Yes Daddy (Daddy Knows Best Book 2)

by Kelly Myers

  Yes Daddy

  Kelly Myers

  Copyright © 2020 by Kelly Myers

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  Blurb

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Epilogue

  Excerpt: My Secret Daddy

  Invitation to join Kelly’s Newsletter

  Blurb

  I’m so tempted to claim Eden.

  So tempted to ravish her.

  But she’s the woman who is completely off limits.

  Eden works at my beach house as a maid.

  She’s over a decade younger than me.

  Gorgeous. Submissive. Innocent.

  I’m insanely protective of her.

  And I care about what she thinks of me.

  I’ve got a past.

  Things that won’t sit well with her.

  Drama that might tear us apart.

  But her safety and happiness come first.

  And I need her troublesome stepfather to back off.

  Eden is my responsibility.

  She has my heart.

  Will she want to keep it once she finds out what I’m hiding?

  Chapter One

  Eden

  As soon as I opened the door after work, I heard one of my younger sisters scream at the top of her lungs. “Ow! Stop! You’re hurting me.”

  My heart leapt into my throat as my sister’s voice rang out. I dropped my purse and ran.

  I raced into the kitchen to find my sister, Piper holding a wooden spoon in her hand. Her wrist had a bright red mark on it.

  My stepfather loomed over her. His pasty white face was red as he panted and snarled. He grabbed for her arm again, but she jumped back, weidling the spoon. “Get away from me!” she yelled.

  “I’ll beat your ass, you ungrateful little shit,” he bellowed, getting right in her face.

  Him berating her was a common sight. Him threatening to hit her was not. And, if that red mark on her arm was from him, there would be Hell to pay. He was not going to put his disgusting hands on either of my sisters.

  I looked around for any weapon that might come in handy. I’d never hurt anyone in my life, but I was not going to let this monster touch my sister. “Mike. Get away from her.”

  His head swiveled in my direction. “You’re not in charge here, no matter how much you’d like to think so,” he said, but he took a step back. He hated me, and the feeling was mutual, but he liked the full-time paycheck I brought in that paid the rent.

  “What’s going on?” I asked, hoping I could distract him.

  My other sister Penny appeared from behind the table. They were identical twins, and they’d just turned sixteen years old. “He called us worthless,” Penny said.

  “Yeah,” Piper chimed in. “And, he said he was going to make us work full time this fall once you went to college. I told him that was bullshit.”

  I needed to defuse this powderkeg. There was no way Mike was going to make them quit school, because they weren’t going to be here in Georgia. They were coming to Florida with me, where I was finally going to start college. I might be twenty-two, but I’d worked my ass off to apply for scholarships and grants, and I’d finally gotten enough funding to leave. Mike wasn’t aware of that fact, because it wasn’t his business.

  I looked at both of my sisters. “Go to your room.” They knew what that meant. They were supposed to go to their rooms, grab the bags they had packed and any money they’d stashed away, and then wait for me. I thought they’d protest at first, but thank God they listened.

  He pointed his finger at me. “You’re a good-for-nothing whore, just like your mother.”

  Before I could think of a comeback, he turned and left. He slammed the door behind him, and then I heard the engine of the car roar to life. I peeked out the window. Good. He was leaving.

  I sank into a chair. I just needed a second to catch my breath. I still had on the apron I wore at the local grocery store, where I was the shift manager.

  I had to get my sisters the hell out of here. We’d been living on borrowed time with Mike, and we all knew it. Our mother had left all of us over a year ago, and he’d gotten increasingly hostile. It was only a matter of time before we had to go.

  We had a car, but Mike’s name was on the lease, so I couldn’t take it, not unless I wanted him reporting me for car theft. Besides, he’d just driven off in it, and I wanted to get my sisters out now.

  After I sat for a few minutes, I pulled a Coke out of the fridge. Mike kept them for himself, for when he drank Jack Daniels whisky and Coke. We weren’t allowed to drink them, even though my paycheck probably paid for them.

  Fuck him. I was drinking this Coke, and then my sisters and I were getting on a bus and getting out of this town.

  We had a cousin in Santa Rosa, Florida, and her house was very close to the beach. She’d told us all about it last Christmas when she’d come home to visit our grandmother. She was the closest person to us that I could ask for a favor, and she was our only family member who held down a steady job. Maybe she’d take us in, and I could pay her some rent. As soon as we got onto a bus and headed south, I’d call her and see if she’d take us in until I could find a job.

  We’d never been to the beach before. It would be an adventure for me and the twins. I had to cling to the hope that things would look up if we ran away to Seagrove, because they were pretty freaking shitty here with Mike.

  Chapter Two

  Luke

  I stood on the porch of my newly-acquired property, and wondered --.what the hell did I want with a tiny resort house in the middle-of-nowhere Florida? It even had a name -- Apricot Sunset. It wasn’t the kind of name I’d have chosen, but that’s how the tourists knew it, so the name stayed.

  It wasn’t in Miami, or even Orlando. It was in a little place called Seagrove. Quaint, was what the executor of the will had called it. My aunt had passed away, and she’d left me the three-story home that functioned as a bed and breakfast.

  If my aunt hadn’t loved it so much, I probably would have donated it or sold it on day one. Instead, I had moved in.

  I was no stranger to hard work, or to running a business. But, in Seattle I’d run a multi-billion dollar investment company. I understood profit margins and advertising, and how to handle a board of directors.

  Running a small business? I had no clue.

  My brother Alec, who ran a tech company in Portland, Oregon, texted me frequently to give me a hard time about my ‘early mid-life crisis.’

  He probably wasn’t wrong.

  But crisis aside, I needed someone to clean the place, and handle the day-to-day aspects of making sure a hotel was hospitable. My aunt had offered e
very guest two meals per day. None of those things were going to come from me -- I hadn’t cleaned or cooked in fifteen years, so I’d taken meals off the list of amenities offered.

  Even though it was a headache for me, I really wanted to make it work. My aunt had loved this place. As a teen and younger man, I hadn’t really understood why, but now that I was thirty-eight years old, it made more sense. It was peaceful in a way the rocky coast of the Pacific Ocean wasn’t. It was quiet in a way that even the most breathtaking beaches in Greece weren’t.

  After her funeral, one of my aunt’s close friends had called me. My aunt had been running the place almost by herself, with just her close friend to help her. Occasionally they hired temporary help, but mostly they enjoyed it on their own.

  I went down to Apricot Sunset to check on the property. Once her estate was squared away, I’d hired someone from a property management agency to take care of it, and I’d gone back to Seattle. But, I didn’t forget about it. A month after her funeral, during a particularly stressful merger at work, I looked up photos of the house online.

  And I let myself think, ‘what if?’ What if I moved to Florida?

  But my wife at the time, who was actually my soon-to-be ex-wife, did not care for that idea. I’d been well-aware for some time that she was mentally and emotionally checked out of our marriage. But she didn’t cheat, and as long as I made sure she had access to the jet at all times, she was semi-happy.

  Over a dinner of roast lamb paired with Pinot Noir, I’d told her I was considering moving to the beach for a while, and taking over the care of my aunt’s home.

  Her jaw had dropped, and then her fork. “Absolutely not,” she said. “Do you know what kind of people live on the Gulf Coast?” she asked in her cultured Greek accent.

  “People like my aunt.”

  A snarl twisted her mouth. “Your aunt was an outcast in this family. You barely bothered seeing her when she was alive, but now that she's dead she's all you care about.”

  Helena had been snarky with me for the last time. I wasn’t going to tolerate it. She could forget about having a jet waiting on her at all times if she couldn’t show some respect for my late aunt. “You need to stop talking right now. I'm leaving for Seagrove tomorrow; you don't have to like it.”

  She flung her napkin to the table and stood up, the snarl still marred her pretty face.

  I didn't wait until morning to get the divorce paperwork started. I called my attorney as soon as I left the restaurant. I was done indulging her whims.

  For the last week, I’d been at the hotel. The top floor was mine. The bottom two each contained a floor that could be rented to a family or a group of up to eight, with its own balcony and outside staircase so everyone had their own entrance and exit.. At the front of the house, there was a foyer that functioned as a lobby. And each floor had a wrap around porch with its own entrance and exit.

  So, I could have up to sixteen guests at any given time. Did I want sixteen guests? I could close the hotel to guests, and let it just be a vacation home. But my aunt had requested that I keep it running, even if I felt the need to pass the ownership along to someone else. The hotel stayed book year around. It was in demand, and if I took it off the market, I’d be depriving people of their peaceful week at the beach.

  Plus, I’d feel guilty as hell for not honoring my aunt’s wishes.

  I wasn't lonely here, but I did need help. I needed someone to wash the sheets and order the toiletries. I was still running my expansive company in Seattle for the most part, just remotely.

  Yesterday I put a small tasteful sign in the yard indicating that I needed help, and I posted it online as well. So far I’d had dozens of people stop by, but not one seemed like a serious worker. I’d been hiring employees for over a decade, and I could spot the slackers early on.

  At six p.m. I sat down on the porch on the bottom floor, which was part of the shared area. To the right there was a rectangular pool and a grassy area with a fire pit, a few picnic tables and a charcoal grill. The hotel was full, with two extended families.

  It was a popular spot, because of the proximity to the beach. All of my guests had left their rooms, and I could see them on the beach taking family photos. Several of the kids ducked away, splashing in the edge of the water.

  It brought back memories of my own large Greek family, with our grandmother forcing all of us to pose for a family photo. I’d been just as rowdy as these children had, dodging my mother and father and running through the waves with my cousins.

  I was sipping a glass of chilled red wine when a striking young woman appeared on the front walk of the hotel. She didn’t have the carefree, easy manner of the young women who came here to relax. Her eyes darted around, and she held her purse clutched tight against her shoulder.

  As she came nearer, I could see her exquisite beauty. Her body was curvier than many of the young women that passed through town, but that only made her more appealing to me.

  She wore a pink top that showed off her hourglass waist, and white capri pants that hugged her round bottom.

  She stopped walking and glanced up at the porch. When she saw me sitting there, she pulled her shoulders back with obvious effort and lifted her chin.

  She came toward the porch steps, taking deliberate steps.

  Once I realized that she was coming to the hotel, probably to inquire about a job, I put my wine glass down and tried to ward off the burgeoning arousal I felt from seeing her. If she was here to work, then I would be professional, just as I was in my office in Seattle.

  At the door, she knocked decisively.

  “I’m coming,” I said, which made her jump.

  “I’m here about the housekeeping job,” she said, still clutching her purse.

  “Then you’re in the right place.” I nodded to the door. “It’s open. Go on in.”

  She opened the door and walked into the foyer of the hotel. The top floor was mine, and it contained the office. It was decorated just like the residential floors, with white, gray and cream tones and casual beach furniture

  “Have a seat,” I said to her, pointing at the dining table. I didn’t want to be too formal in this setting. “Would you like anything to drink?”

  She perched on the edge of one of the dining chairs. “No. I’m fine.”

  I went through the usual appropriate questions, and I learned that she was the current shift manager for a small grocery store in Quitman, Georgia. Although she’d looked wary on the boardwalk outside the hotel, as soon as she began to answer, she was confident and self-assured.

  “What brings you to Seagrove?” I asked.

  It was a typical question for an interview in the hospitality business, but the color drained from her face. Her clear blue eyes glanced down and then up toward the ceiling. “Um.” She clasped her fingers together and then unclasped them, and when she finally answered, her voice was lower than it had been. “I’m starting college in the fall in Florida.”

  Clearly her move was a sensitive topic, so I wouldn’t press the issue. I didn’t even know her yet, but I didn’t want to cause her any distress.

  “I need someone who’s going to be able to live here,” I said. “You won’t have to work more than forty hours, but I need you to live here, and to be on call. If you do work overtime, you’ll be compensated.”

  “Is there anything special I should wear to work?” she asked.

  “No. What you have on is just fine.” The outfit was hardly sexy, but she looked good in it, and I wasn’t too evolved to admit that I liked looking at a beautiful woman. I enjoyed listening to her soft Georgian accent too. “If you’re interested, you’re hired.” I needed someone now, and I could tell she was competent just from this short interview.

  “Thank you for the opportunity. I appreciate it.” She leaned forward and shook my hand. “I won’t let you down.”

  I had a feeling that she wouldn’t and I usually trusted my instincts and went with my gut, especially when my gut agreed wit
h my experience. Eden was going to be a damned good employee.

  I tried to stop myself, but I couldn’t help watching her backside as she walked away.

  Chapter Three

  Eden

  “I got the job,” I said to the twins. I’d left them in one of the picturesque ice cream parlours on the main drag while I went to apply for the job at the hotel.

  The ice cream place had been right out of a storybook, with pastel walls and white tables. Bright canvases lined the walls, depicting colorful ice cream scoops that made my mouth water.

  It was a different world from the rural town we’d grown up in. Tourists breezed in and out, parking old-fashioned bicycles outside on the street, laughing and ordering scoops of outlandish flavors. The women and girls were clad in swimsuits with flowing cover ups, and the men had on polo shirts and board shorts.

  The twins stuck out like a sore thumb in their cut off jeans and faded-out t-shirts. It was clear that they were from a different world from the ones these tourists inhabited.

  Even though they were older now, I had still found myself instructing them not to spend more than two dollars each on a treat, which had earned me a double eye roll. They had a point. They were mature kids; I didn’t need to babysit all of their choices.

  “Really? You got the job?” Piper asked. “That’s great news.”

  “Now we need to get to our cousin’s house, and see if she’s going to let you guys stay with her, now that we’re actually here in town.” My cousin Marla had agreed to let them stay when I called her, but she’d seemed somewhat hesitant. Maybe a few hundred dollars toward the rent would help change her mind.