by Grant, Pippa
I’m no scientist, but I have a theory that when you treat people right and care, they’ll bend over backward to do just about anything you ask. Which isn’t why I give my staff extra days off, invite them to bring their kids to work, and throw not only a wicked awesome holiday party, but also untoppable Valentine’s Day, Independence Day, and Talk Like A Pirate Day parties.
I also ask how Hussein in accounting is feeling after his accident. If Katya in legal is still having trouble with her ex. And if Jorge in marketing needs some extra time off since his mama has been sick back home.
Deep down, most people just want to be loved and appreciated and seen. So I give them what they need, and in return, they give me what I need, and we’re all one big pile of happiness shining brighter than the Miami sun, with me standing between them and my grandmother.
Okay, maybe that’s just me being a big pile of happiness. Since Thursday night, though, I’ve been standing on a pile of panic asking my staff for favors, alternated with begging Alessandro and Tiana, my personal assistant, to help me discretely donate to college funds for orphaned kids and send shoes and toiletries to homeless shelters, that finally results in Lucinda shooing me outside late Saturday morning with orders to let someone else take care of you.
As if she hasn’t been doing that anyway. But now, for the first time in thirty-six hours, I can actually take a full breath and relax. I’m sitting next to the sun-shielded cabana hut she set up for Remy by the pool inside my D-shaped courtyard, not to be confused with my dick pool on the outside of my own fortress, for the record.
That pool’s there basically just to challenge my grandmother’s Botox.
I know. I know. If I want her approval, I shouldn’t bait her. But the Bluewater community is the only thing I have in my life that I’ve done on my own—Cameron, Emily, Luna and I designed and built it, not Carter International Properties—and I wanted a pool shaped like a dick.
So I have a dick pool.
I glance over at Remy, who’s hangin’ in a baby swing in the shade, fans blowing around him, bottles chilling in an ice bucket until he gets hungry, diapers stacked and ready for battle under the small changing table, while I sip a virgin piña colada and catch up on emails, checking in on my staff not just here in Miami, but also in New York and Atlanta, and I pretend everything’s normal while I let the sunshine reassure me.
West is inside unpacking, which means I haven’t been disinherited yet.
It also means I owe him favors basically for the rest of my life. I might be breathing easier at knowing that I can soak up all the baby knowledge I can get from him. But lucky for him, I have a very good idea of where to start with favors.
Alessandro got his hands on the background check and private investigator reports my grandmother had done before she brought Julienne’s will to light, and I have a lead on West’s maybe-girlfriend.
The thought both sours my stomach and gives me a huge sense of relief, because if he has a girlfriend, then he’s off-limits, and it doesn’t matter how ovary-popping it is to watch him holding Remy or how I’ve noticed that he smells like sawdust and has rough fingers that send shivers across my skin every time we accidentally touch. There aren’t many lines I won’t cross, but cheating is a definite no-no.
The report doesn’t definitively say she’s his girlfriend, but it definitely says there’s something there, and so I’m making it my mission to speed that process along.
I owe him, don’t I?
And what’s a better gift to give someone than love?
Just as I’m finishing up a text to Tiana with instructions on what I’d like to do, the door near my outdoor kitchen flings open, and three of my very favorite people in the entire universe tumble out onto the patio.
I leap up with a cheer, completely forgetting anything but the sight of these three women. “Yay! Friends!”
“Daisy! Oh, I’m so sorry.” Luna reaches me first, wrapping her long, deeply tanned, slender arms around me. She’s dressed in a bright sundress that reminds me of a party bar in Jamaica, and she smells like sunshine. “Why didn’t you tell us about Julienne’s funeral?”
“She and I weren’t all that close. Actually, turns out, she wasn’t really close to anyone. It’s okay. Mom was there. You didn’t need to witness all that awkwardness too.”
“It was still a funeral. Do you need some dog hugs? Dog hugs make everything better. I can bring Penelope over.”
“Oh my god, a baby,” Cam whispers as she hugs both of us tight. She’s taller than Luna, with gorgeous, natural red hair that makes my extensions look the adorable kind of trashy, and in a business suit that’s basically the opposite of my red bikini. And the huge opal surrounded by diamonds on her ring finger is also the opposite of everything I’ve ever thought I wanted in life. “You should’ve texted sooner! Do you know anything about raising babies? I don’t know anything about babies. But there’s so much stuff about raising babies on the internet. We’re going to be fine.”
“Have you talked to your lawyers yet? Wait. Of course you have. Does he have a trust fund? A college fund? An IRA?” Emily, the natural blonde of the group, and also closest to me in height, wraps her freakishly strong arms around all of us and squeezes us until we all squeak. She’s business-casual and so genuinely gorgeous that flowers bow to her. “Derek’s team’s going to get what they can out of Julienne’s house—the electronics, I mean—before anyone seals it up pending the auction, and they’ll see if they can find anything about when Julienne and Rafe made their will. He’s also working on a plan to make you look like an angel and the Rodericks look like unfit parents. I can’t believe they’re refuting the will. Did they honestly claim your grandmother forged it?”
“What else can we do? What do you need?” Cam asks.
I swallow hard as reality hits me in the face again. Playing babysitter for a couple days is one thing, but telling my three besties that I’m basically a mom now makes it more real. And being a mom to Remy makes Julienne being dead a little more real. No matter who you are, dying in your early thirties and leaving a baby behind is sad.
And not understanding why they thought I would make the best guardian to their child is even worse.
What if I screw it up?
And not for the sake of staying in my grandmother’s good graces, but for Remy’s sake?
“You guys are the best.” I try to wrap my arms around them too, but I’m basically being straightjacketed by them, which is super comfortable and perfect and soothing. If I have to have a meltdown, having one while the three women who are the closest things I’ve ever had to real sisters squeeze the air out of me is exactly the time to do it.
I never had sisters until I had these three women, and I’ll forever be grateful for the moment we met. And I’m so, so glad all three of them have found amazing men to share their lives with. I know they’ve all made good matches because I feel less like I’m losing each of them, and more like I’ve gained three brothers over the past six months.
“Remy’s basically broke,” I say, because answering questions is easy, whereas admitting I’m terrified parenting is the thing that’s finally going to expose me as a total fraud to these women who mean so much to me is hard, “but he’s got me, so no worries there. As for what I know about babies…I’m getting plenty of on-the-job training, and he’s really pretty awesome.”
“This baby is the luckiest baby in the world to have you,” Luna tells me.
“In so many ways,” Emily agrees.
“And us,” Cam pipes up. “We’re going to be the aunts he never knew he wanted. Dibs on the college fund!”
“I’m sure my grandma’s taking care of the college fund and trust fund and IRA,” I tell my friends. “Provided he doesn’t fuck it up when he turns twenty-one, but she’d be over a hundred by then, so he might be spared the family test. Except for the part where she’s part-vampire and basically immortal. So maybe I should do a college fund for him too.”
Emily snorts in amus
ement.
“Vampire would explain a lot,” Cam says, more to herself than to me. “I wonder if the mirror thing is true. That would be a simple way to conduct a test.”
“What did your mom say about the baby?” Luna asks. She peers hesitantly toward the cabana hut, her voice dropping like she’s afraid she’ll wake him.
“She doesn’t know yet. She’s out of reach on my yacht.”
That earns me a healthy side-eye from all three of them, but they don’t press it.
“Will she try to move in?” Emily asks. “We can amend the community rules to dictate that anyone over thirty can’t live with their parents. I don’t think it would impact any other families in the neighborhood. And I’m already getting requests for another community forum since your note went out about increased security for the baby. But it would mean another association meeting…”
“Oh, psh. I’ll hire stunt doubles for us,” I assure her.
“I’m not letting a stunt double stand-in for me during negotiations.”
We all crack up. Well, except Emily. Once a quarter, we have meetings with the Bluewater residents for them to air their complaints and make suggestions for improvements. As the community’s management team, final decisions are in our hands, and we always send Emily in to negotiate terms of improvements.
She has a well-earned reputation for being tough but fair, and I always bring the alcoholic beverages because it makes watching the proceedings that much more fun.
Luna strokes my hair. “Your house isn’t big enough to share with your mom? Your mom is awesome.”
“She is,” I agree. “But I still don’t want her talking to Cristoff.”
Emily’s eyes go wide. She gets him half the week, and I get him the other half. Our chef is the most temperamental culinary genius I’ve ever met. I pay him exceptionally well, because I love food, and I especially love Cristoff’s food, and I’m secretly entertained at how easy it is to make that vein in his forehead throb and then make it all better by tossing out a perfectly timed By the way, Cristoff, I’ve never had better cinnamon pineapple risotto. One day you’ll be immortalized with a statue in the Chef Hall of Fame. Magnifique!
I like to think of it as my way of bringing balance to his life, because he wouldn’t appreciate the compliment if he wasn’t steaming hotter than a fresh-boiled lobster first.
“What’s wrong with your mom talking to Cristoff?” Cam asks.
“The last time she talked to him, she made him so mad in four seconds flat that he only prepped me California rolls and avocado pasta for the next three weeks. Which was delicious, by the way, because it’s Cristoff, but the point is, they can’t exist in the same kitchen space if I want any variety in my menu.”
“Wait, wasn’t that the time he made me that amazing garlic-shallot-butternut squash ravioli with prawns in a cream sauce?” Emily asks.
“No, that was the time he gave you peanut butter sandwiches for a week. The ravioli was after one of my guests told him her chef did tuna steaks better, because her chef cooked them all the way through. So he was insulted, but mostly on behalf of the tuna instead of on his own behalf.”
“Oh. Okay, yes, your mom definitely can’t talk to Cristoff.”
“Oh, no!” Luna suddenly says. “What are you going to do with the baby when you have to travel? Does he have a nanny? Will you take him along? What about…”
She trails off, and all three of my friends look at me.
Because what do you do with a baby while you’re having a hot weekend fling with an Italian stallion is probably beyond what all three of them think is an appropriate thing to say out loud.
“What about what?” a now-familiar male voice asks behind them.
All three of my friends turn as one.
“Wow,” Cam whispers.
“Hello, arm porn,” Emily murmurs.
Luna pokes me. “Did you start dating American men again? Because that man right there would convince me to date American men again if I were you. Or at least to consider it.”
“Where’s the baby?” West asks.
“He’s rockin’ the pool life,” I reply with a smile and a gesture toward the baby cabana. “Water’s perfect. Dive on in.”
He’s in jeans, tan work boots that I’d bet are steel-toed, and a Marines T-shirt that perfectly matches the scowl on his square jaw. To say he hasn’t been in the best of moods since he agreed to move in would be an understatement. I’m telling myself that this isn’t a mistake, that he’ll cheer up soon, but I’m also getting nervous that I’m totally fucked.
Because he, too, could tell the courts I’m an unfit mother.
And then I’d lose everything.
“Did you put sunscreen on him?” he asks.
“Organic, baby-safe sunscreen, I hope,” Luna pipes up.
“Who are you?” Emily rarely minces words. Also, don’t get between her and the people she loves if you don’t want to lose an appendage.
“Who are you?” West counters.
Emily slides me a look, her blond hair shimmering in the sunlight and making her look like a runway model while her sharp blue-gray eyes silently ask permission to practice her ninja-jiujitsu skills on him.
“So, that’s the other part of my news,” I say casually to my friends. “Westley Jaeger, meet Emily Stanton, Luna da Rosa, and Cameron Whitbury. Em trained our alligator to play fetch with men’s balls, and Luna and Cam know how to dispose of a body, which is basically unnecessary when you consider the alligator.”
“Was that a threat?”
“No, standard warning everyone gets when they visit Bluewater the first time. I couldn’t possibly threaten you, given all that you’re doing for my family.” I smile easily at him to let him know I’m kidding, then turn to my friends. “Julienne and Rafe designated West here as Remy’s co-guardian. Best I can tell, it was because Julienne liked how his ass filled out his jeans while he was remodeling the baby’s nursery a few months ago.”
“What are your intentions with this baby?” Emily asks.
West lifts a brow. “Are you related to Imogen Carter too?”
All four of us gasp, because no one insults my besties by implying that they, too, share blood with The Dame.
“We are not going to be friends,” Luna murmurs.
“He’s cranky. Took the night shift,” I whisper, which is a better story than he doesn’t want to be here. But I like him not wanting to be here. It puts a layer of protection between me and that undeniable attraction I have to the man who played along like he was a stripper before my grandmother dropped a bombshell on both of us the other night.
“My three friends here helped design and build the Bluewater community,” I tell him as I sling my arms around Emily and Luna. “They all run billion-dollar corporations and are strong, powerful, sexy-ass motherfucking women who are basically going to rule the world one day. Also known as Remy’s de facto aunts, whom he’ll probably love more than he loves me, which is saying something, because I’m kinda fabulous, but I’m going to have to learn to be a disciplinarian once he starts crawling and talking.”
Bluewater was a dream come true for all of us. My friends wanted a warm, welcoming, private place to call home, and I wanted to be near the three women who understood completely how hard it is to navigate the world with the extra pressure of so many people wanting to see you fail, merely because you broke out of the mold they wanted to put you into.
Bonus that from the air, the enclave looks like a uterus, complete with fallopian tubes branching out to two ovaries. Emily, Luna, Cam, and I live on one. The marina’s on the other ovary, at the end of the private airfield on the other fallopian tube.
There’s a reason I call us Miami’s vagillionaires.
Our community isn’t just for us though. We wanted a safe haven for other people who need shelter from prying eyes and uplifting neighbors and who want to embrace the best part of life on the beach. We screen every applicant who wants to purchase property or a condo or open a
shop, and we have a lengthy privacy agreement, which means now we have a robust, vibrant, diverse neighborhood with the most amazing people ever who don’t just want to rub elbows with us, but who want to be a part of something bigger than themselves.
Remy’s so lucky he gets to grow up here.
I can’t wait to take him walking through the village to meet all the little shop owners and take him boating and out to feed Steve, the resident three-legged alligator, and oh my god, I’m basically a mom now.
West looks each of my friends up and down again, then his shoulders sag in defeat while he mutters something about sisters.
He has sisters. He told me so. Google confirmed it.
Google didn’t tell me that he’s an excellent oldest brother, but it didn’t have to. I can see it.
I wonder how my life would’ve been different if I’d had an older brother like West?
Not that he feels anything like brotherly to me. He’s entirely too potently sexy, even in his grumpy pants. Considering I’m the reason he’s grumpy, I feel like I need to help him become ungrumpy.
And lucky for him, I think I know exactly how to do that.
A noise from the baby cabana has all of us turning to look Remy’s way. It’s a yawn—I think—but it’s a noisy yawn that probably means I need to figure out if that bottle warmer works the way Lucinda told me it does before she took off for the rest of the weekend.
“Is that the baby?”
“Can we look?”
“Have you held him? Have you ever held a baby? I don’t think I’ve ever held a baby.”
“Is it like taking care of a dog? Let them run loose, poop in the yard, and then put out some food on the floor?”
That was Luna.
And I think the question was enough to make West nearly stroke out.
I step over to the cabana and pull back the gauzy curtains. Remy waves his fists at me, his face screwed up like he either wants to yell, eat, or poop.
“Oh, those eyes,” Emily, the skincare scientist, sighs.
“Look at his little gummy smile!” Cam, the aeronautical engineer genius, exclaims. “He doesn’t have teeth!”