Chapter 9 #2
The man had been doing the same once-over of me that I had of him, and he didn’t appear to be impressed with what he saw.
I was back in my uniform—red heels, red slacks and a silk blouse, my hair pulled back into a severe bun.
I wondered if the scowl on his face meant he’d assumed that I was a lawyer like his brother had.
“I’m Calliope,” I told the older, more rumpled and generally more cynical version of Elliot.
“I know who you are.” Though he spoke without warmth, there wasn’t any malice either.
I couldn’t get a read on him. He appeared to be cold, jaded, but one tended to become jaded when their helpless child was besieged with an illness he or she doesn’t deserve.
I held up the pink box. “I know that there isn’t much that can help right now, but sugar will do its damn best. Especially when Nora baked it.”
The way he looked from the cake to me, I thought he might just take it and shut the door in my face.
Most of me hoped for that. That way I could just do my good deed and be gone.
I didn’t do small talk—especially not with the brother of the man I’d fucked then ghosted.
Especially not with a man going through an ordeal I wasn’t physically capable of witnessing up close, offering empathy for.
Staying far away from every member of the Shaw family was the best course of action. Which begged the question as to why I was even there in the first place.
“Daddy?” a small voice said from behind him.
And that’s when the man in front of me disappeared so quickly, I thought I might have imagined him. Everything about him softened, seeming to drop years from his face as he turned to smile—to beam— at the little girl who had spoken.
She was small. Tiny. I wasn’t exactly an expert at guessing children’s ages, but I had enough nieces and nephews to decipher that she was exceptionally small and petite for four.
Her hair was midnight black, pulled up into two precise pigtails fastened by two pink bows. She was wearing a pink tutu, a Nirvana tee, and black combat boots. My kind of girl.
And though there were hints of it in the fragility of her petite frame and paleness of her skin, she didn’t look sick. She was extremely gorgeous with a wide smile of her own, first for her father, then for me.
“Hi, I’m Clara.” She waved without an ounce of self-consciousness.
I grinned at her because even though I was sometimes considered a bitch, I wasn’t the kind that didn’t smile at young children, especially young children about to be admitted for a bone marrow transplant.
“I’m Calliope.”
She gave me an assessing gaze. “Are you a princess?”
I let out a half bark, half laugh that surprised even me then cleared my throat. “Um, no way, Jose. Absolutely not. Nope.”
Clara continued studying me. “Thought I’d check.”
I couldn’t help but smile at this child’s simultaneously serious but playful energy. She somehow had the intensity of her father and the light aura of her uncle.
“I like your shoes.” She pointed down at my heels.
“Then you have good taste.” I gave her a wink. “I like yours too.”
“Daddy says I’m too young for heels.” She gave her father a frown that was adorable. “These are the next best thing.” She held out a foot for appraisal.
I looked at them, nodding. “I wholeheartedly agree.”
She then noticed the box in my hand. “Is that cake?” she screeched.
“It is. My sister-in-law baked it for you.”
“Awesome!” She held up rock and roll fingers. “Are you coming in to have some?”
I shook my head with a quick glance to her father, who looked appropriately horrified by his daughter’s invitation.
I wasn’t sure if he wasn’t a people person or if he wasn’t a ‘me’ person. Not that he knew me, but if his brother kissed and told, he might.
“I just came to drop it off, and I wouldn’t want to steal a slice,” I told Clara with the warmth I reserved for my nieces and nephews.
“You must!” She burst forward and reached for my hand, putting delicate pressure on my arm before pulling.
I could’ve resisted. I was stronger than a four-year-old, obviously. But only a demon would. And I wasn’t quite a demon. Not yet at least.
I let Clara Shaw drag me into her house, past her father—who looked as if he were being dragged to the executioner as he closed the door.
That made me swallow a smile. Male discomfort was always amusing. Beau Shaw did not want me in his house, but his daughter did, and it seemed that he’d do anything for his daughter.
And I might have too.
I wanted something from Clara, though.
I wanted her to give me hope.
We ate cake, Beau sitting stoically, frowning every moment his daughter wasn’t looking at him while smiling genuinely every time her attention went in his direction.
Clara chatted away, frosting smearing on her nose with each bite.
After she decided she was done with the cake, she dragged me to her room to show me her collection of rocks and to have a tea party.
The room itself was amazing. A canopy bed, black mosquito net cloaking it. Fairies hung from fishing twine. Typical girl toys and dolls mixed with spiders, large textbooks and what looked like an old clock radio.
Without hesitation, I kicked off my heels and sat down at the designated tea area, this not being my first rodeo with young children. Though the other guests at this tea party were not dolls; they were toy dinosaurs and insects. This chick was a little weird. I loved that.
Beau had silently followed us from the dining room to Clara’s bedroom, standing sentinel as if he thought I was about to unhinge my jaw and eat his daughter whole.
He hadn’t said a word since we spoke at the door, not that there was much chance with Clara barely stopping to take a breath.
But I got the idea that he preferred it that way.
I didn’t miss the hard glares he directed at me once in a while, communicating that he did not want me here.
His daughter did, though, and fuck if I would’ve disappointed her.
A grown man could handle a little discomfort…
I wasn’t going to be the reason for a single second of this little girl’s.
“You can go do whatever you need to do,” I offered Beau from my spot on the floor.
“Or you can hover over the strange woman having a tea party with your daughter.” I grinned.
“I promise, I only eat children when there’s a full moon.
Otherwise, I’m a pretty trustworthy person.
And though I don’t have any spawn of my own, I understand they are a time suck at the best of times.
” I glanced over to where Clara was busy arranging her tea set.
“And I get that this isn’t the best of times. ” I said that part a little lower.
I watched Beau’s features harden further, which I hadn’t thought possible. He was a tense bastard, but he had reason to be.
“Even with family support, I imagine there’s a boat-load of shit on your to-do list.” I was thinking of Elliot on the boat. It was one of the many times I’d broken my covenant to not think about him. “No pun intended.”
At least I wasn’t thinking of him with his hands on me, mouth on me, cock inside of me. I was thinking of Elliot the person, a brother, an uncle. Elliot’s skin browning with the sun, the saltwater coating his skin.
“My brother catches the fish,” Beau grunted, unaware of me fantasizing about his brother, not betraying that he had any knowledge of mine and Elliot’s relationship, for lack of a better word. “I cook them.”
The wheels started turning as I searched his face, deciding he didn’t know about Elliot and myself. “You’re the chef at Shaw Shack.”
He nodded curtly. Even his nods were brusque, violent, almost. He reminded me of my brother. “When I can. Lately…”
He looked down at his daughter with an impossible tenderness in his expression that displayed every ounce of love and pain he’d been feeling.
She was smiling away, pouring ‘tea’, arranging where each of her arachnids would be positioned. “Patricia,” she scolded a plastic tarantula. “You can wait your turn.”
I nodded, understanding how this man came to be as guarded and tense as he was. It would be impossible not to be. Horrifying … the thought of what he’d been through. “As I said, I imagine you’re unaccustomed to finding time for yourself. I’m trustworthy, if you want to go do whatever.”
I didn’t know why I was offering to babysit the niece of the man I’d fucked once and who I had promised myself I was going to stay away from—for his own good.
But then I remembered that I broke all of the promises I made to myself these days.
And—because quite simply—the guy needed a break. He needed help. Fuck knows why I ended up being the person to extend the hand.
Most of me didn’t expect him to take me up on my offer. From what I’d gleaned from the man, he didn’t seem to trust easily, was apprehensive, closed off, and fiercely protective of his daughter, only softening for her. As he should’ve been.
And I guessed he might be a good judge of character, after learning the hard way with his previous wife.
If he was a good judge of character, then he’d be hesitant about leaving me alone with his daughter. Rightly so. Not because I couldn’t be trusted with children—they were the only thing I could be trusted with. But because he’d probably correctly ascertain that I was not a good person.
I certainly wasn’t going to be offended if he told me to get out of his house. Although I would’ve been disappointed because I already liked his daughter and wanted to bask in her energy and how exceptionally healthy she seemed. I wanted to bask in the hope of it all.
Selfish of me.
And maybe, just maybe, I wanted the chance that Elliot might arrive. Because not being a good person meant I always had ulterior motives.
Beau surprised the shit out of me by nodding once again, after looking at his daughter for a long moment. “I’ll be in the dining room.”