by Grant, Pippa
I take stock of everything from the security outpost to the tasteful tropical landscaping to the cars around us to the house with its massive double oak doors and arched windows following the curve of the building, because I haven’t been out of the military long enough to lose that desire to have situational awareness at all times.
Mr. Chihuahua leaps out of his car and gestures for me to follow him. We don’t head to the front door, but instead, steer around the curved side of the building along a path beneath palm trees and alongside hibiscus bushes, curiosity and suspicion growing with every step.
“Where are we going?” This doesn’t feel like a party, and the music is fading as we walk.
“Pool house.”
“Why?”
“Privacy.”
“What—”
“Soon, Mr. Jaeger. I’ve been instructed to wait.”
That’s not ominous. Fuck. What the hell’s going on?
Eventually, we reach a pool shaped like—
Huh.
That’s a dick pool.
Daisy’s initials are DICK—my sisters say her parents must’ve hated her—so I guess a dick pool makes sense. Definitely a cock-and-balls shape, with the balls as a hot tub. Another house’s lights are just visible beyond the patio.
We skirt around the ball sack and a statue of a dude peeing and head to the small, brightly-painted pool house. It’s about the size of a double-wide, except the front of the house is all glass, and inside, it feels like an exotic getaway with marble tile floors, a dolphin chandelier, a sleek bar along one wall, and tropical plants in every corner. Discreet signs point down a hallway to changing rooms and a restroom on one side and a spa on the other.
I do a double-take when I realize the arrows are actually crystal dicks.
Crystal?
Or diamond?
And is that a diamond-encrusted mosaic of a penis hanging on the wall?
This is nothing like the neighborhood pool my siblings and I begged to go to every summer back home in Chicago. Not that I expected it to be, but I didn’t expect so many penises either.
The subtle noise from the party is completely muted once the glass door slides shut behind us. “What—” I start again, but before I can finish, a colorful mass of a person tumbles into the room from one of the hallways. She’s wearing stilettos, drink in hand, bringing a whirlwind of chaos with just her presence.
Her dress is a gold and white glittery number that barely covers her from boobs to thigh and shows off every curve. Her hair’s neon red, tied in a tall ponytail on top of her head, and she’s wearing a choker collar of diamonds that matches the dangly sparkles in her ears.
“Stanley! You brought me a stripper! You shouldn’t have!”
He opens his mouth, but she holds up a finger. “Ah-ah, don’t ruin the mood.” She whips out a phone, hits the screen twice, and “Low Rider” fills the air. “Okay, big guy. Show me what you’ve got.”
Comfortable. Becca said I was comfortable.
Can’t wait to tell her this story. Though when I tell it, it’ll involve tequila shots and falling in the pool and mistaking a blow-up doll for a drowning woman and getting crowned king of the dick pool.
Assuming I get to leave. This whole night is turning surreal. I don’t like it.
Mr. Chihuahua sighs heavily. Glances at me. Back to her. Then to me again. “Five minutes, Mr. Jaeger. Please don’t—don’t let her scare you off. Mrs. Carter would be very put out.”
The woman claps. “Oh, a stripper from Gramalicious? I didn’t know she had it in her.”
“Daisy?” I ask.
She grins and circles me, hips swaying, shoulders rolling to the music. It’s hard to watch just her lips when she’s a whirling blur of sensuality and outrageousness, so I don’t catch everything she says over the music, but she’s having a party whether the rest of us join in or not.
Her eyes sparkle as she twirls near me in that tight dress, her breasts jiggling just enough to be noticeable. “You gonna dance, or you just gonna stand there?”
My heart drums.
My fingers twitch.
Pure lust stirs low in my gut.
I don’t know exactly why I’m here—being pranked into going to a party by my brother is feeling like a less and less likely option—but I haven’t worked my ass off my entire life to not let loose and have a good time when the situation presents itself.
Especially tonight.
Don’t know that I have moves—the last time I tried to impress a girl, I did it by throwing down in a chin-up contest on a rope, and yes, I won—but I close my eyes and let the music hit my veins.
Dancing isn’t my thing.
Usually.
Tonight?
Tonight we’re in straight Fuck It-ville.
“Woo, baby!” Daisy crows. “What’s your name, sugarplum?”
“West.” My voice comes out rough.
Jesus. I’m shaking my booty for Daisy Carter-Kincaid.
She circles me closer, one hand on her phone, the other holding her drink in that fancy martini glass. She’s dancing, but not wobbling on those thin spikes under her heels. Her drink sloshes, but her eyes aren’t bloodshot, and she’s not slurring anything. “Where you from?”
“Everywhere.”
The backs of her fingers brush my biceps, and her drink dribbles over the edge onto my skin. “I like everywhere. Where’s your favorite?”
I’m not the partying-with-heiresses type. Whatever I’m here for, it’s tonight, and tonight only. Probably no more than the next hour.
What the hell do I have to lose?
I stare straight into those lavender eyes, ignore the warning, warning buzzing at the back of my brain because no one has lavender eyes, which means she’s hiding something, probably a lot of somethings.
But again—fuck it.
“My favorite?” I sway with her, squatting lower to be closer to her level. She’s not at all as tall as you’d think she’d be from her reputation, but she’s every bit as wild. “Right now, it’s right here.”
Her nose crinkles, and then her smile spreads wider. “Are you flirting with me, West from Everywhere?”
“Are you dancing with me, Daisy from Right Here?”
“What can I say? I love to dance.” She winks. “And flirt. You gonna strip, or what?”
Once more—fuck it.
Why the hell wouldn’t I strip?
I step back, pull my polo out of my jeans while I keep doing my best to dance. You want a mountain of boulders moved, I’m your man. Need a makeshift linebacker in a pick-up game of football in the park, I’m the first guy you call. You want a striptease—can’t say that’s ever been my style.
But I’m doing this anyway. Slowly giving her a peek at my abs. Tugging my jeans down at one side, like I’ve seen on the cover of so many of my sisters’ romance novels.
Her pupils go dark, and she keeps swaying to the music, tilting her head so her unnatural neon red ponytail swishes with the beat too.
“You strip often?” she breathes.
“Couple times a day.”
“Where?”
“Usually my bathroom.”
She tips her head back and laughs, and fuck me, that happy, rich laughter makes me want to get a hearing aid so I can soak in the sound fully in both ears. She’s curvy and bold and bright, and she’s rendered my balls mute.
“I think I like you, West from Everywhere,” she says.
I don’t let that go to my head—not the one on my shoulders anyway—because this has first date written on it, and first dates and I don’t get along. “Let’s leave it at that,” I tell her.
She laughs again. Sips her drink. Nods to my stomach. “C’mon, then. Let’s see what else you’ve got.
I’m about to whip the shirt over my head when a loud bang erupts behind us.
I spin and crouch, ready to face danger, and find myself eyeball to eyeball with—fuck.
Imogen Carter.
She’s a crust
y one. And meticulous to boot. Julienne Carter-Roderick might’ve officially been in charge of the nursery renovation, but her grandmother stopped by nearly every day to make sure the two-by-fours were straight enough and that none of my small crew were drinking.
Surprised the hell out of me when she hired me to fix a few windowpanes in her solarium after that one-star review Julienne gave me, but she did, and she was even crustier the week I was on her solarium job.
And that sour expression darkening her face is making even the dolphin chandelier above us wince and shrink back.
“Daisy, shut that music off before I have Pierson toss your phone into that abomination of a pool,” she orders without taking her ice blue eyes off me. “Mr. Jaeger, I presume?”
I open my mouth to remind her we’ve met, then realize with people like this, it doesn’t matter. She won’t remember me.
I’m just the hired help.
Much like to the curvy, petite woman behind me, I’m just the stripper.
“Gram-gram!” Daisy kills the music and tucks her phone into her cleavage, though she’s still swaying to the beat. “If I knew you wanted to party, I would’ve called up ol’ Piersy and told him to find you some club clothes.” She lifts her glass with a grin. “And did I tell you I closed the Milan deal last week? Summer in Italy, here we come. Woot! Also, a stripper? Nice, Gramalicious. I expected way less of you!”
“You’re drunk,” Imogen sniffs.
“Nope, just buzzed and happy.” Daisy tosses herself sideways into one of the low sea blue chairs and drapes her bare, curvy legs over the armrest, which is shaped like a dolphin too, and reaches over her head to deposit the drink on the floor behind her.
Sweet Jesus, she’s flexible.
Another noise has me whipping my head back toward Imogen, and this time, I don’t miss the people behind her.
A tall, salt-and-pepper-haired man in a suit carrying Imogen’s ivory purse. A brick shithouse with dark blond hair and a scowl who looks like a bodyguard. And Stanley Chihuahua, who’s now carrying a baby carrier that’s the source of the noise.
“Whatcha drinkin’, Granny-boo?” Daisy asks. “Alessandro, get The Dame a cognac. She’s about to stroke out. Then we can all take a nice, deep, cleansing Moon-breath and be happy again.”
“How drunk is she?” Imogen asks the bodyguard who isn’t moving to get the older woman a drink. Alessandro, I assume.
“She’s not.”
“You’re completely certain?”
“Yes.”
Daisy winks at me, like we’re sharing a secret, except I don’t know if it’s that she’s actually drunk and her bodyguard is lying, or that she’s sober and just trying to get her grandmother’s goat.
But I don’t give two fucks about Daisy and goats.
I give two fucks about the kid in the carrier.
He’s young. Super young. So little, his legs don’t reach the edge of the carrier, and he has little control over his hands as he waves them about, crying his lungs out.
Another lightheaded feeling washes over me as I realize who he is.
He has to be, doesn’t he?
“Nothing better to do on the night we laid your cousin to rest than to throw a party?” Imogen scowls at Daisy, who rolls her eyes, grabs her drink, and sips off it upside down.
“Everyone mourns in their own way.”
None of the adults move to comfort the baby.
The crying orphan.
Don’t do it, Marine! my nut sack barks. Retreat! Retreat!
For being ignorant, randy suckers, they know me damn well.
Stanley Chihuahua grimaces at the carrier, puts it down, and steps a few feet away.
“Why am I here?” I interrupt as Daisy and her grandmother bicker.
They ignore me.
The baby wails harder.
And something deep in my heart twists.
I take three strides to the carrier and squat. No one tries to stop me, which pisses me off even more. I’m a fucking stranger. Unbuckling a baby. If there were strangers in my sisters’ houses doing what I’m doing right now, I’d tackle the fuckers first and ask questions later.
There’s an issue with Julienne Carter-Roderick’s will. I need you to come with me. It’s personal.
I’m starting to get a very, very bad feeling.
The baby’s still so tiny I have to cradle his head as I put him to my shoulder—next to my bad ear—and stand and bounce.
Imogen spears me a glance. Her lips pinch, but she doesn’t tell me to unhand the kid.
Not that I would. Who would I hand him to? She’s clearly not a baby person, or she’d be comforting him herself. Her lawyer and her purse carrier dude too.
“What am I doing here?” I press again while the little guy snuggles in deeper and his sobs slow.
Imogen ignores me.
These people are total assholes when it comes to answering questions.
But this baby is not. He smells like spit-up and pee, and he’s so tiny my hand covers his entire back. His black hair is slick, like he’s been sweating, and his tears are dripping onto my neck.
I’m the oldest of six. I have twelve nieces and nephews. I signed up for the Marines to take care of people.
This baby?
This baby needs someone to take care of him, and having him curl into me is sparking every protective instinct in my entire being.
None of them brought so much as a diaper bag, though, so I clearly can’t take care of him any more than just holding him.
“Put that drink down,” Imogen orders Daisy, who lifts a lazy brow that’s also neon red.
“Gramsies, we all mourn in our own way. This is mine.”
“Your time for mourning is over. Congratulations, Daisy. You’re Remington Nathaniel Roderick’s new guardian.”
Daisy blinks at her grandmother, then turns her lavender eyes to the lawyer, then me, then back to her grandmother.
While my hands tighten around the baby—is she fucking kidding?—Daisy busts out laughing. “That’s a good one.”
“I am regrettably not joking.” Imogen Carter turns that glacial glare on me. “Mr. Jaeger, Julienne and Rafe named you as co-guardian.”
I tilt my good ear toward her as my grip tightens even harder around the baby while my stomach goes bungee jumping to my toes. “Come again?”
“I said, Mr. Jaeger, that you and Daisy were named as co-guardians for my great-grandson. Whom you’re currently holding.”
Holy fuck.
My nuts are too in shock to offer up any commentary. There’s a buzz in my ears—the good and the bad one—and I go momentarily light-headed while I, too, sink into a dolphin chair with the baby.
I’m definitely not here for a party.
Four
Daisy
This is not happening.
Except it is, and I need to call my support staff immediately to get plans put in motion. Nannies. Trust funds. Roller coasters that need to be added to the neighborhood.
Fuck.
A baby?
We’re in my office while my security team slowly kills the party, since word reached us that Anthony Roderick tried to sneak into the Bluewater enclave—undoubtedly looking for the baby, which he probably sees as property, since he’s that kind of ass—and it’s safer in my office than in the pool house because I have a tighter alarm system in here.
I should ping Cameron, Emily, and Luna—my three vagillionaire besties who live down the street in their own mansions with their boyfriends and fiancés—and let them know we might have a slight security situation brewing, except Luna and Beck’s dog next door will bark if she feels the slightest bit of danger. Brutus, the community’s free-range St. Bernard, would also bark if he saw anything suspicious, though who knows where Brutus is right now?
Hell, Steve the Alligator would probably bark at the Rodericks too. Steve can sense evil. I’m sure of it.
But on an actually-likely-to-happen note, Cam’s fiancé, Jude, is basically always
on high alert after the little security ordeal that brought him into her life. He notices even when the sea turtles change direction. And I suspect it bothers the shit out of him when I throw parties after everything Cam went through when they met, but generally, all I get is a text message.
You’re not being stupid, are you?
Huh. Why hasn’t he texted yet? Or Cam?
Oh.
Right.
Because they’re probably having wild monkey sex.
Emily and Derek are probably having monkey sex too.
Actually, add Luna and Big Dick Beck to the monkey sex list as well.
I sigh, because I will most likely not be having wild monkey sex again anytime soon.
All I’ll have is a memory of a striptease from the hot as fuck stranger who probably wouldn’t be here if Gramalicious hadn’t vetted him already, and who probably won’t be here long, because who stays to take care of a stranger’s baby?
He’s feeding the baby right now. And he changed a diaper after Pierson, The Dame’s butler, produced a bag of supplies, but staying? For the next eighteen years?
No way.
People don’t do that.
But not only is he holding and feeding the baby, he’s also engaged in the stare war to end all stare wars with my grandmother.
Usually challenging her only makes her paranormal undead powers stronger, but it seems that being challenged might also be strengthening him.
Whoa.
Just whoa.
I said sexy as fuck, right?
“Mr. Jaeger, my legal team has all the paperwork prepared for you to surrender custodial rights to Daisy,” my grandmother says.
I need a paper bag. And that’s before he growls a low, “No,” at her.
She frowns and glowers, which is impressive.
Usually I’m the only one who can overcome the power of her Botox, but unlike me, Westley Jaeger hasn’t made her a few billion dollars—I’m equally fucked the day my grandmother realizes I’m more lucky than brilliant, because I do love poking her—so he’s really taking his life into his own hands.
“As you didn’t appear to read the will in its entirety, allow me to sum it up for you,” The Dame says dryly. “All of Rafe and Julienne’s assets are to be liquidated with proceeds donated to the local chapter of Sea Stars Anonymous.”