by Imani King
Helena sighs and finally uncrosses her arms, and I move my hand away from her chin, almost awkwardly. I say “almost” since I don’t want to consider myself awkward around any woman, not even a formidable one like Helena Landon. But I am, just a little.
“Trixie’s pretty incredible,” Helena says. “And I think it would be okay if you met her. I don’t think we should tell her you’re her father just yet, but we’ll work up to that.”
Something in my heart sinks, and I feel my pulse quickening at the same time. Meeting my daughter for real—that’s something to be excited about. But not being able to say that I’m her father—well, that’s what I’ve been imagining since I first laid eyes on that photo of Helena and the kid.
I’ve been imagining other things, things that involve Helena and her mass of curly hair spread across my pillow while I do unspeakable things to that curvy body of hers. I bet I could play it like a piano, make her sing like an opera star on opening night.
But I keep that part to myself.
Slowly, Helena unglues herself from the spot she’s standing in, and she lets me take her arm as we walk down the street to the ice cream parlor, the one she likes. It carries pumpkin ice cream year-round, and there’s no arguing with that logic.
We walk along to the ice cream parlor, and I start developing the plan that will win Helena over for good.
I should put checks and balances in place to make sure she’s actually impressed.
And now I know she won’t be swayed by a giant teddy bear. So there’s that to take into consideration.
My plans will have to be better, not bigger. That’s not the way I usually think.
But even though I built my life around not doing too much, I never said I didn’t like a challenge.
Especially when that challenge looks as good as Helena Landon.
CHAPTER NINE
A week later when we show up in Los Angeles, I don’t quite know what I’m expecting. I half expect to show up and find a giant bouncy house or a limo to take us to a cleared out section of Disneyland.
Actually, that second one might be a pretty good idea. Can’t billionaires do that kind of thing? I bet a few of them have their own personal theme parks in their backyards. Especially if they have kids.
And this one has a kid—my kid.
Trixie breaks me out of my reverie. “Mom, tell me again where we’re going.” She kicks happily in the back seat. “And how long it takes to get there.”
“We’re going to visit... a friend of mine named Saint. He’s the one who brought you that giant teddy bear.”
She kicks a little faster, shaking her booster seat. “Horace?”
I turn into the parking garage under Saint Corbett’s building. Imagine me—associating with a man who owns an entire building. “Since when did you name him Horace?”
“Celia told me to pick a name that would make him sound distinguished. So I picked Horace.”
... The hell did she come up with that? Sometimes, this kid... I wonder where she came from.
And then I pull up to Saint’s building, and I remember exactly where she came from. From a perfectly handsome showman. I laugh.
I pull into the space right by the elevator, the one that Saint said was reserved for special guests. Even the parking garage looks clean and well built, with gleaming white walls and recessed lighting.
This is part of where Trixie comes from, I think. She’s part me... and part billionaire. Half of her genetics come from a smart-mouthed, fast-talking, too good-looking, utterly charming... panty-melting rich man. With messy blond hair and eyes that look like the Pacific on a calm day.
He’s not the family man that any of his brothers are. He’s maybe got some of that race car driver, Nicolas. But not a bit of any of the rest of them—all stable, all settled down.
He does share the look they all have—that tall, rugged, handsome thing with the chiseled jawline and the stubble that seems so carefully crafted for maximum sexiness—but with a mop of blond hair that makes him stand out in the few family pictures I’ve found online.
Yes, I have been spying on this man online. Just like I’m investigating a prom date. The quarterback who wants to take me to the big dance. There’s no denying it. I’ve got a big old crush on my girl’s baby daddy, and here we are, going deeper and deeper down the rabbit hole. And the way he looks at me... well, he thinks of me as a little more than a friend. At least, I think he does...
“Mama, we’re parked, and the car is still on.” Trixie pauses a second, and I look back at her in my rearview mirror. There’s a puzzled, slightly worried look on her face. It’s a look I’ve seen too many times in the past year. Sometimes, I think all the things I’ve been through have been too much for her. Maybe I should have waited for a man to come around and propose, get married, get pregnant on the honeymoon. But I could have easily risked the early menopause that runs rampant in my family. And then Trixie wouldn’t be Trixie—she wouldn’t be here at all. “Should we turn off the car and go inside? To see your friend?”
I unbuckle my seatbelt and turn the car off, and a smile creeps over my face. “Sure, baby. This is going to be a real fun day, I promise.”
By the time I get Trixie out of the car and take her up the floors to Saint’s penthouse suite, I’m regretting not taking him up on his offer of a car that would pick us up and deliver us to his door—because I’m so damn nervous, I’m not sure I’ll be able to drive home.
But there’s nothing troubling on the other side. Instead, Saint opens the door, his smile beaming. Not just at me, but also at Trixie. Deep inside, warmth spreads through my chest. It feels almost like something is unlocking, making a space that wasn’t there before.
I stand awkwardly in the door, wondering if I should have told Trixie who Saint really is.
Saint doesn’t let me stand there and worry anymore. Instead, he takes my arm like he did last week, and he puts his hand gently on Trixie’s shoulder, almost reverently. “Come on in, guys. I had a lot of thoughts about what we should do today. Bouncy house—”
I knew it. This show off—
“But I decided against that,” he continues. “And I think maybe we should go to Disneyland next time.”
“Disneyland!” Trixie chirps merrily. She skips into Saint’s penthouse, kicking off her shoes and twirling around. When she faces us again, she gives Saint a shy smile, looking to the place where he’s still touching my arm. “Next time, for sure.”
Saint nods. “But today, I thought we could just spend some time here. Together.”
Trixie looks up at him and puts down the pink princess backpack she has slung over one shoulder. “But this is just a big building. What could we possibly do here?” She puts her hands on her hips like she’s got him figured out.
Saint crouches down on his gleaming hardwood floor. The furniture is all white, and there are larger-than-life paintings hanging on every wall—each with that minimalist, block-of-color look to them. It all makes him seem grand and fine, like someone far above us. But when he gets down to Trixie’s level, he smiles at her like she’s the finest piece of art he’s ever seen. “That’s right. But we’ve got an ice cream parlor on the top floor. I had it built when I moved in. And on the roof, there’s a pool. We’ve got hamburgers and hot dogs and we can go swimming all day. What do you say to that?”
Trixie, of course, beams at him. And quite unexpectedly, she throws her arms around Saint’s neck. My pulse quickens. Beatrix hugs me and Celia, and that’s it. She’s sparing with any affection since Kellan left us. And here she is, hugging this man, her little arms around his neck.
Saint moves a hand to her back and places it there, gingerly, like Trixie is something that could possibly break—or evaporate into thin air.
“Thank you. It’s been so long since we went somewhere fun,” she says, pulling away from him and running over to his coffee table.
My heart sinks. Leave it to a kid to call you out on your biggest mistakes. Since we moved
to Santa Barbara, I tried so hard to develop her routines and make her life consistent that I forgot about doing all the fun things parents are supposed to do, too.
“Thank you,” I mumble, as Saint stands up again. I silently chastise myself for ever thinking this day would be a mess. He planned it to be perfect, not overdone or cheesy, or too over-stimulating for a little girl. “I guess she needed this.”
Trixie squeals and jumps up and down. On the coffee table, there are several brand new coloring books and one of those huge boxes of Crayola crayons. Besides that, there are five brand-new packs of markers, ten or fifteen chapter books, and a whole slew of paints and brushes and small canvasses.
“But maybe not fifty gifts,” I say, laughing.
Saint shrugs. “Those are good gifts—educational gifts. Trust me.” He gives me a look and then winks. “I’m not even guilty for doing it either. Stacy—my secretary and the woman who actually runs this company—has a six-year-old boy and an eight-year-old girl. She said to forgo the Barbie stuff, and the princess dresses, and whatever else I was thinking of. She said books and art supplies were brainy gifts, that you’d like them. I mean, that Trixie would like them.” His face colors a little when he says all of that, words rushing together, hands in his pockets.
He couldn’t be—flustered—could he?
It’s just my imagination.
“We don’t have any swimsuits,” I say, glancing between him and Trixie and trying to get the thought of him without a shirt on out of my head. Because if we do get up to that pool, I think that could happen. And the sight might eat my entire brain and cause me to have a huge lapse in judgment.
“Taken care of.” Trixie continues looking through the books and picking up markers, testing each out in a rainbow of color. Saint stands next to me and rocks back on his heels. He leans closer to me and whispers in my ear, breath hot against my skin. “Don’t worry. I got you something nice and demure. No skimpy bikinis to show off that body. That’s what I’d like... but maybe not for a family day.”
My throat tightens immediately, anxiety cresting through me in waves. I can feel the heat of his body, his closeness. And here I am in his home, standing next to him, unable to control the thoughts circling through my head--and the arousal coursing through my body, pooling between my legs. Instead of saying something smart and funny—or biting—I just stand there, totally dumb. When I turn to look at him, he winks at me and gives me a smile that’s far more than friendly.
He steps closer and touches me on the back of my arm. It’s not even a suggestive place to be touched, not even particularly sensitive. But his touch sends a fire through me, heat rushing through every pore, white hot energy all centering on the innocuous place he’s touching me.
What would those fingers feel like if they moved lower—to my breasts, the small of my back, the dark secret of my sex, opening me like a flower blooming in the spring sun?
“No response? That’s fine. I’ve been biding my time. And with every day that passes, I realize how right it is.” He moves his hand up my arm, fingers snaking just under the hem of my sleeve. I gasp. “That some things are very much worth waiting for.”
“I thought you didn’t wait for women,” I whisper, my cheeks growing hot. And other places on my body—even hotter.
“Shows how much you know.” While Trixie’s turned away, he leans in and kisses me on the cheek. “As long as it takes.”
That’s the last thing he says before he moves over to the coffee table to sit with Trixie. Soon we’re all there, working on a puzzle together while one of his chefs takes food up to the roof and some other random member of the staff who works here lays out a selection of swimwear for me and Trixie. Saint’s gaze follows my body as we finish the puzzle together, his hand brushing against mine and sending shivers through my body.
But that’s all he does. Instead of focusing on flirting with me, he asks Trixie about her friends at school and listens to her as she talks about her favorite books and her imaginary conversations with Horace. When he takes us back to our dressing rooms, Trixie holds his hand and skips along like she’s known Saint for years.
I put on my suit—a chocolate brown one piece, with a modest neckline and respectable leg openings that actually cover my hips. He wasn’t kidding. But when I look at myself in the thing, it feels like I’m actually sexy. Somehow, his assistant picked out a one-piece that somehow shows off my body while not making me feel like I’m showing off.
Of course.
When we walk up the stairs to the pool, Saint is already sitting outside, lounging on one of his reclining chairs in his bright blue board shorts—and nothing else.
His body is even better than I thought it would be—his muscles chiseled and compact and defined. Every bit of him is hard.
As Trixie runs off and jumps into the pool, swimming like the little dolphin she is, I can’t keep my eyes off of Saint. Pressure and heat build together in my body, and the fire that was there before builds up again.
Is this what it feels like to be a mom, looking at your child’s father? Thinking he’s sexy as hell, not just because he’s physically attractive, but because he wants you and loves your child and—all that kind of stuff?
It seems very, very inappropriate to have these kinds of thoughts while my child is swimming and splashing in the pool. I squirm uncomfortably, wondering if other parents in the world feel some type of way even after their kids are five.
Saint tips down his sunglasses at me and bites his lower lip, very gently.
“You look hot,” he whispers.
CHAPTER TEN
Helena Landon looks like a goddess in that deep brown swimsuit, and I have to applaud Stacy for her choice. I can’t keep my eyes off of her as she wades in the pool and plays with Trixie. It’s not just that she has a beautiful body—she’s got that too. But she holds herself with such confidence and moxie, even though there have been things in her life that have beaten her down, and brutally. It’s also her round face, sensual lips, eyes that radiate intelligence and humor.
It’s all of that.
My brothers have each told me they knew when it was right with their wives—and it was so early, so soon. With Helena, things have moved more slowly than ever for me over the past six weeks. With every other woman I’ve been with, she would have been gone and done with me after a week or two. And nothing would have been bad about that. Nothing at all.
But the thought of Helena being done with me—well, it sends a shiver down my spine, and not in a good way.
I push the thought away, and I swim in the pool I rarely ever use, even playing with the little girl—the one whose cheekbones look just like my mother’s, the one who laughs like my brother Christian did before his accident got him so down and so lonely. Trixie lets me carry her around the pool, and she even allows me to teach her to dive from the diving board. The way she looks between me and her mother, I know she can tell that there’s something going on. But she keeps to herself—quiet and reserved—while we eat hamburgers that afternoon, all of us wrapped in big, fluffy towels.
Helena runs her fingers through the girl’s wet curls. “What are you thinking about, Peanut?”
Trixie sits, kicking her legs and eating small bites of her hamburger.
The girl looks to me, uncertainty in her eyes. “I like Saint. Can we come back sometime?”
Helena’s eyes cut over to me, those gold starbursts unreadable. The slight breeze blows through her curls, and something in my chest tightens. Compared to the endless, repetitive nights at Hyde Lounge and the meetings that never seem to stop when you’re running a billion-dollar corporation, this is the best day I’ve had in years. Even when I think of the dulcet days of my youth, spent running around with my brothers, chasing them on the big wraparound porch, this day still shines above them all.
“If that’s okay with Saint, we might come back again. If he’d like that. I know he’s busy with all the things he has going on...” Her voice trails off, and she put
s her sunglasses on, kicking her legs up on another chair and pulling Trixie into her lap.
“That’s more than fine by me. I’d like to have both of you down here every weekend, if that’s something you guys would like.”
Helena pulls her sunglasses down and gives me a hesitant look. “I don’t think that would be—well, I think maybe once a month or...” She bites her lip. “Trixie is starting karate. And then she’s changing schools. We’ve got a lot going on. Los Angeles isn’t really our place.”
“But we have to go to Disneyland!” Trixie says, raising her little hand and twirling her mother’s curls in her fingers. “So maybe we can come up every weekend until Saint decides to take us all to Disneyland. We’ll do that if I’m good enough, right?”
Helena squeezes Trixie tight and purses her lips. “What do you mean, baby? You’re always such a good girl.” Her voice comes out hoarse this time. I feel like I’m looking in on something I shouldn’t be, and I think it has to do with the things they’ve been through together.
The little girl pauses and drops her hand back down, covering her mother’s hand with hers. “Kellan left because I wasn’t good enough. That’s what he told me. I’ll try to be just wonderful so we can keep coming and visiting your friend.” She says “wonderful” with a dramatic flair. It would be adorable if it weren’t so fucking heartbreaking.