Chapter Ten
Piper
I putter around the kitchen, unease gnawing at my gut as I cook the very last meal I’ll have with the family I’m in love with. I probably should have ordered in, since I have a million things to do—to pack—before I fly home tomorrow, but I don’t want to do any of them, which is why I’m in the kitchen stalling. I don’t want to leave this family. How can I? What will it do to little Maddie when another woman she cares about just ups and disappears? What will it do to me to be that woman, to leave this little girl behind? That would make me no better than my own mother.
I think about the man I’m in love with. I haven’t seen much of him since returning from the dog park. My mind revisits the way he was with Gabriela, closing his hands over hers as she touched him. The look on his face was pure bliss, happiness… forgiveness. I have no idea what was going through his head at that particular moment, but after that encounter with Gabriela he seems different, quieter, more relaxed, yet more distant from me. I turn to Maddie, who is on the floor with the pup.
“Hey, Maddie, can you help me set the table?” I ask and try to keep my voice light, free of the jealously taking up residence in my stomach. I don’t want the child picking up on my distress. She’s been through enough already.
I pull the forks from the drawer and hand them to her, carrying the knives to the table myself. Maddie starts humming the song from Frozen as we set the table, and I just go about my business, trying not to make a big deal out of it even though it’s a huge deal. I start to hum along with her, and she gives me a smile then skips back to the kitchen to play with the pup.
With my pulse racing, I quietly go into the hall, desperate to tell Lucas about this breakthrough. While I’m at it, maybe I should be true to myself and go after what I want and prove to Lucas I’m the girl for him, not Gabriela or any of the other women in the neighborhood. Yeah, he said he wasn’t interested in a relationship—heck, so did I—but I think we’ve both changed over the last few weeks. I know I’ve learned so much about myself. I can and will be a good mother—to Maddie, and to any other children I might decide to have.
I want to have children
Oh, my, God. I want to have children—with Lucas.
As that revelation hits like a lightning bolt, I search out Lucas. I find his office empty, and I’m about to go to his bedroom when the doorbell chimes. I hurry toward it, but my feet come to a resounding halt when I see Lucas opening the door for Gabriela, who has a casserole in her hands. But what Lucas has in his hands has the bottom falling out of my world.
Gabriela pushes her way into the house and snarls when she sees me in the hallway. “I’ve brought dinner,” she says, her eyes dropping to the suitcase in Lucas’s hands—my suitcase. “Going somewhere?” she asks.
“No, this isn’t mine.”
Her lips part in a smile. “So, you’ll be needing a new nanny, then?”
Lucas opens his mouth to respond, but she cuts him off and places her hands on his chest. “Of course, you do. I’m happy to take the job, and to take care of anything else you need.”
As if sensing me behind him, Lucas turns. There was a change in him that night we made love in his bed, but there is something else going on with him. Even the way he holds himself has changed. Is he taking this moment to move on? Does Gabriela sense it, too? Is that why she was all over him at the park, at his door now? I want him happy. I truly do. Maybe Gabriela will be the one to bring joy into his life.
I want it to be me.
Should I have said something to him earlier? If only I hadn’t been so scared.
Visions of my ex dumping me for a woman ready and willing to give him what he wanted rush through my head, and my stomach cramps. I glance at Lucas, and our eyes meet. Even though my insides are in chaos, I quickly pull myself together and bite back a need that burns in my throat. Cripes, I wish I didn’t care. Caring has only led to heartache. I should have left that first day. Run as far away as possible. Alyssa never should have sent me here. I really do want to kill her again.
He lifts the suitcase. “I was—”
I can’t stand to hear him say he was packing my bag to take me to the airport early so he could be with the shark next door, so I cut him off. “Thanks. I have a million things to do and didn’t know when I would find the time.”
I step up to him and reach for the bag, but he holds it tightly. His gaze searches mine, his brow pulling tight as a lock of hair falls into his eyes. I resist the urge to push it back.
“Piper, what’s wrong?” he asks. So much for trying to appear casual. I guess I’m just not that good of an actress.
“Nothing,” I say and practically yank the bag from his firm grip. “I, uh…I’ll just take this to my room and make sure everything is in there.”
I hurry up the stairs and leave Lucas with Gabriela, but when I enter my room, I find it completely empty of my things, and a relevant shift comes over me. I’m in love with Lucas, and if he’s ready and willing to move on, it should be with me, dammit. I think about that for a moment longer, think about Maddie, the pup, the family I always wanted, the family Maddie needs. Am I a girl who gives up so easily? Hell no. It’s time to tell Lucas how I feel about him and his daughter.
I spin around, ready to go back down the stairs, shove Gabriela out the door and fight for the family I love. But when I turn, I find Lucas in my doorway, leaning against the jamb, a sexy grin on his face.
“Something funny?” I ask, both my knees and heart wobbling at the sight of him.
“You’re jealous.”
He knows. He knows how I feel. But how does he feel? Was this just sex for him, or something more?
Ask him.
He pushes off the door, heat and desire in his eyes as he takes three steps and stands before me.
“Who says I’m jealous?” I ask, my heart full of the love I feel for him.
He laughs, but his expression is filled with pure adoration as he looks at me. “Oh, you’re not?”
“I…Lucas…was this just—”
He puts a silencing fingertip to my lips. “I don’t want Gabriela. I never did.” As his finger moves to my cheek in a gentle caress, relief, hope, and need zing through me.
“No? Then who do you want?” I ask, a silly question. The want and need in his gaze as it moves over my face speaks volumes.
It’s me he wants.
As my heart dwells on that, he says, “I want a woman who is sweet, kind, and insightful with my daughter,” he begins, his voice deeper, more intimate than ever. “I want a woman I can be open and honest with, share my life with, the good parts, and the bad. I want a woman who is insightful with me, and gets all jealous when my neighbor tries to throw herself at me.” He brushes my cheek. “I can’t tell you how happy that made me.”
Raw need shimmers between us, and I melt into him. “Oh. Where are you ever going to find a woman like that?” I ask, my voice rough from the emotions squeezing my heart.
He grins, and love shines in his eyes as he coils a long strand of my hair around his finger. “I’m guessing not in this neighborhood.” He shakes his head, standing solidly over me, hard and muscular. Possessive. “No. To find a girl like that, I’m going to have to look in the U.S., or better yet, look at what’s right in front of me.”
He bends and drops a soft kiss onto my mouth, so tender and achingly passionate, my knees nearly give. “I want you, Piper,” he whispers into my mouth.
He breaks the kiss, and I’m left breathless. “I want you, too, but why did you pack my suitcase?”
“You know, I figured I could tell you what you meant to me and how much I wanted you, but I thought actions spoke louder than words.”
Clearly, I’m missing something here. “So you packed my suitcase? Ready to ship me off to the airport?”
“I wasn’t sure how you felt, but I wanted to show you how I did by packing your bag so I could unpack it in my bedroom. I don’t want to hide this from Maddie anymore. I want us to be a family.” I gulp, a deep choking sound, and Lucas runs his thumb over my cheek. “When I saw the way you looked at Gabriela, I realized you wanted the same things I wanted. I know you have a life in New York, and I’ve given this a lot of thought. If you want, we’ll go there with you.”
Love rips through me, and it hurts to breathe “You would do that?”
“Yes. Anything you want.”
I shake my head, incredulous. “I don’t want to go back. There is nothing really for me to go back to. I want to stay here. I want to take care of you, Maddie, and her nameless pup.”
“Olaf.” The small voice comes from the doorway, and we both turn to see Maddie standing there. I suck in a tight breath and hold it as she holds out her pup. “Olaf,” she says again, naming her pup after the snowman from the movie Frozen.
“Maddie,” Lucas says and hurries across the room to scoop up his sweet daughter—soon to me my daughter, too—and her pup, Olaf.
Tears fill my eyes, and I look at father and daughter through a blurry haze. Lucas carries Maddie to me, and I don’t miss the moisture in his eyes as he pulls me in for a big family hug.
Family.
I have a family.
“You sure liked Frozen, didn’t you?” I ask Maddie as I poke her on the nose.
She nods. “I love Olaf.”
“Maddie,” I say, my heart so full it’s difficult to talk. “Have you ever wanted a baby brother or sister?” I ask.
Lucas’s eyes go wide, pleasure all over his face. “Are you serious?”
I go up on my toes and press my lips to his. Warmth spreads over my skin as I kiss him with all the love inside me. “Never more serious in my life.”
“Sister,” Maddie says. “Can we call her Anna?” Again from the movie Frozen, and also her grandmother’s name, which will likely really please her. And I want to please her, want to be a part of her family, too.
“I think Anna is a great name,” I say as my heart soars. For the first time in my life, I have everything I need—the family I always wanted, but never thought I could have.
I’m definitely going to have to thank Alyssa.
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