Chapter 8 #3
Daphne leaned in Finn’s direction, voice low. “What on earth happened?”
“A nosebleed.” Finn’s voice was steady as he recounted the evening’s events. But the flirty pub owner persona had taken a
back seat to this other Finn. The protective dad one. “And since our moving truck failed to arrive today, we have no supplies.”
He exhaled. “It’s not dangerous, just messy. And I didn’t want to drag her around town this late.”
Daphne’s gaze caught in his.
“Of course not.” She’d seen serious Finn a few times before. Usually when he apologized. And the look beat against the flirt
assumptions like an all-out drum solo. This was a tired, caring dad doing his best. Her defenses crumpled slightly.
She pulled her attention from him and crouched to Lucy’s level. “Well, Lucy, lucky for you, I’m baking cookies. They should
be ready when you’re out of the bath.”
Lucy perked up. “Chocolate chip?”
“The only kind worth staying up past bedtime for.”
“Baking cookies?” Finn arched a brow. “This late?”
Daphne lifted her chin. “It’s always a good time for cookies.”
She shot Lucy a wink as she stood, then schooled her face before turning back to him.
“Ah, while watching . . .” He gestured with his chin toward her television, where the screen paused quite dramatically on
Ethan Hunt running. “Interesting choice for a tea princess.”
Daphne opened her mouth. Then closed it. And then, she raised her chin and tightened a smile. “Stereotypes.” She batted her
lashes and worked up her best English accent. “Nasty little things, aren’t they?”
Something flashed in his eyes, warming her cheeks. “It does add a whole new layer to your personality, Miss Austen.”
His voice brushed across her skin like velvet. She stepped back automatically, heart thudding far too loud in her ears. Nope.
Not going there.
“Come on, Lucy.” She waved toward the hallway, refusing to glance at the man behind her. “I’ll show you the way.”
Finn took Lucy’s small hand in his, and that single gesture was almost her undoing. Gentle. Steady. Sweet in a way that felt . . .
dangerous.
She closed her fingers into fists at her sides.
Ever since Sunday lunch, when he’d shown up with that crooked smile and his adorable daughter—and then had the nerve to become
her business rival—she’d been stuck in a full-on tennis match with her own brain. Admire him? Absolutely not. Crush on him?
Worse.
And yet, here he was. Being nice. Being grateful. Holding his daughter’s hand and trailing behind her like some sort of walking
contradiction with an accent.
She flicked on the bathroom light.
And froze.
Oh no, no, no—
Her pink lace bra—her favorite pink lace bra—was hanging in all its humiliating glory from the shower rod.
She made a strangled noise that may or may not have been human and launched toward it, yanking it down and shoving it behind her back.
Silence.
Then a cough. A suspiciously choked one.
Decidedly male.
Her face flared to volcanic temperatures.
“Um . . . towels are in the closet. Shampoo’s on the tub.” She gestured vaguely with her empty hand. “And you should probably turn on the space heater. This apartment stays cold even in summer. It’s not been updated
like yours.”
And hopefully, her heater would last one more winter.
Or two.
Since the plumbing repairs couldn’t wait.
Finn was staring at her. Not smirking, not laughing—just looking. Too much. She pulled at her baggy T-shirt. He’s not a nice person. He’s a jerk who criticized your precious tea shop and poured salt in your sugar bowls. Right. Exactly.
Avoid eye contact.
“Well, I’ll let you two get cleaned up.” Daphne flattened herself against the wall, shimmying past Mr. Hotface with every
ounce of dignity she could scrape together.
She was almost clear when—
“Her clothes.”
She paused. Turned. Too close. Way too close.
“I forgot to fetch clean ones when we left.”
She looked over his wrinkled, blood-specked shirt. Then at Lucy’s princess nightgown. And just like that, the tug in her chest
resurrected.
“She can stay with me while you run next door.”
His gaze snapped to hers. Measured. Intense. Like he was making sure she could be trusted with the most precious thing in
his world. And Daphne’s heart flipped all over again.
A dad who loved his little girl.
She didn’t blink, only held his attention, daring him to doubt her.
Finally, something shifted in his face. That soft look crept a little too close to . . . tender.
No, no. Stop that. He is a rival. An arrogant Brit with an emotional support smirk and an unhealthy aversion to proper tea.
But then he stepped closer. The doorframe was at her back. No escape.
“Thank you.”
The air thickened, and Daphne decided to stop breathing because maybe it would help.
Then—because he clearly couldn’t help himself—a crooked grin formed on his face, the flirt back in full force. “Be back in
a trice.”
He disappeared down the hallway, leaving behind the scent of vanilla, cedar, and confusion.
Daphne exhaled. Hard. Whatever that was—it needed to stop. Preferably with a bucket of cold water.
She turned back to her neon bathroom with a bloody-nosed little girl staring up at her and tried to sort out what to do next.
“Green is my second favorite color,” Lucy announced, matter-of-factly.
“Is it?” Daphne grinned, kneeling to start the bathwater. “I bet I can guess your first favorite.”
Lucy’s eyes glimmered with a smile mostly hidden behind the pillowcase, granting permission. What had happened to Lucy’s mom?
Daphne’s chest squeezed. She knew the hole left behind from the loss of a mother.
And if Finn was raising Lucy alone?
Well, that implied a lot of possibly painful somethings, didn’t it?
“Hmm,” Daphne mused aloud, scanning Lucy’s bright pink nightgown down to her matching socks. “Blue?”
Lucy shook her dark head, bobbing a few curls. Gosh, she was a cutie.
Daphne grinned and moved to the linen closet, pulling out a fresh towel and washcloth. “Orange?”
Lucy gave a dramatic shudder in full-body disapproval.
“It’s a princess color,” Lucy prompted.
“Ohhh,” Daphne said, drawing out the word, eyes wide with theatrical discovery. “Well, then. In that case . . . pink?”
At that, Lucy lowered the pillowcase, revealing the red-streaked skin beneath her nose and the world’s most triumphant nod.
“Yes.”
“I like pink too.” Daphne reached for the washcloth, lowering herself to her knees near the little darling. Her smile came
quickly. Her eyes sparkled.
Daphne’s assumptions hit a snag. Whatever flirty, smug, infuriating Finn Dashwood was doing, it clearly included being a very
good dad.
“Is it your favorite?” Lucy exaggerated the word. There was a challenge in her tone—a test of true princess allegiance.
Daphne wrung out the cloth and tilted her head in return. “It’s my second favorite.”
Lucy’s eyes widened with the drama such a statement deserved. “Den what’s your first favorite?”
“The color of your eyes, Lucy.” Daphne leaned close, carefully dabbing a fresh washcloth against the crinkled skin beneath
her nose. “I love green best.”
Finn returned to the sound of Lucy’s giggle—and slowed his pace. He’d barely been gone two minutes, still riding the nerves
of leaving his daughter alone with a woman he’d known for all of five sideways conversations and one Sunday lunch.
But that laughter? That soft, delighted sound?
It melted the tension from his shoulders faster than butter on a hot griddle.
And replaced the unease with something far less familiar. Something warm and treacherously appealing.
He didn’t know what to do with it.
Or, perhaps, somewhere deep inside he knew exactly what he wanted to do with it.
So, naturally, he told himself to ignore it.
He eased his way down the hall to the bathroom door and peeked inside.
Daphne knelt beside Lucy, dabbing gently at her face with a washcloth, murmuring something too soft to hear. Her golden hair
was pulled into a ponytail, loose strands framing her face, and that absurdly domestic picture hit him straight in the gut.
“Okay, I bet you can’t guess this one,” she teased, then broke into a softly sung line.
“Dat one’s easy,” Lucy interrupted, beaming. “Sleeping Beauty.”
Daphne gasped dramatically. “You are so good at this game.”
Her voice held a kind of warmth Finn didn’t expect—light, sincere, steady. Like it had been there all along, waiting for someone
to need it. For Lucy.
He rubbed absently at his chest, an ache growing in the space beneath his fingers. What was this?
“What’s the score?” Daphne asked.
“I have free and you only have one,” Lucy declared.
Daphne’s shoulders slumped in exaggerated defeat. “Then you should go easy on me next time.”
Lucy’s giggle sparkled again, and Finn let a grin slip. That laugh had always been his undoing. Since the first time he’d
heard it, it had been a kind of magic. His favorite sound.
Lucy launched into the chorus of “Be Our Guest” and Daphne looked skyward, feigning deep thought, though Finn didn’t miss
the telltale tip of a smile at her lips.
She knew it. Of course she did.
And he . . . could really like her.
Which was precisely the problem.
He wasn’t looking for something complicated. With strings. Risky.
He’d done that before. Twice. Once with his heart and once with his business. And each time he’d come out of it with more
damage than he knew what to do with. He’d learned the hard way that love came with an expiration date, and he refused to risk
Lucy’s heart—or his own—again. His job was to protect her, not rewrite some fairy tale for himself.
He knew how these stories ended.
So he shoved the rising knot of hope down deep and leaned into the easier thing: a casual spark. Harmless flirtation. Nothing
that threatened to become more.
“Beauty and the Beast,” Finn said, stepping into the room.
Daphne’s gaze shot to his, her smile still warm on her face, and then with a look back at Lucy, she unfolded from her position
and stood, handing him the washcloth. “She’s very good at this game.” She tossed a one-shouldered shrug. “I suppose I need
to catch up on my princess songs.”
Then with the slightest smile, she slid past him into the hallway, those blue eyes of hers flicking to his as she passed.
“I’ll be in the kitchen if you need something.”
And then she was gone, the faint scent of cinnamon trailing in her wake.
Finn stared after her a moment longer than was strictly necessary.
Cinnamon and sass. Floured fingertips and pink bras on shower rods.
She wasn’t what he expected. Not at all.
And that’s exactly what made her dangerous. Temptingly dangerous.
“Daddy?”
Finn exhaled, forcing his focus back to Lucy, who was watching him with that small, knowing smile of hers. “Yes, lamb.”
“I’m okay if we don’t get a puppy right now.”
His attention zeroed in on his little pixie, her smile crooked, her eyes dancing. His chest constricted from the effort to withstand the pull of her daydream for a mother. But he’d learned the devastating and hard truth: Love wasn’t safe.
And despite his devil-may-care persona, when it came to Lucy’s heart, he had to play it safe.