back to me soon, okay? I’ll be counting the minutes.”
Chapter Eleven
Serena
As much as I wanted to take the baby to see my mother again soon, days passed without my father leaving the estate, except to pay a late-night visit to whatever whore he frequented now, and then those days turned into weeks. Because I refused to follow his edict about letting one of his goon squad accompany me whenever I left the grounds without Ryder, for nearly a month, Cayden and I were stuck at home.
Feeling particularly trapped one sunny morning in early summer, I dressed the baby in a blue and green outfit with baseballs and bats on it and laid him in the stroller for a walk around the grounds. It wasn’t much and it wasn’t anywhere as good as leaving to see my mother, but I’d take it over spending all day cooped up in the house.
It had been years since I walked the full length of the estate. I’d been a teenage girl the last time I explored past the main house and the gardens, but there were acres of land past those. Much of it wasn’t anywhere I could take a stroller, but the road that travelled throughout the main part of the estate gave me a long enough walk so I didn’t have to return inside for hours.
Cayden smiled up at me as I pushed the stroller around the garage, the concrete smooth enough for him that he didn’t get jostled around too much. I leaned down and tickled his uncovered toes until he giggled.
“We don’t have to stay in that house, now do we? No, we don’t. We’re just going to take a walk around and I’ll give you the tour. Don’t worry. I’ll be sure to point out the highlights.”
He looked at me with his dark green eyes so much like his father’s, and even though I knew he didn’t understand a word I’d said, his expression said he liked hearing them anyway. I’d never realized how happy I could be as a mother, but now as he watched me like I was the best thing in the world, I couldn’t imagine my life without him. He brought out all the best parts of me I’d only known before with Ryder.
We rolled past the apartments my father’s men and the staff lived in, and I stopped in front of the one that used to be Ryder’s. Leaning into the stroller, I pushed back the canopy and said to Cayden, “That’s where Daddy used to live when he was one of my father’s men.”
The words left my mouth and I instantly regretted saying them. I never wanted our son to know about what Ryder did for my father. He was a better man than that. He deserved to be known as that man instead of the monster my father had worked so hard to make him.
I pulled the canopy down again to shield Cayden from the sun and began pushing the stroller again. As we passed the apartment I’d shared with Oliver, I said nothing and barely gave it a second glance. My son never needed to know what happened there.
We headed toward the back of the estate where my father had his own townhouse. Far enough away from the main house to be private, it still stood way too close for my comfort on most days. Much bigger than the apartments for his employees, it was actually the size of three of their places put together.
I saw it in the distance as we approached and couldn’t help but compare it to the tiny carriage house he’d forced my mother to live in for all those years and the rundown house in a strange town she had to live in now to hide away from him.
Someday that would change. All of this would change, and he wouldn’t have the power anymore.
Cayden began to fuss, so I slowed down my pace and turned around before I reached my father’s house. I had no reason to go there anyway.
“What do you say we take a walk in the garden, my little man?” I asked Cayden, who smiled up at me like he knew exactly what I’d said and loved the idea.
I followed the road to the back of the house and the entrance to the gardens. The path wasn’t exactly meant for a baby stroller, but we’d make do.
“It’s just a little bumpy for a few minutes until Mommy gets us to my favorite spot of all, so be patient with me, okay?”
My question received a smile in return, and in a few minutes I’d rolled him to the place in the garden where Ryder and I liked to meet last summer. The rose bush next to the bench sat in full bloom, and the fragrance from the flowers filled the air with sweetness.
Reaching into the stroller, I lifted Cayden out and sat him on my lap to enjoy the beautiful day, making sure to put his little hat on to protect his head from the sun. He quickly grew tired and rested his head against my chest, so I closed my eyes and let myself enjoy the contentment I felt sitting there with my son in a place his father and I loved and my mother had created years before.
I didn’t know how long I sat there with Cayden in my arms, but I felt the sun disappear at one point and opened my eyes, excitedly thinking Ryder had taken a break from work and found us there in our special spot.
But I didn’t see Ryder. Instead, I saw my father standing in front of me blocking the light. Instantly, I clutched the baby to me and sat up straight on the bench.
“What are you doing out here, Dad? You never come this far back in the garden.”
He stood in his dark suit and grey tie staring down at me and arched a single eyebrow. “The better question is what are you doing here, Serena?”
Already frustrated by the early questions of his inquisition, I held onto Cayden tightly and shrugged as if his presence didn’t upset me. “Enjoying the day with my son. Or am I under the Robert Erickson version of house arrest and I can’t even go outside?”
His face twisted into a grimace, but he didn’t leave. Instead, he sat down beside me and said nothing, like we were the kind of father and daughter who could spend quiet time together and neither of us would feel like it was a matter of waiting for the next shoe to drop.
We weren’t, and I sat waiting, wishing he would just leave me alone.
Finally, when he did begin to speak, it was to give his opinion on how I was doing as a mother. “I wish y
ou would hire a nanny for the baby, Serena.”
“I don’t want a nanny. I don’t work, so why shouldn’t I take care of my son?” I said, my defensiveness rising with every word.
With a wave of his hand, he dismissed my ideas. “Even your mother had a nanny, Serena.”
I turned to look at him to see if I could find any evidence in his face that his claim was true. I saw nothing to show he was lying, but he had to be because I didn’t remember ever having a nanny.
“That’s not true. Who?”
“She did. Her name was Cynthia. You and your sister loved her when you were babies.”
“How long did she work for us?”
He thought about the question for a moment and shook his head. “She left before you were a year old. Your mother felt she didn’t need her around, for some reason.”
His dismissive tone whenever he spoke about my mother, like she wasn’t worthy of the respect I knew she deserved, irritated me. I wanted to tell him if my mother thought she didn’t need a damn nanny, then she didn’t need one. She probably caught him sleeping with the woman.
What would he know about taking care of babies anyway? I don’t remember him any more during those years than I remembered the nanny.
But I remembered my mother from then.
I looked off in the distance, not caring if he even heard me reminisce about her. “Mom used to sit with Janelle and me in the kitchen and try to teach us how to make cinnamon sugar toast. We used to make a mess all over the counter, but she always looked so happy, no matter what we did to the kitchen.”
“It’s a shame she won’t get the chance to see her grandson grow up.”
Cayden began to cry, so I rubbed his back for a minute to calm him since I knew it wasn’t time for him to eat again. My father’s cryptic words hung in the air, but even though I wanted to tell him she would, I said nothing. We both knew he’d ordered her killed and Jesse had failed because of Ryder. It existed as an unspoken truth among the three of us.
When I didn’t take the bait, he turned toward me and took Cayden’s hand in his. “I’m so happy you and Ryder are doing so well. I wasn’t sure he’d be able to come back from everything and be the man he’d need to be for you two.”
Before I could stop myself, my curiosity got the best of me and I asked, “Come back from what?”
My father frowned and shook his head, like he was disappointed. “I would have thought he’d have told you.”
Holding Cayden to me, I tried not to focus on my father’s hand still holding his. “I’m sure he has, but your statement was so vague.”
He brought the baby’s hand to his mouth to kiss his fingertips and looked up at me. “I want you to know, Serena, that I did it because I love you.”
“Did what?”
Sitting up straight, he let Cayden’s hand drop. “Cleaned up that mess with that fighter. I’m sure Ryder didn’t mean to beat him into a coma, but the police weren’t going to care about his intentions.”
Suddenly, Ryder’s drinking and nightmares made sense. He’d been suffering through that all alone for months, with no one to confide in about what he was going through.
But I didn’t want my father to think there were any secrets between Ryder and me.
“I’ve wanted to thank you for doing that for us, Dad. Ryder told me all about it, and I know you may not have liked the idea of us being together, so you helping him when he needed it to stay with me and be there for our son means a lot to me.”
My father stood from the bench and flashed one of his crocodile smiles. “That’s what family does for one another, honey.”
I pasted a smile on my face and watched as he walked away, clearly pleased with how our little conversation had gone. He knew Ryder had never told me, but what he thought would happen next wouldn’t. Maybe those bimbos he liked to spend time with yelled and screamed at a man when they found out he’d hidden something, but I knew Ryder too well for that.
He didn’t tell me because he wanted to protect me. My father banked on me being like his women, but I was nothing like them.
Even though I grew up without my mother, I was her daughter, not his.
I tucked Cayden into bed and turned on his nightlight before checking to make sure the baby monitor was working properly. Exhausted from our time outside earlier that day, he didn’t even fuss for a few minutes like usual before falling right to sleep.
Ryder came into the nursery just as I said goodnight to Cayden for the last time. I put my finger up to my lips to let him know he’d already fallen fast asleep.
“He’s tired from our adventure outside today,” I whispered.
Craning his neck to look into the crib, Ryder smiled. “He looks so peaceful. I’d give anything to sleep like that just once a week.”
I wove my fingers through his and tugged him toward the door. “Let’s go. He needs to sleep.”
We got out into the hall and I closed the door behind me. Ryder stood staring at me like something was on his mind.
“Why did you rush me out of there?”
I planted a kiss on his lips and smiled. “I didn’t rush you out. It’s just that the baby is tired. We had a big day today.”
“A big day? Doing what? I know you didn’t leave the estate, so what did you do on your big day?” he asked as we walked toward our room.
“How do you know I didn’t leave today?” I asked with a giggle, knowing full well that as head of security he knew the exact whereabouts of everyone on the property at all times.
He recognized my teasing and slid his arms around my waist as we walked into our room. Resting his chin on my shoulder as I walked, he explained, “Well, other than the fact that I know everything that happens on this estate, I also know how you feel about taking one of Robert’s men along with you when you go anywhere.”
I turned in his hold and looked up at him, stopping next to the bed. “I guess that was a stupid question then, huh? In my defense, I was teasing more than anything else.”
A slow grin spread across his lips, making him look incredibly sexy. “Teasing? So you want to tease tonight?”
Sliding my hands down the front of his shirt, I let them come to rest just above his pants and felt the hardness of his abs against my palms. God, I could spend the rest of my life exploring the pleasures of his body.
“I’m not against teasing any time,” I said quietly as I stretched my thumbs out to slide under the waist of his pants.
I brushed against the head of his cock and looked up at him. “Are you?”
His tongue slid across his bottom lip before he winced. Need filled his eyes as he said, “Nope. As long as the teasing is followed by something a little more satisfying.”
The tips of my thumbs traced up the sides of his cock, making him wince again. “Like?”
He fastened his hands around my wrists and held them in place as he pushed his hips forward to make my thumbs press harder against his skin. “Like your mouth on my cock or my cock in your pussy. Either one…or both…both sounds better, to be honest.”
I strained against his hold, tugging my arms to no avail. Looking up, I pursed my lips. “I can’t do anything as long as you’re keeping my hands from what they want.”
He released my wrists and watched as I unbuttoned his pants before doing the same to his shirt. My breath caught in my chest at the sight of him beneath his clothes. Hard and toned, his body never ceased to make me want him.
Running my hands over the muscular peaks and valleys of his abs, I teased him with a light touch that made goosebumps rise up on his skin. A thin trail of black hair from just below his belly button ran down behind his pants, and I followed it with my fingertip until it met his erect cock.
“I’m just about done with the teasing,” he groaned and closed his eyes.
I lowered myself to my knees and wrapped my hand around his thick cock. “Then I guess I better get to the satisfying part.”
He opened his eyes and watched me wrap my lips arou
nd the head before slowly sliding down his shaft, my tongue flicking the skin underneath as I took all of him into my mouth. Seeing him stare down at me as I sucked his cock always excited me, and I felt my panties get wet in anticipation of when I’d have him inside me.
Wrapping his hand around the base, he fed his cock to me, setting the pace as I swallowed every inch of him and then slowly eased him out until all that was left between my lips was the head. I knew what he loved, and I gave it to him.
“Oh…God, baby…you feel so fucking good…” he moaned while he stared at me through half-lidded eyes.
I took hold of him and began stroking, but he shook his head and pulled me up to my feet. “I don’t want to come like that. We’re still working on giving Cayden a baby brother or sister.”
He kissed me hard on the mouth, snaking his tongue in to tease mine as he quickly stripped my clothes off. In seconds, I stood naked in front of him and desperate to feel him inside me.
His hand tugged at my hair, pulling my head back so I had no choice but to look up at him when he spoke. “I want to see your face when I slide into you, Serena. I want to watch your eyes fill with that look you get when my cock is inside you.”
“Fuck me, Ryder,” I whimpered, willing to beg if I had to.
Lifting me to waist level, he held me by my hips and groaned, “Wrap your legs around me.”
I did as he ordered and kept my eyes focused on his while he slowly eased his cock into me, inch by delicious inch until he was buried in me completely. He stretched my body to take all of him, a feeling more exquisite than anything else I’d ever felt in my life.
Then, just when I thought I couldn’t feel any more incredible, he tilted his hips and began fucking me in earnest. I rocked against him, desperate to feel him inside me when he moved away and beyond happy when his cock touched that spot deep inside me that caused pleasure to race through my body.
He buried his face in my shoulder and moved us toward the bed, moaning my name as he lowered me down onto my back without leaving my body. I pressed my heels hard into the small of his back and silently urged him to fuck me harder.
