Chapter Eighteen
Jason
When we walked into my house, I could see Lucy was shocked to find Megan there. I walked in behind her, and Jenna took off running for me. Megan got up from the ground with a wide smile on her face while Lucy kept her eyes trained on her.
“How was the hunting?” Megan asked.
“Not very fruitful, but we can always try again,” I said.
“Well, Jenna and I here had a wonderful time. We colored and rearranged her room. She wanted her bed right smack dab in the middle, so that’s what we did.”
“Ah, so you wanted your room changed again,” I said to Jenna.
“Yep! Wanna go see, Miss Lucy?”
“You bet I do, kiddo. Come on, let’s go see your new room.”
She was definitely shocked that Megan was there. And I couldn't blame her. After all the times I had talked to Lucy about her coming around and creeping me out, she probably figured I wouldn’t want someone like that around Jenna. But, she was the one that suggested Megan was good with kids, and it looked like they had a nice enough time.
Plus, she seemed a bit jealous, coming into my home with another woman in it, and there was a part of me that swelled a bit with pride. It meant she cared who I spent my time with and what role they played in my life, which meant she was actively thinking about the role she played in mine.
And something about that was exciting to me.
I wrapped up my conversation with Megan before I paid her. For the most part, she had ceased her flirtatious advances for a couple of weeks now, so I figured she saw how close Lucy and I were getting and had decided to back off. It made me feel more comfortable with her coming around, especially when I wasn’t having to shrug off her touches on my arm. But now, I needed to go see what she and Jenna had done to this room.
“I’ll be right back,” I said.
I went and stood at the door, watching Lucy sit on the edge of Jenna’s bed. My daughter was talking her through everything in her room and showing her where it used to be. Jenna was taken with Lucy, and the way she looked with pride and happiness upon my daughter warmed a part of my chest that had been dead for a very long time.
But then, a question that flew from Lucy’s mouth confirmed the jealous feelings I thought she was having.
“How did you like Miss Megan?” she asked.
“She was lots of fun. Not as fun as you, but I made it work.”
“Oh, you did, did you?” I asked.
She turned around and saw me smiling at the door, and a blush of embarrassment crept down her neck. She rubbed at it, probably hoping I didn’t see it, but the appearance of it brought a smirk to my cheeks. Lucy was jealous of Megan being in the house when she got home, and jealousy looked adorable on her.
“I wasn’t prying or anything,” she said. “I was just wondering if she had fun, is all.”
“My regular babysitter got sick at the last minute, and I needed a sitter unless I wanted to cancel. And I really didn’t wanna cancel. Plus, she offered to do it for less money, so that’s nice.” I said.
“Oh, no. It’s fine. Really. Just curious,” she said.
“Uh huh. So that red blush on the nape of your neck is just you being happy?” I asked.
“Shut up,” she said.
“Ooooo! Miss Lucy said a bad word, Daddy!”
“Yes, she did, princess. And do you know what happens when people say bad words?” I asked.
“They get tickles!” we both exclaimed. I threw Jenna onto her before I climbed up onto the bed. Jenna was already tickling her stomach, and I slid my fingertips underneath her arms. She laughed and laughed until her face turned red, and when she couldn’t catch her breath or fight back, we laid off. I watched her pant, her chest rising and falling with desperation while a sheen of sweat shone over her face, and my pelvis began to churn at the sight. This was not the time or the place to be thinking these thoughts, so I turned my sights onto dinner and climbed off the bed.
“Dinner’ll be ready in thirty minutes. That enough time for you to recuperate from your punishment?” I asked.
All she did was give me a thumbs up.
I was honestly a bit leery of letting Megan babysit. I mean, I was only taking Lucy’s word for it, and while I trusted her and her opinions of people, I couldn’t get out of my mind how Megan had first approached me. Her tits had been shoved out, her smile gleaming white, and she had intentionally placed a pie in my crotch just to feel my dick.
But, it seemed like she and Jenna had hit it off, and I didn’t get any desperate phone calls, so I figured it couldn't have been too bad. And it helped to know I had an emergency babysitter just up the road who took less cash for the same job. That might come in handy one of these days.
I was putting the finishing touches on dinner and chatting with Megan when I heard Lucy and Jenna enter the kitchen. Lucy was still panting a bit, and I looked over at her flushed face. She stuck her tongue out at me, and I gave her a playful wink. If she was still breathing like that after dinner, I’d try to make sure she was settled and alright.
“Megan is awesome at playing games,” Jenna said.
“Oh, really? What games did you guys play?”
“We played hide and seek and tag, and she taught me a new game called pick ‘em up.”
“What’s pick ‘em up?” Lucy asked.
“It’s where you take a deck of cards and scatter them across a room, and then the first one to find two aces doesn’t have to pick up the rest of them,” Megan said.
“Sounds like a fun game,” I said.
“You staying for dinner, Megan?” Lucy asked.
“Nope. Just hanging out until I’m kicked out,” she said.
“Can Megan come babysit again soon?” Jenna asked. A big smile crawled across Megan’s cheeks before she opened her arms for Jenna. She got off the chair and ran for the redhead in the corner, but instead of watching them, I kept my eyes on Lucy.
“What?” she mouthed to me.
“Anytime you need a babysitter, your daddy can call,” she said.
“That’s nice of you, Megan,” I said.
“No, really. Anytime. Your daughter is phenomenal, and I’ll never charge you as much as some sitters around here do. Sometimes, you just need someone to give you a break, and I'm good at those. Plus, I love kids. They’re always much more fun than adults and their stuffy activities anyway.”
“Yeah, like mowing the lawn and painting,” Jenna said.
“Yuck,” Megan said.
I chuckled at the two of them interacting, but I couldn’t help but notice the twinge of jealousy behind Lucy’s eyes. I knew she was being protective of us, given how Megan first approached us, but I wanted to try and talk with her about it later. If we were going to grow something good and healthy between the two of us, we needed to talk about things like this. I’m sure there would come a time where some dude who was chattin’ her up would make me jealous, and I’d hope she’d want me to talk with her about it.
But I shoved that conversation into the back of my mind for now.
“We’ll talk soon,” I said.
“Bye, Jenna,” Megan said.
“Bye, Miss Megan!”
“Alright, Jenna, go wash up for dinner,” I said.
The door shut behind her. Lucy eyed Megan from the window, and once the woman hit the sidewalk and started for her house, Lucy began talking.
“Well, for all her beginning desperation and her kookiness, she really is good with kids,” she said.
“Yeah, Jenna seemed to have a good time with her,” I said.
“That’s good, so long as she knows her place.”
“What was that?” I asked. I’d heard exactly what she’d said, but would she repeat it while looking at me?
“Nothing. I’m just glad Jenna had fun,” she said. “I’m gonna go check on Jenna while you finish up dinner.”
“Sounds good to me.”
I started setting the table with the finished food and drinks, and I heard commotion going on in the bathroom. I stilled my movements and listened in on Lucy and Jenna, and the moment I heard splashing, I knew exactly what was going on. Lucy’s giggles kicked up, and Jenna squealed with delight, and for the first time in my life, I caught a glimpse of what it would be like to have the family I’d never been able to provide for Jenna. The splashing of water continued, and I peeked my head around the corner only to see Lucy holding Jenna in her arms and spinning her around in the hallway.
The look of sheer happiness on my daughter’s face would forever be seared into my memory. In that moment, with Lucy twirling her around and Jenna hugging tightly onto her neck, I saw what I had taken from Jenna by keeping myself so closed off from the women around me. She had bonded with Megan, and now, she was clinging closer to Lucy than I’d ever seen. They stilled their movements in the hallway while Jenna wrapped her legs around this beautiful woman I’d come to wholly respect, and then a small song drifted down the hallway and hit my ears just as the stove timer went off.
“You are my Jenna. My only Jenna. You make me happy when skies are gray. You’ll never know, Jenna, how much I love you. Please don’t take my Jenna away.”
Lucy was singing to my daughter, and I had to swallow back the tears as my heart began to break into two.
Closing myself off had hurt my daughter more than I’d ever imagined.
And I was determined not to close myself off with Lucy.