I keep an eye on my phone even as Lina sits cross-legged across from me refilling the plastic teacup between us from her favorite plastic teapot.

“Daddy, what kind of tea?” she asks, probably for the second time to judge by her exasperated eye roll.

I grin. “Black tea, please.”

“No sugar?” she cries, aghast.

I laugh. “Okay, sugar and milk, too, please. If the server insists.” I wink at her, and she shakes her head, clicking her tongue.

“Of course I do. Tea isn’t any good without it.” She sets about pouring me the perfect imaginary cup, while I glance at my phone once more.

Tilly and I have been texting all day. Well texting, which escalated to sexting, which got me way too hot and bothered at the office, especially after our phone call, when I listened to her whisper my name over the phone as she pleasured herself in bed, all while I hid in the lone private bathroom stall at work, my cock throbbing hard and aching for her.

Now the sexting has settled back into chatting, in anticipation of her visit tonight. But tonight is still hours away. I’ll have all the time I want with her then.

For now, I flip my phone over and turn my attention back to my daughter. “What about Mr. Buns?” I ask. “Doesn’t he get tea too?”

Lina purses her lips, considering the stuffed rabbit propped on the chair beside us, at the little knee-height table we keep in her playroom. It’s not the most comfortable table for adults like me to sit at, but I make do, cross-legged in my work pants, across from Lina, who perches on her little head-of-table stool. “Mr. Buns doesn’t like tea,” she announces decisively. “He’s a coffee drinker.”

I stifle a grin. “I see. Well did you bring some coffee for him?”

“Oh no!” She flings her hands up and considers the table. “One second.” Then she twirls away to rifle through the giant toy kitchen set I bought her for Christmas last year. While she’s doing that, my phone begins to vibrate with an incoming call.

“One second, honey,” I tell her, and snatch up the phone, answering without even looking at the screen. There are only two people who ever reliably call me—Tilly and work. I’m hoping for the former, but if it’s work calling to demand I come back into the office, then I need to know that sooner than later. “Hello?” I say into the phone, flashing Lina a wink as she digs a large plastic pot out of the toy kitchen and begins to set it on the toy kitchen’s burner to prepare Mr. Buns’s coffee.

“Killian.” The voice on the other end of the line turns my stomach to ice, yet somehow makes my veins boil all at the same time.

I lean back from the table and push to my feet. Normally my ex-wife and I maintain a very call-for-emergencies-only routine. We set dates for her to pick up Lina, dates for her to drop her off. We trade information if one or the other of us ever need to change the schedule or will be out of town for a bit. Sometimes we text about doctor’s appointments. That’s about it.

A random call like this, out of the blue, can never mean anything good. “Lina’s right here,” I say, before she says anything, because in the back of my mind, I envision the other conversations we’ve had. The way she screams at me, tries to get me to break in front of our daughter. I never do, because above all else, I want to protect Lina. No matter what happened between her mother and me, the burden of it should never fall on our daughter.

“Good,” comes back the voice on the other end, sharp as ever. “I don’t care if she hears this. After all, I’m sure Lina was right there when you decided to fuck the Party Princess you hired, too.”

I surge to my feet, cupping a hand around the phone to prevent Lina from hearing. My daughter stares up at me, her eyes wide. I force a broad smile, for her, and keep my tone even when I answer. “Of course she wasn’t. Don’t be ridiculous.”

“So you don’t deny it.” Her voice drops about ten degrees colder.

“Tricia, listen to me—”

“What is wrong with you?” she shouts into the phone. “Did you start fucking this girl just to get at me, to try and ruin my company?”

“What are you talking about?” I reply, voice still low and even, for Lina’s sake.

“You hire this girl last minute, then you decide, what, that vapid pink glitter bimbos are suddenly your kink? Or was this all a ploy to get at me? To hit me in the spot where you knew it would hurt the most? I’m trying to build a professional brand here, a real company, not some escort service for angry ex-husbands.”

“You run Birthday Party Princesses?” I hiss, moving across the room, still keeping a smile plastered on my face. But Lina’s too smart for me. She’s frowning now, her stovetop abandoned as she picks up Mr. Buns from his chair and hugs him to her chest, sensing a fight in the air. One second, I mouth to Lina, and then I duck out of the playroom and around the corner, into the hallway, where I can respond properly.

On the other end of the line, Tricia is just getting started. “I thought you were better than this. And I would never have agreed to let you hire one of my girls, planning our daughter’s party last-minute all because you couldn’t be bothered to do it yourself or plan it out ahead of time—”

“I wanted to make sure Lina had the birthday she wanted,” I snap. “The birthday she deserved. But believe me, if I’d known this was your company, I would never have done it.”

“It’s so wonderful to have an ex-spouse who supports your endeavors.” Tricia laughs, just once, sharp and harsh. “But I’m not buying the innocent guy act. You thought fucking some young airhead would get under my skin, didn’t you? Well, the jokes on you, because you’re the only one pathetic enough to use a Party Princess company as a hookup service.”

“This isn’t just some random hookup!” I shout. “And Tilly is not some air-headed kid.”

Tricia snorts. “Oh, of course. My apologies. I’m sure it’s true love with the 25-year-old girl who makes a living dressing up in princess gowns and playing with toddlers. That doesn’t sound at all like a mid-life crisis.”

“Coming from the woman who runs a princess company,” I point out, rolling my eyes, “that seems a bit hypocritical.”

“I’m building a business. Creating a professional brand. Acting like a goddamn adult. That’s more than you can say right now.” On the other end of the line, she sighs, feigning regret. “Very well. If you won’t put a stop to this, then for the poor girl’s sake, I’ll have to. I’m going to explain to her that I’m your wife—”

“Ex-wife,” I interrupt. “And go ahead,” I add, with more bravado than I feel. “It doesn’t matter what you tell her, or how many lies you spin. Tilly has never pried or asked about my past, because she’s smart enough to know that it’s just that. It’s in the past.”

“I will never be your past, Killian. We have a child together. We have a family. This girl? She’s nothing. Nobody.”

“Don’t talk about her like that.”

“I’ll talk about her however I damn well please. How could you do this to me?”

“To you?” I shake my head, fists balled. “We’re divorced, Tricia. You cheated on me and then you left me, remember all of that? You want to talk about mid-life crises? How about when you ran off to Boca Raton without so much as a word, and left your daughter and me worried sick about you for weeks, all so you could hook up with a pool boy?”

“I told you, I needed a break from us for my mental health.”

I grimace. “And how about the way you drained our accounts, huh? Is that where you got the money to start this fucking princess empire of yours?”

“My finances are none of your concern,” she starts, but I shake my head, fists clenched.

“You took money from Lina’s college fund, money we saved together—”

“She’s five years old, Killian. We have plenty of time to replenish that fund before she’s old enough to even know what college is,” Tricia mutters.

“We’re over, Tricia,” I say. “We have been since long before we signed those divorce papers last year. And I can do what I want with whom I want. It’s none of your business.”

She laughs, low and soft. I recognize the laugh. It’s the one she gets whenever she’s about to throw another punch. My stomach clenches in anticipation. “That’s where you’re wrong, Killian. It is my business. Very much so. I’m Tilly’s boss, after all. And you met her while she was employed for me. How do you think I found out about your little dalliance? She called to tell me. To apologize for her improper conduct in the workplace.”

I shut my eyes. Dammit. I didn’t think of that. But what should it matter how we met? We’re both adults, and anyway, I wasn’t planning on using the Party Princess company ever again. Especially not now. By next year, if Lina hasn’t grown out of her princess phase, I’ll have plenty of time to find a new company to run her birthday. A company without unsavory ties to my old life. “Trish, this is between you and me. Don’t take it out on her.”

“I don’t plan to,” Tricia answers brightly. “Unless you force my hand. Stop seeing her, and she’ll be just fine. But if you continue to see this girl, I will terminate her employment. The last thing I need is for my other employees to get the wrong idea about how they should be behaving at work.”

“Tricia, please. You need to get over me and move on with your life. All this anger you’re bottling up, the way you dig at me, it’s not healthy.”

“I have moved on!” Tricia practically spits into the phone. “But that doesn’t mean I can’t still worry about the people you associate with—the women you choose to bring into our daughter’s life. Lina doesn’t need some bimbo young fling of yours in her life. You know how Lina is, she’ll get attached to anyone you date, and you can’t possibly be serious about this girl. So let it go. Let her go.”

“Tricia,” I start, but the phone buzzes in my ear, already dead.

She hung up on me.

I clench my fist around the phone, scowling at the screen. How dare she. That’s the thought first and foremost in my mind, burning bright.

How fucking dare she. She thinks she can tell me what to do, control my life from afar? Threaten a girl I’m starting to care about, all because of some made-up perceptions she has about her?

She’s wrong about Tilly. Tilly isn’t some air-headed bimbo, only obsessed with glittery dresses. That might be the character she has to play at work, but I’ve seen the real Tilly. The sweet, caring woman who is always ready to offer Lina a hug, tease her and play house with her. And the hardworking woman who knows what she wants—to publish her stories—and will stop at nothing to attain that goal.

Not to mention the sexy as hell bad girl she turns into in the bedroom…

I shake my head. No. Tricia doesn’t know Tilly at all. And she doesn’t know me, either, if she thinks she can bully me around with threats.

It would be easy to end things with Tilly. Easy to cave to Tricia’s demands and let her run the show, like she always does. Like she did for years before I finally came to my senses and saw who she really was. A user, a manipulator, a bad person. The type of woman who stops at nothing to get what she wants, no matter who she has to trample along the way. Even if the people she winds up trampling are her nearest and dearest.

When she ran away two years ago for an extended “mental health break” in Florida with some younger guy she met on the internet, and wouldn’t even speak to Lina on the phone to reassure her she was okay when I finally tracked her down… That was when I knew. Tricia would only ever do what suited Tricia. She didn’t care about anyone else in her life.

I left her the next day, though not before she was able to drain our joint savings account. The account we’d set aside, at my insistence of course, for Lina’s college.

We’ve been at each other’s throats ever since. All I want now is for her to move on, to get whatever it is she’s always looking for, whatever it is she couldn’t find with Lina and me. But from the tone of that last phone call, it doesn’t seem like she’s gotten any closer to doing that in the year and more it’s been since our official divorce.

With a deep sigh, I head back into the playroom, and force a bright smile for Lina.

But she’s staring at me, eyes wide, and far too knowing for a girl her age. “Was that Mommy?” she asks, her voice quiet, the way it goes whenever she’s upset.

I kneel down beside the table, where her teapot sits, forgotten. “That was,” I admit.

“Was she mad again?” Lina’s mouth turns down at the edges.

“A little, but only at me. She’s not mad at you, sweetheart. Nobody is.”

“I don’t like it when she’s mad at you.” Lina tightens her grip on her stuffed bunny, still clutched tightly in her arms. “It’s not nice.”

“Well, sweetie, sometimes grownups fight,” I tell her, keeping my voice soft and low. “But you have to remember, no matter what we say, no matter what happens between your mommy and me, we both love you more than anything. Okay?” I smile hard, to disguise the sinking feeling in my gut. The one I feel whenever I have to have this conversation with Lina, which is more often than I should. Far, far more often.

“Okay,” she replies, tone still low.

I reach for the teapot to distract her. “Now, where were we… oh yes, how would you like your tea?” I mime pouring a glass into the teacup in front of her.

She stares at me for another long, quiet moment. Then, slowly, she relaxes her grip on Mr. Buns, and tilts her head at the table, considering. “Sugar and milk,” she replies. “But extra milk.”

“You got it,” I reply with a sideways grin, and finish topping up her cup. All the while, deep down, I keep studying her expression, her open face, her bright eyes, as I slowly coax a smile out of her once more.

Tricia is wrong when she says Lina doesn’t need Tilly in her life. In reality, Tilly is exactly the kind of woman Lina needs around her. Someone who makes her smile, who reassures her, who holds her hand through the tough spots, instead of blaming her and making them tougher.

Tilly’s the kind of woman I need too. The kind of woman I’d be crazy to let slip through my grasp…

As Lina chatters away, I reach for my phone to text Tilly. I need to see you tonight.