Suddenly Engaged (A Lake Haven Novel Book 3)

by Julia London

  Dax was still shaking his head. “I’m not a babysitter, Kyra.”

  “Just this once,” she begged him. “I’m in a bind here.”

  He looked caught, and Kyra felt a twinge of guilt for having caught him. “I mean, unless you’re going to the jazz club tonight,” she said, giving him the out.

  He frowned. “No jazz.”

  “Sunday nights are really busy,” she said. “I could make some good money.”

  Dax groaned heavenward. “What time?” he asked, his voice full of resignation.

  “Thank you so much,” Kyra said earnestly and took her hand from the phone. “I can do it, Randa!”

  “Great! Be here by five?”

  That was an hour and a half from now. “Yep. See you then.” She clicked off and smiled at Dax.

  His gray eyes moved over her face. “Don’t smile at me like that, woman.”

  “Why not?”

  “Just don’t.” He put his hands on his hips and looked to the ground. “A guy can only take so much.”

  She walked down the steps to him and dipped down a little so she could look him in the eye. “I can’t thank you enough,” she said sincerely.

  “That’s true, you can’t. But you keep trying.” He lifted his head and looked at her in a way that made her skin tingle all over. Like she was the Popsicle.

  “Do you want me to bring her to you?” Kyra asked.

  “Nope. I’ll hang out here. That way she’s got her toys. And you probably need half a dozen things fixed in that cottage you don’t even know about.”

  Kyra was smiling again. She really liked this man. A lot. But she sincerely wished that she didn’t need so much of his help. “You’re a good guy, Dax. This is yet another bind you’re helping me with. I owe you.”

  His gaze flicked to her mouth and lingered there. “You do. And I’m going to collect.”

  Now, in addition to the tingling, she felt a little light-headed. She would like nothing better. “Promise?”

  “Yep.” His eyes turned a very sexy shade of smoke—hot and intense and locked in on her. She could feel the heat rising in her skin, her pulse beginning to race.

  “Well, okay,” she said. “I, ah . . . I better get ready to go.” She started to back up the steps.

  Dax silently watched her, his gaze still fixed on her. She was so turned on by the idea of him collecting his debt that her heart was jackhammering wildly with anticipation. “About an hour?” she suggested.

  He nodded.

  Kyra turned around and darted into her house before she did something like lunge at him to rip his clothes off and risk missing her shift.

  Once inside, she walked quickly to the kitchen and braced her hands against the tabletop, taking deep draws of air. Work was the furthest thing from her mind right now. She’d never had a man look at her like that, with such ferocious desire. Never. And she’d felt it just as fiercely.

  “Mommy, what do I do with the stick?”

  Ruby had appeared at the kitchen door, and the remnants of the Popsicle had dripped down her dress and were all over her mouth.

  “Oh, wow,” Kyra said, her thoughts slowly swimming to the surface of her reality. “We better get you cleaned up. Guess what?”

  “What?”

  “I have to go to work and Dax is going to babysit.”

  Ruby gasped. “Awesome!” she shouted.

  Yes, it was awesome, and Kyra couldn’t wait for her shift to be over so she could pay that debt.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The night went by in a whirl—the bistro was so crowded that people waiting in the bar area spilled into the dining area. It was one of Kyra’s most successful shifts yet—she made enough money that if she did have to miss work this week, it wouldn’t ruin her. That only strengthened her resolve to get on night shifts . . . which, she realized, was in direct opposition to her equally strong desire to be home with her daughter. But she couldn’t help thinking of what she’d be able to do for Ruby if she doubled or tripled her tips on a daily basis. She might even start saving for a house.

  Kyra was exhausted by the time the bistro closed for the evening, and drove home yawning most of the way. When she pulled into the drive, she noticed her front door was open and soft yellow light was spilling out of the screen door. She gathered her things, locked her car, and walked up to her cottage. As she climbed the porch steps, she could see Dax and Ruby at the kitchen table. What was Ruby doing up? Hadn’t she mentioned what time to put Ruby to bed? God, no, she hadn’t—she’d been too busy trying not to grin like an idiot around him.

  Ruby’s head was bent over a piece of paper, and Dax was sitting in a chair across from her with his legs stretched long. There was something different about his hair that Kyra couldn’t quite make out.

  She opened the screen door and stepped in. “Hello?”

  “Mommy!” Ruby dropped her crayon and sprinted for Kyra. She threw her arms around Kyra’s legs and grinned up at her.

  “Hey, you fixed your hair,” Kyra said and kissed the top of her daughter’s head.

  “We made our hair like Taleesha’s.”

  “We did?” She glanced up as Dax ambled to the door between the kitchen and living area and braced his arms against the frame overhead. That thing she’d noticed in his hair was tiny little pigtails. Three of them. “Oh,” she said, her voice full of awe.

  “Dax did mine and then I did his,” Ruby explained. “He doesn’t have much hair, so his are tiny. I painted his fingernails, too, Mommy. You know, like you let me do to you sometimes.”

  Dax silently held up a hand, his fingers spread wide, so that she could see the paint job Ruby had done. It looked as if the tips of his fingers were bleeding.

  “That’s . . . festive.”

  “I painted some of Otto’s, too, but he didn’t like it and he left.”

  “Fled,” Dax said over her head.

  “And look, Mommy,” Ruby said. She let go of Kyra and rocked back on her heels.

  “What?”

  “My feet,” Ruby said.

  Kyra glanced down at Ruby’s pink cowboy boots. The ends had been split away from the soles, and her toes were peeking out. Kyra gasped. “What happened?”

  “Dax made them so they didn’t squash my feet anymore. They were squashing me.”

  “If they’re too small, we should get you some new—”

  “No, I like these,” Ruby said and rocked again.

  “Well, you two have certainly had an eventful evening.”

  “You could say,” Dax said.

  “Thanks,” Kyra said. “And sorry for . . . the makeover. Come on, Ruby. It’s way past your bedtime. Run in and brush your teeth, and I’ll come in a minute.”

  Ruby walked on her heels out of the living room.

  “I’m really sorry,” Kyra said to Dax, wincing a little. “I forgot to tell you what time she goes to bed.”

  “Don’t apologize. I didn’t have to agree to any of it,” he said, gesturing to his hair.

  “Yes, you did. I know how persistent she can be if she wants something.”

  “She’s six. I could have taken her if I had to.”

  Kyra smiled gratefully. “Let me get her to bed.”

  “Yep. I’ll just go—”

  “Please don’t,” Kyra said. “I brought you something.” She held up a plastic bag.

  “Food?” he asked hopefully.

  “Eggplant parm. Are you hungry?”

  “Starving. Ruby made me a sandwich, but it was inedible.”

  Kyra smiled sympathetically. “You have to toss those in the garbage when she’s not looking. Look, I brought this, too.” She put down the bag and withdrew a bottle of one of the bistro’s top-dollar wines from her backpack.

  Dax looked at the bottle, then at her.

  “It’s wine. Good wine. The kind I can’t afford.”

  “I noticed,” he said.

  “I hope you like it, because I kind of made a deal with the devil for it.”

 
; “Oh yeah?”

  “Bar cleanup duty, three times in the next week, for a ten percent discount.”

  Dax grinned. “I like your deals,” he said approvingly. “I’m not sure it’s a good deal, but I like it.”

  She grinned. “Just give me ten minutes.”

  It was past eleven, and although Ruby was bubbly and full of the news of what she and Dax had done all evening, she was unsteady on her feet. Her eyes closed almost the moment her head hit the pillow.

  Kyra ducked into her room and hastily changed out of her work clothes, putting on a summer dress. She pulled her hair out of the required bun and shook it loose, then returned to the kitchen.

  Dax had taken the pigtails out of his hair and the food out of the container. He’d found two paper plates on top of her fridge. “It smells delicious,” he said.

  Kyra opened the wine and poured two healthy servings. They settled at the kitchen table after Kyra cleaned off the drawings and crayons. “Cheers,” she said, lifting her glass.

  Dax touched his glass to hers, then picked up his fork.

  “Ruby had the time of her life,” Kyra said before she tasted the wine. “She could hardly stand she was so tired, but it was Dax this and Dax that. If a six-year-old can be in love, I think she is.”

  He laughed.

  “You’re really good with her,” Kyra added. “It’s not easy, I know. You could have put her in front of the television and she would have been fine.”

  “I didn’t mind,” he said with a shrug. “Gave me something to do.” He ate a forkful of the eggplant.

  Kyra ate a little, too, wondering if she had ever dated anyone who got on so well with Ruby. Well, no, because she could count on one hand all her dates in the last six years, and none of them had been around Ruby except briefly. Still, of all the men she would have guessed would be good with Ruby, Dax wasn’t one of them. “Have you ever thought of having kids?” she asked curiously.

  Dax’s face instantly changed. He looked like she’d just asked him if he’d ever thought of murdering someone.

  “What did I say?” she asked guiltily.

  “Nothing.”

  It was obviously something. “Okay,” Kyra said slowly. And here she was, feeling all warm and fuzzy about how well he and Ruby got along.

  “It’s just that I’m about to be a father.”

  Kyra looked up so quickly that her fork missed the plate altogether. “You what?”

  “Surprised? Yep, my ex is due any day now.”

  Kyra put down her fork and cast her arms wide with surprised jubilation. “Dax! Congratulations! Why didn’t you say so?” She lifted her wineglass in toast. He halfheartedly lifted his and resumed his meal.

  His ex-wife was pregnant. That must be so exciting. But . . . as Kyra thought about it, she realized that meant he must have ended their marriage while his ex was pregnant. “Oh,” she said without thinking.

  “Oh? What does oh mean?” he demanded.

  “Nothing,” she said, shaking her head more than was necessary. Except that she had a funny feeling in her stomach. She thought so highly of him—she would hate to know he was the kind of guy to leave a woman high and dry with a pregnancy. And if he was, well . . . that put a whole new spin on things, didn’t it? She could hardly tolerate one man in her life like that, and definitely not two.

  “It’s something,” he said and put down his fork.

  “I was just doing the math, I guess.”

  “I’m not the kind of guy who’s going to leave a woman when she’s pregnant with my baby, if that’s the math you’re doing,” he said flatly.

  Kyra blanched. Was she so obvious? “I didn’t mean that. I’m sorry, I don’t want to pry—”

  “That’s what everyone thinks, you know. But that’s not what happened. I wanted kids. And she . . . well, she used my sperm after we separated.” He winced, then waved his hand. “It’s complicated.” He seemed exasperated and wounded all at once.

  “Everything is complicated when it comes to breakups,” she said.

  Dax’s jaw clenched. “Not like this,” he said low. “We were trying.” He focused on his plate, then breathed in so deeply that his shoulders lifted with it, then let it go. “But . . . she had other ideas about who she wanted to be with.”

  Kyra was shocked. That was a startling admission from her neighbor, and suddenly she saw him in a completely different and sympathetic light than moments before. She knew what that felt like. She knew how disheartening and lonely it could be, and her heart went out to him. “That sucks,” she said softly. “I guess I know better than anyone how much that sucks.”

  He nodded.

  “Why didn’t she use the, ah . . . the other person’s sperm?”

  Dax snorted and drank more wine—a lot more. “Because the other person doesn’t produce sperm.”

  Kyra had to work out that puzzle. “Oh, I get it,” she said after a moment. “He’s sterile, right?”

  Dax groaned, then sighed to the ceiling as if this was all very difficult. “There is no he, Kyra,” he said, then lowered his gaze to her. “Ashley left me for a woman, okay? God, I hate dancing around the truth, so there it is. My wife left me for a woman and then used my sperm to have a baby.” He swiped up his wine and drained the glass, then put the glass down before Kyra could even grasp what he’d just said. “I better get going.” He stood up.

  “No!” She stood up, too. “You haven’t finished your meal, and I told you what I had to promise to get the wine. Sit down, Dax—I’m not making any judgments of you, if that’s what you think.”

  He laughed ruefully. “You don’t have to, Kyra—I’ve made them all. I’ve beaten myself up every which way to Sunday.” He shoved a hand through his hair. “Now I am waiting for a child, a son, who I want more than air, and I don’t know what kind of role I’ll have in his life. I mean, how it will all work. I just know that at the very best, it’s going to include those two and me.”

  “Have you talked to her?” Kyra asked.

  He laughed again. “Oh, I’ve talked to her. Ashley thinks we can all be one big happy family and raise the baby together. She doesn’t seem to get or care how I feel about that. Honestly, that’s the problem—I don’t really know how I feel about it. I don’t want to fight Ashley, because I know she’ll be a good mom. But neither do I want to pretend it’s all okay with me and spend any time with her . . . significant other,” he bit out. “I don’t know what the answer is—I just want my son.”

  “Is the significant other so bad?” Kyra asked.

  Dax chuckled. And then he told her of how his ex-wife had hooked up with Stephanie. How Stephanie, a dour, sharp-tongued woman, had worked alongside him, and then had continued to work with him even after the truth came out. He admitted how humiliated he’d been and how he’d begun to realize he was the laughingstock around Teaneck.

  Kyra was fascinated by such a salacious story, but she could feel Dax’s anguish. He had loved his wife, had wanted a family, and had been blindsided by all of it. She suddenly understood the gruffness, his desire to keep to himself, to keep people at arm’s length.

  “So there you have it,” he said at last. “The sad story of Dax Bishop.”

  “You’re too hard on yourself,” she said.

  He grunted. “You don’t know what it’s like to wake up every day full of anger and regrets and so many freaking questions that it makes your head spin.”

  “I don’t?” Kyra pushed her plate away and planted her arms on the table. “You do realize I am living hand-to-mouth because of one weekend, right? I have a college degree. I was working at US Fitness magazine, and I loved that job. I mean loved it. I had goals, lofty goals, and being a mother wasn’t part of the equation. In fact, a baby was so far removed from what I was about that I even went so far as to make an appointment for an abortion.”

  Her eyes instantly began to burn with unshed tears when she said those words. It happened every time she thought of how close she’d come to not having Ruby.
“I can’t imagine my life without Ruby, you know? I love her more than anything in the world, and I can’t believe I almost didn’t have her. But I was this close, Dax,” she said, holding up a forefinger and thumb.

  To his credit, Dax did not look appalled or shocked—he looked concerned. And compassionate. “I’m so sorry you went through that.” He reached for her arm and squeezed it affectionately.

  Kyra told him about how it had happened. The fabulous weekend in Puerto Vallarta, then being ghosted by Josh, and Josh’s panic when he found out she was pregnant. She told Dax she’d not known what to do, especially with her mother gone from her life and her father’s less-than-supportive attitude. He was an old-school type who had been more concerned about how much it might cost him. She told Dax that had it not been for Brandi, who had gone with her that day to her appointment, she might have gone through with it. But Brandi had held her hand and had said, “I’ll help you, Kyra. You’re not alone. I’ll help you.”

  It was the tiny shred of hope that Kyra had needed to cling to. She told him how she’d decided she’d give her baby up for adoption, but by the time she gave birth, she couldn’t possibly let her go. And how Brandi had helped her. Through the first year of Ruby’s life, Brandi had been there for Kyra. But then her new husband had gotten a job in LA, and Kyra couldn’t afford child care or rent in New York, and she’d kept moving farther and farther out in search of jobs and affordable housing. She told him how she’d ended up in East Beach, and for the first time since Ruby was born, she wasn’t lying awake every night worrying about how she’d put her finances together that month. And how she thought a career in real estate might be the thing that would finally give them breathing room, maybe even allow her to get a house for the two of them.

  When she’d finished telling him everything, he seemed contemplative. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to unload on you.”

  “I’m glad you told me,” Dax said, and he smiled.

  Amazingly, so did Kyra. She’d never told anyone the full story—too afraid of being judged for what she’d done, she supposed—but it was kind of freeing to say it out loud. She’d made a mistake, and it had been a hard lesson—it was still a hard lesson—but it was the best thing she’d ever done. She could honestly say she wouldn’t change a thing.