by Evan Grace
“Hey darlin’, I got your message that you’re back in town. I’m sorry I can’t hook up.” There’s a pause. “Yeah, I’m seeing someone.” He chuckles, and it’s a rich sound. “Of course she’s gorgeous. She’s got a beautiful heart, and the most adorable son.”
His door is cracked open a little, but he can’t see me as I race by and head to my office so I can get to work.
When the day is over, I collect my stuff, put my coat on, and go searching for Erik. I see that he’s nowhere to be found. I stop at Jack’s open office door. “Hi, Jack. Have you seen Erik?”
The older man smiles up at me. “Hey, I was just getting ready to come find you. Erik is out working on something with Reece. I’m going to give you a ride to your babysitter’s place, and Erik will pick you up there.”
“Okay, thanks Jack.”
I wait out in the reception area for him to join me a few minutes later. We ride the elevators in silence, and that’s okay. This man, though he’s nice, intimidates the hell out of me. He leads me to a—surprise, surprise—black Escalade. What is it with men and their black SUVs?
As I buckle my belt, I don’t miss the base for a baby carrier strapped to the back seat. I smile because from what Delilah’s told me, he’s absolutely smitten with his granddaughter, and sometimes he’ll come take her just for a little bit so Delilah can nap.
When we stop at a traffic light, Jack fiddles with his phone and then holds it up. “Charlie smiled yesterday.” I take his phone and smile at the picture. Oh sure, it looks like she’s smiling, but at only a month old, it’s more than likely gas.
“She’s a doll. I’m glad Delilah seems to be doing better.” I hand him his phone back.
“You and me both. I’m just glad she has someone like Reece looking out for her. You’re a parent—you know what it’s like to do whatever’s necessary to look out for our kids.” His words make my stomach dip. Why? Because I took Ryan’s abuse for too long before I finally left.
That night comes back to me, and the horrified look on Grant’s face when he walked in and saw Ryan beating me. Tears slid down his face, but he made no noise while he stood there. The underlying guilt I always feel comes roaring back, strong as ever.
I thank Jack for the ride and hop out. On quick feet I make my way up to Luna and Rocco’s apartment. When Luna opens the door, she holds her finger to her lips and leads me into their kitchen. What I see makes my heart trip up in my chest. Erik is here already and at the table with Grant, who’s sitting right next to him on one side with Lennon on the other. Their heads are all bent and they’re coloring together.
He must feel my eyes on him because he looks up and gives me that smile that makes my belly dip. In all honesty he looks ridiculous, but only because he’s so large and the kids are so little. Erik leans toward Grant and whispers something. My boy looks up, and when he sees me he smiles. Of course as always the guilt curdles in my belly.
Grant climbs down from his chair and comes running toward me. “Hi, Mommy.”
“Hi, my baby boy. Did you have a good day?”
He wraps his arms around my thighs and then tips his head back to look up at me. “I did. Erik and me are coloring you a picture.”
“It’s Erik and I, baby.” He nods and then runs back over to the table.
Starr runs over to me, and I pick her up. “Hi, sweetheart.”
I greet Luna’s girls while Erik and Grant finish coloring. Once they’re done, they present both pictures to me. “I’ll look at these in the car.”
We take our leave, and on the way home I look at the pictures on my lap and smile. Erik’s picture is just a bunch of flowers. As he drives toward his place, he leans toward me. “Now you can say I’ve given you flowers.”
“Thank you for the flowers,” I tell him before pulling out Grant’s picture. Immediately my eyes burn. It’s a picture of a woman and little boy holding hands. Of course they’re stick figures and they’re holding hands. On the other side of the little boy is a cat. I turn to look at Grant. “Thanks for the picture, baby.”
Back at Erik’s, I get set up in the kitchen to make dinner. I take a moment while I’m alone to push those feelings of guilt away. They don’t help me—I can’t change the past as much as I might want to, and I just need to move forward. It’s so fucking hard, though.
I make my special baked chicken strips, sweet potato fries, and a huge salad for dinner. We sit around the kitchen table and I watch both my boy and Erik clean their plates and then some. My ex was a big man, though not as big as Erik, and the men are big in my family too, so Grant has no choice but to be huge.
“Grant, I was talking to Gretchen earlier, and she wants to see you so she’s coming to spend the night with us this coming weekend. If I set up an air mattress in your bedroom, do you think she could sleep in there with you?”
I watch my son look at Erik with no expression and my stomach starts to knot, but then it’s like a miracle happens. Grant’s lips tip up into a smile, albeit a small one, and he nods his head. “Yep.” That’s all he says to him, but I’ll take it because it means he’s warming up to him.
“Good. She’ll be happy to hear that.” My little Grunt goes back to eating and only shrugging when Erik talks to him.
When I look at Erik, he gives me a wink. I lick my lips nervously. My heart pounds in my chest and I feel a flush creeping up my cheeks. I know I’m in big trouble because I want to crawl on his lap and kiss the shit out of him. Instead of that, I look down at my plate until I have myself back under control.
“Egan got the cameras installed, but we want to watch things for at least another week before you guys are good to stay there again.” That makes my stomach clench, but I push it back while swallowing the knot in my throat.
I look up at him and nod. “We can go stay at a hotel if it’s easier on you. I know we’re cramping your style.”
“You’re not cramping my style. You’ll stay with me until it’s fine for you to go back.” I can hear the conviction in his voice. Plus he’s never been anything other than honest with me.
“Thank you, Erik.”
***
Erik bites my neck, and I moan.
It wasn’t long after Grant went to bed that we began making out in the kitchen. I couldn’t help myself—he’d gone to the gym earlier, and when he’d come home he’d gone to shower. I’d decided to make him a protein shake, and when he’d come out to get it, he’d only been wearing a towel. The man is gorgeous fully clothed, but in just a towel around his hips…no words could describe it.
His muscles were bulging, and behind the towel I could see the big bulge of his dick. Next thing I knew I was in his arms with my legs wrapped around his waist.
Now my back is against the headboard and my legs are again wrapped around him as he pounds into me. I feel those familiar tingles begin as my orgasm comes racing toward the surface.
“Fuuuucck…you’re squeezing me so fucking tight,” he whispers against my ear.
I whimper as he nips my earlobe. He braces one hand on the wall and reaches between us with the other, strumming my clit until I have to bite my lip to stop from crying out as I come, and hard. While I continue to come Erik flips us, pushes my legs back and pounds into me until he buries himself to the hilt.
He pulls his softening cock from me and kisses my lips softly. “I’ll be right back.” He disappears into his bathroom while I slip my panties and nightgown on. A minute later, the toilet flushes and the sink turns on and off. Erik climbs back into bed with pajama pants on and pulls me to him. “It keeps getting better and better with you,” he whispers softly against my forehead.
I burrow under his chin. “There are things about me that I haven’t told you yet, but…I’m not ready.”
“I know baby, and I know you’ll tell me when you’re ready.” We lie chest to chest, and he strokes my cheek as his bedroom is bathed in moonlight. “This weekend I thought we could go get a Christmas tree. The kids can decorate it.” My heart sque
ezes. I like the sound of that—“the kids”—so much. Maybe too much.
“That sounds like a lot of fun. We could grab the lights and decorations I have at my place. It’s not a lot, but it’s a good start.”
We lie there for a long time, kissing, talking, or just cuddling. “What’s one of your fondest memories of your dad?” I ask him.
For a second I think I may have said the wrong thing because his body stiffens, but then he relaxes. “I was eight, and it was about a year before he died. He and my Uncle Chet had taken me and my cousins to our first Cubs game. I remember we sat in the bleachers, and we gorged ourselves on hot dogs, popcorn, and cotton candy. We were having the best time, and the ultimate happened.” He laughs softly.
“Mark Grace hit a homer, and we could see it coming right toward us. I held up my glove, and he lifted me in the air. The ball hit my hand so hard, but when my dad lowered me to the ground and I turned my hand over and saw that baseball in my glove, we jumped up and down. We were so excited, my dad took me down and after the game Mark signed my ball.” Erik gets quiet for a minute. “At his funeral I stuck the ball in his casket, and he was buried with it.”
I say nothing but wrap my arms around him, hugging him close. “Thank you for sharing that with me.”
He hugs me back. “I miss him so fucking much. I’ve forgotten so much about him.” Erik clutches me to him in a firm grip.
To see this big man vulnerable is bringing me to my knees. I’m not sure how long we lie here before Erik’s breathing evens out, and I know he’s asleep. I listen to his deep breathing, and it doesn’t take long before it lulls me to sleep.
Opening my eyes, I realize I’m in Erik’s bed, facing the wrong direction, and I’m alone. I head into his bathroom, and once I’m finished I head out into the living room, but it’s empty.
“Can I stir it?” I hear Grant’s voice.
“Yeah bud, nice and slow, okay?”
I peer around the corner; Erik is in front of the stove flipping a pancake while Grant stirs something in a big red bowl. “I’m doing it.” My son smiles at Erik, and when he sees me he flings his arms up, getting batter everywhere. “Look Mommy, I’m making bweakfast.”
I come up behind my boy, wrapping my arms around him. “I see that. You’re doing a great job.” I kiss the top of his head and then wrap my arms around Erik. “Good morning.”
Erik leans down, kissing my lips gently before standing back up. “Morning.” He’s quiet, not his usual flirtatious self. I never should’ve mentioned his dad. Maybe he’s upset with me for bringing it up.
My heart starts to race, and an unwelcome feeling slithers down my spine. When Ryan used to get mad, and before he started using his fists, he would play the mental game with me—ignoring me or berating me.
I take a deep breath and push those feelings aside. Erik is not Ryan, and he’s treated me with nothing but kindness…and shameless flirting
After he finishes making the pancakes, we all sit together and begin to eat. Grant’s quiet, but that’s only because he’s shoveling food into his mouth. Erik finishes up first, and after he puts his plate in the sink, he disappears down the hall.
“Baby, I’ll be right back. I’m going to talk to Erik.” He nods and goes back to shoveling his food in.
Lucifer watches me from the couch as I follow after Erik. His door is open and I hear a noise coming from his closet. A moment later, he comes out with a binder in his hands. “Come here, baby.” Erik sits on the end of the bed and pats the spot next to him.
“I’m sorry I brought up your dad. I didn’t mean—”
He holds up his hand. “No, I’m glad you did. I forgot that my mom made this for me and sent it the first time I was deployed.” Erik flips it open—it’s a scrapbook of him and his mom and Dad.
Grant joins us a minute later with a sticky mouth and sits on my lap while Erik shows us the pictures and tells us the story behind them. He remembers so much about his dad, more than he realized. By the time he’s done, my head is resting on his shoulder. “You should keep it on your bookcase.”
He seems to perk up a little after the trip down memory lane, and after his shower. While he gets dressed, I shower in the other room. It’s not a hair-washing day, so I’m ready in twenty minutes. The temperature is even more frigid today. Erik and Grant wear matching beanies on their heads, but it was the only way I could get Grant to wear a hat.
In such a short time my son is really warming up to Erik, which is great, because every day I’m falling harder and harder for this man.
After we drop Grant off we stop in my apartment, and he shows me where all the cameras are; I’m glad no one will see me in my room. He explains that after Grant and I go to sleep, the cameras will go into sleep mode, only turning back on if they sense movement. Erik also tells me that the cameras are high enough that the cat won’t trigger them.
While we’re here, I grab some more clothes and the Christmas decorations.
Once we get to the office, he kisses me before he disappears toward the conference room. When I get into my office, I get to work.
Chapter Thirteen
Erik
I grab Shayla’s hand and pull her in between two Douglas fir trees, kissing the shit out of her. The rest of this past week I hardly got to see her due to a case that I was working on. Luckily between Reece, Jack, and Egan, they’ve helped me get my girl and her boy home to my place. She was usually asleep by the time I got home, but she usually left me a note and instructions for how to warm up my plate of food she had waiting for me.
She also had started sleeping in my bed, even without me. All I would have to do is strip off my clothes and then crawl into bed, pulling her into my arms. This girl has me wanting things I’ve always figured I’d never have, because what if something happened to me and I left my wife to raise our children alone? I just couldn’t do that to someone I loved.
I pull back and smile down at her. “I really needed that.”
“Me too,” she says with a sigh.
I grab her hand and pull her out from between the trees. We spot the kids up ahead, grab them, and head over to the concession stand for hot chocolates for the kids and Shayla. I get myself a hot cider.
It’s been the perfect fucking day. Tad and my mom dropped Gretchen off at eight this morning. Grant had been up since six, anxiously waiting for her arrival. When she arrived, Grant went downstairs with me to get her. It’s amazing the bond they share already.
We took the kids out for breakfast before we came to the tree farm, which brings us to now. There’s a Santa here, and somehow my sister convinces me that we need to get our picture taken with him. After we drink our beverages, we head over to the jolly man in the red suit. Gretchen takes Grant up to sit on Santa’s lap so he can tell him what he wants for Christmas.
When he’s finished, I drag Shayla with me and sit next to Santa on the red bench. I pull her to sit on my lap, and we all smile at the camera. While the girls and Grant wait for the picture to print out, I go pay for the tree and they put it through the little machine that ties it up.
They meet me at the Explorer, and Shayla holds the photo out to me. I take it from her and turn it over for a look. “Wow” is all I can say. We look perfect, and it makes me fall that much harder for her, and that much more for that little boy. I look up at her and smile. “We need to frame this.”
She nods. “That’s why I got this.” Shayla holds up a picture frame that’s red and covered in hand-painted snowflakes.
Her lips tip up at the corners, and I bend down to kiss those lips.
When we get back to the apartment we get the tree set up and I wrap it in the lights before Shayla and the kids do the decorating. Once the girls are finished, we decide to walk down the street to a little pizzeria.
When we sit down, they come out to take our drink orders and then our order for food. I glance out the window and spot a man standing across the street just staring at us. His face isn’t recognizable to me, but
that doesn’t mean anything. I move to stand up and go outside, but when I turn back, he’s gone. “I’ll be right back,” I tell Shayla as I slip my coat on.
“Is everything okay?” she asks.
“Yeah babe, I just need to check something real quick.” I step outside and look up and down the street but don’t see him.
It was probably some jackass checking my woman out. I head inside and am just slipping my coat off when they deliver some fresh, hot garlic bread for us. When our pie comes, my mouth immediately waters.
We were definitely all hungry because we’re quiet while we eat. When we finally finish, they box up our leftovers and we head back to my apartment.
***
Shayla and Grant stayed back at my place while I took Gretchen home. Shayla wanted my sister and I to have some quality time together. “If you don’t marry Shayla, I’m gonna kick your butt.”
I turn my head to look at my sister and can’t help but laugh. She looks serious as hell right now. “It’s a little too soon to think about marriage, but I’m falling in love with her.” Gretchen squeals and does that girly clap while hopping up and down in her seat.
We pull into the driveway of my parents’ home, and Gretchen opens the door. I follow her inside. “Mom! Tad! We’re here.” I holler, and hear my mom yell they’re in the kitchen. They’re sitting at the breakfast bar eating lunch. I hug my mom and slap Tad on the shoulder. “How was your sermon today?” Tad’s always respected the fact that I’m not the church-going type.
“It was good. The congregation is definitely getting in the Christmas spirit. If they’re free, are you bringing Shayla and Grant for Christmas?”
“I haven’t asked her, but I was planning on it.” Tad always does the sermon on Christmas Eve, and the kids sing for the congregation. It’s one of the few times Tad gets me in there. They know I sometimes have a hard time seeing Cesar, but I do it because it’s important to my mom.