“Everything go okay?” he asked.
“What could go wrong?” Emily answered. “We were just discussing the implant. And I was telling Nyxie, if I took it out, I’d worry that they didn’t make condoms small enough for you.” With a sassy smile, she held out her little finger and wiggled it at him.
“Last time you felt the need to discuss my penis, you said I had a cannon and two bowling balls between my legs.”
“I said you walk around like a man with a cannon and two bowling balls between your legs—not that you had them. I’m sure your little micro penis swelled with pride over that assessment. I was trying to boost your ego.”
Declan rolled his eyes at her but before he could say anything, Nyxie spoke up. “I think I may need a new doctor if Dr. Saunders thinks a condom goes on a man’s pinkie,” she said, making him laugh. Nyxie turned towards Emily, leaned in, and whispered. “I don’t know about the bowling ball part, but I think a cannon is a fair description.”
A look of irritation crossed Emily’s face. “I know when I’m outnumbered,” she said, holding her hands up and retreating one step.
Declan moved closer to Nyxie and gave her a quick peck. “You were talking about the implant? Have you decided to have it removed, yet?”
“Yet? Is it a foregone conclusion that I will at some point? I haven’t even made the other decision yet. And it is much less permanent.”
“Would you give us a few minutes alone?” he said, turning to Emily, his voice sounding ill-tempered.
Emily looked back-and-forth between the pair before nodding and leaving the room.
“What the hell does that mean? Marriage isn’t a permanent decision?”
“I don’t like to be yelled at,” she said, clutching the sheet and trying to tuck one end into the other so she it would stay up on its own. “When you act like this, I don’t want to be married to you at all.” She slid off the exam table and the sheet came loose. She decided it wasn’t worth the effort, so threw it back on the table and began getting dressed. “You know what I mean. If the marriage doesn’t work out, there’s always the possibility of a divorce. Having a baby together is permanent. Our lives will always be linked. And what happens if we have a baby and then we divorce?
“I’m no match for your lawyer and your millions,” she continued. “You know how much I love Cody and the girls. How much worse would it tear me apart if you took my own child from me?”
“Why do you have to assume we're going to end up divorced? You tell me you love me, and I don’t know any way to make it clearer how I feel. I know I’m not perfect, but nobody is. And guess what, you’re not perfect either. Never in my wildest imagination did I picture myself with a high school dropout with three kids. We can fix your lack of education, but how do you think it makes me feel to know I am number four in the pecking order for your love?”
“You’re not number four,” she said quietly. “I love you, and I want you so much, I’m afraid I’ll make decisions concerning you that aren’t in the best interest of my kids.”
Declan stepped closer and cupped her face. “Have I ever asked you to choose between us? I’m not going to let you do that.”
She nestled against his hand. How could a mere touch to her face illicit such love for him? “I’m sorry it’s taking me so long to decide. I’m not like you. Hell, it took me ten minutes of debate to buy Cody balloons, and then I had to bargain with myself.”
When he saw her looking up at him with big brown eyes that showed her uncertainty, his shoulders dropped and he sighed. Pressuring her was not going to help. He had enough difficultly restraining his natural impatient urges.
“How can I help you make up your mind?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. Tell me the right answer.”
“You already know what I think the right answer is.” He wrapped his arms around her, her bra and panties the only thing separating them. “Go home. Write down every objection you can think of, and we will go over them. I will do everything I can to resolve as many of your concerns as possible to make your decision easier.”
“When are you coming over?”
He looked at her searchingly. “The fundraiser is Friday. I would like to have it resolved before then. I’ll postpone our meeting with Junior until Wednesday morning. You arrange for the nanny to keep them Thursday evening and we’ll go out to dinner and discuss it. Bring the list.”
~*~
Nyxie sighed with relief as she turned off the ignition. Driving to her doctor’s appointment was the first time she had driven herself anywhere after getting her license with the help of Joanie, the second limo driver who had taken Joseph, Treshaun and her shopping. She had not made any bad decisions, had no close calls, managed to get into the parking place relatively straight, and had parked in the garage without clipping the mirror, running into the wall, or having the garage door hit the Lexus when it closed.
The grin on her face faded away when she walked into the kitchen to find Lotus and Reina sitting at the breakfast bar, eating lunch and looking miserable. Each girl had a glass of milk and plate of lettuce with tomatoes, celery and carrots on it. Nyxie knew they’d eat salad if it had Ranch dressing on it, but Ms. Kiki, as the nanny wanted them to address her, had dressed the salad with what smelled like red wine vinegar and olive oil.
“I’m sorry I’m late,” Nyxie said. “There was an issue with my appointment and it took longer than I thought it would.”
“I am not the cook, I am not the maid, and I am not the chauffeur,” Ms. Kiki said. “You should have called to let me know you would not be on time to fix lunch.”
“I’m sorry. I just assumed you would wait until I got home.”
“How many times and ways do I need to tell you, children need structure. That’s the reason I posted the schedule on the refrigerator.”
Nyxie pursed her lips and said nothing as she looked around to see if there was any salad left for her.
“We had a visitor while you were gone,” Ms. Kiki said, standing in the kitchen holding her plate and stabbing at the lettuce with her fork.
“You did?”
“You did. Her card is on the counter.”
Nyxie picked up the card and saw the state seal before she read Rosita Gomez’s name. “Oh shit,” she said. “What did she say? Do I need to call her?”
“Apparently, it’s routine to make surprise follow-up visits after CPS returns custody of abused and neglected children. She doesn’t need you to call. She could see a professional had matters well under control.”
Nyxie stared at the woman, unable to find any words to defend herself, or to put the nanny in her place. She felt like a doormat because of her inability to stand up to the woman. Her stomach roiled and she wanted to skip lunch entirely. However, she knew Declan would be angry if she did. She went into the huge walk-in pantry, and for the millionth time, felt amazed that so much food belonged to her. Her eyes were drawn to the big jars of peanut butter that Declan had specifically asked Sonia to buy when she purchased groceries. Ever since she discovered a jar of Jif in her locker her freshman year, she had an affinity for it. It was only recently that she found out, Declan had placed it there. She and Cody had rationed it out two spoonfuls each night while it lasted.
She grabbed a jar and a loaf of bread, hoping it would make her feel as if Declan was with her and would give her strength as she dealt with Ms. Kiki and her irritation.
She pulled a clean plate and knife out of the dishwasher and began making a sandwich.
“Can I have one too?” Reina asked.
“May,” Kiki corrected. “And you most certainly may not. You have a healthy lunch in front of you. No one needs that garbage.”
“Do you want strawberry or grape jelly?” Nyxie asked, leaning toward Reina with a big smile.
“Their diet is half the problem. They need nutritious food.”
Nyxie pointedly ignored Ms. Kiki as she waited for Reina to make up her mind.
“Grape,” Rein
a said.
“I want one too. But I want strawberry,” Lotus said.
“Good choices,” Nyxie said as she walked around Kiki to retrieve the jelly from the refrigerator. “Did you take your vitamins this morning?”
“They wouldn’t need vitamins if they were eating properly.”
“Doctor’s orders,” Nyxie said.
“She wanted to point out that the salad couldn’t have contained more than a couple hundred calories—not enough for two growing girls to thrive on. Both girls were in the lower weight ranges for their heights and didn’t need their calories restricted. But perhaps the plan was to make the girls so weak with hunger that they wouldn’t be any trouble for her.
That was what she wanted to say.
Normally, Nyxie would have cut the sandwich in two to make them a little easier to handle. The idea of the girls getting a bit of the thickly slathered jelly on their cheeks amused Nyxie as a little fuck you to Ms. Kiki.
“Did you want me to make you one?” she asked the nanny. “I think PB&J on squishy white bread is my favorite sandwich.”
The woman glared at her as Nyxie pulled a fork out of the drawer and went to sit next to Lotus and Reina. “Can I have some of your salad?” she asked each girl individually, knowing it would get on Ms. Kiki’s nerves.
“You can have all of mine,” Reina said. “It tastes like vinegar.”
“So do pickles, but I know you love pickles. Go ahead and eat it. It’s good for you.” Nyxie wore a slight smirk as she met the woman’s eyes. “They like Ranch on their salads.”
“I am not a short order cook. You’re lucky I fed them at all.”
“Yes, it’s so difficult to put the bottle on the counter. If it’s too much trouble, tell the girls to fend for themselves. They know how to feed themselves. I’ll make sure the pantry and fridge are filled with all the things they know how to cook.”
“Yes, I suppose most neglected children have to learn to fend for themselves.”
Biting the inside of her lip, Nyxie did her best to ignore her. She knew Rosita Gomez must have relished telling Kiki why CPS took the children from her.
“Guess who I saw today,” she said to Lotus and Reina.
“Papa!” they said in unison.
She nodded as she swallowed a bite of food. “He came in after my exam.” She took a bite of her sandwich and intentionally spoke with her mouth full. “Ms. Kiki, I have dates this Thursday and Friday nights. I need you to watch the girls—maybe overnight.”
Kiki made a sound of disgust. “Am I going to be compensated for the extra time?”
“Why don’t you take Wednesday off? I’ll take the girls with me to see Cody. They haven’t seen him in a while and I know he misses them.”
“Can we go with you and Papa?” Lotus asked, her mouth full of food.
“Thursday, Papa and I need to have a grown-up discussion and Friday we're going to a big hospital party. I’m afraid it’s adults only. You’d be bored silly.”
“We haven’t seen Papa in ages,” Reina pouted.
“You know he works long hours. But he told me he misses you both,” she lied in hopes of keeping their feelings from being hurt.
Lotus gave her a look that conveyed her doubt and Nyxie looked away quickly.
“Hopefully, we’ll finish early and we’ll get back before bedtime.”
Kiki finished her salad, set her plate in the sink and left it there. Even when the dishwasher was empty, the woman never put her dishes in or even rinsed them.
“When are you going to have the deadbolt installed on my room?”
“I haven’t gotten a chance to talk to Declan about it. It’s his house. I don’t know if he’ll mind.”
“The lock on the door knob is not enough, especially when I hear strange men roaming around at night.”
Nyxie didn’t understand the woman’s need for more than the lock that was already there. Did she think someone was planning to come in while she was sleeping or go through her belongings when she was out of the room? But Nyxie justified it by assuming the woman might have had bad experiences in a former placement.
“Papa came by?” Lotus asked.
“He needed to give me something.”
“He didn’t say hello to us.”
“It was late. You were already asleep.”
“He checked on you,” Kiki said. “I heard him look in your room. That’s what woke me up. I’m a light sleeper when I don’t feel safe. I hear every little noise.” She fixed her eyes on Nyxie. “And they say puppy love never lasts.”
Onyx blushed to her roots, realizing the nanny had heard Declan howling and barking when they had had sex.
“He was just playing around.”
“I’m sure,” Kiki said, rolling her eyes.
“I guess neither of us realized the walls and floors were so thin. I imagine we’ll normally go next door.” Why was she justifying anything to the nanny? It was none of her business. It was their house and if they wanted to raise the rafters, what business was it of hers? Although she hoped Declan and she would get their relationship squared away, it was too soon to say if anyone would be giving up their bedroom anytime soon.
“I see. You plan to live next door with your friend, while I live over here with your kids. Why didn’t you just let CPS keep them?”
Nyxie gasped. She couldn’t believe she had said that in front of the girls. “I would never do that to you,” she said to Lotus and Reina. “Declan told me he wants to put doors in downstairs to make this one big house instead of two town houses. But CPS said we had to wait to do it until we could leave the house while the work is done.”
Chapter 19
Nyxie picked up the big pack of fajitas on her way home from the hospital Thursday night. She was tired of Ms. Kiki constantly nitpicking about their diet and hoped since they were good enough for Declan, they would be good enough for her. She resisted the urge to buy the girls cake. It was just the kind of passive aggressive revenge Nyxie indulged in when she disliked someone. She opted not to buy the cake because she didn’t want to spoil the girls.
She also hoped when Declan smelled the mesquite smoked meal, he might want to eat with the girls instead of taking her out to a restaurant. They didn’t need a fancy atmosphere to discuss the future of their marriage. They just needed a bit of privacy after the meal.
~*~
Declan used the keypad to enter through the garage and was surprised to see the nanny’s car parked inside next to the Lexus.
Nyxie craned her head around the corner towards him as she descended the stairs. “I heard the garage door open,” she said, a wide smile upon her face.
She stepped into his arms and kissed him passionately. His hands slid down her small ass, cupping it through the short skirt he had asked her to wear. Declan broke off the kiss and glanced up the stairs. His hands were suddenly under her skirt dragging her panties down her legs.
“W-what are you doing?”
“Taking off your underwear,” he said, smiling up at her. “Hurry and lift your feet before we get caught. Girls!” he yelled up the stairs. “Come say goodbye to us before we go.”
The squeals came first, then the unmistakable pounding footsteps of children running through the house.
“Walk,” the nanny shouted about the time the girls got to the stairs. “Walk. You sound like a herd of stampeding longhorns.”
If they slowed their pace one iota, it was because the stairs forced the slower pace.
Declan laughed. “My house is never going to be the same.”
Lotus beat Reina down the steps and had her arms around Nyxie when Reina jumped at Declan from the fourth step from the bottom. By some miracle, he caught her. He hiked her up and she latched onto his neck.
“I missed you too, squirt.”
“Princess Reina,” she corrected.
“Princess Squirt,” he countered.
“Reina, you’re too big to be held like a three-year-old,” Nyxie said and frowned when she
thought she sounded like the nanny.
Declan lowered her until her feet touched the ground, but when she did not let go of his neck, he had to pull her arms away.
The woman followed the girls down at a sedate pace. She wore jeans and a crisp white men’s dress shirt with the sleeves scrunched up to her elbows and one more button at the collar unbuttoned than she really should have. Nothing showed exactly, but it hung open within an inch of her bra showing. She was easily forty but dressed like a college student after a sleepover with her boyfriend.
“Declan Stryker,” he introducing himself, holding out his hand to shake hers.
“Kiki Hallett. And you are?” the nanny asked, eyeing Declan with an appreciative rake of her eyes.
“He’s the master of the house,” Nyxie said with a grin at him. With her eyes on Declan, she missed the older woman’s bold assessment of her husband.
He could sense Kiki’s attraction to him. Nothing new there. Since his teens, he’d been having women of all ages eyeballing him as if they wanted to devour him. It pissed him off that she would mentally undress him in front of Nyxie and the girls. She had a nice body, and she knew it. Nevertheless, he felt repulsed by the aggression in her expression. Nothing could have turned him off more. Declan’s eyes met Nyxie’s momentarily and he suspected Nyxie regretted hiring her.
“So, this is the big dog, is it? It’s nice to put a face to the bark.”
“What can I say?” Declan said without missing a beat. “Nyxie brings out the animal in me.”
Nyxie leaned down and whispered something to the girls, and they shot past Ms. Kiki and ran up the stairs.
“Walk,” the woman yelled after them.
Declan had a strong desire to put the woman in her place. He wanted to verbally compare her to his mother in age and attitude, but kept it to himself because he didn’t want her taking it out on the girls if he made her angry.
Instead, he put his arms around Nyxie, both hands on her ass. “That’s so hot that the nanny heard us having hot sex last time. Now, every time I’m inside you, I’m going to picture the nanny standing outside our room with her ear pressed to the door and her hand between her legs.”
The Love He Craves (The Love She Craves: Selling Her Soul to Declan Book 2) Page 17