“Who’s Patty?”
“An old friend from school. Her creepy landlord is giving her some problems so the money will help her pay the security deposit for a new place. Maybe you can go down there and talk to him until she finds something else?”
Lately, my Duchess worries about everything and everyone besides the one thing she should be, herself.
“Are you finished?” I ask impatiently because I’m sick and tired of competing with every device in this house.
She places the phone on her lap and slowly rolls her head up to glare at me. This woman I adore has developed a serious attitude problem which I attribute to a sleep deprivation and a lack of some good dick in her life.
“Fine, you want to talk about my business? Well, I think it’s perfectly okay for us to have different approaches toward how we accomplish our goals. You have your way of doing things and I have mine.”
“Yeah, but it’s my approach that actually works.”
“You’re so arrogant.”
“Is it I’m arrogant or that I’m right?”
“It sounds like you’re throwing up in my face you pay all the bills around here?”
Damn, she must be sleep deprived. I totally wasn’t saying that shit.
“No, Duchess, not at all. I’m just saying that all the strategies I’ve learned over the years like buying favors, arranging backdoor deals, and leveraging influence over people to get what I need is what works.”
“I think you’re comparing oranges to apples. The two of us are in very different lines of work, and that’s not the way I’m going to build School Bucks into a brand that every college student in the world can use. I’m going to do it my way. No skipping the line.”
I grunt to myself, which is the equivalent of me rolling my eyes. While I’ve never attended an ivy league university like Elizabeth and her friends, I’ve learned everything I need to know on the streets, specifically under the tutelage of my father, Joseph. One thing he’s always impressed upon me is that nobody gets brownie points for doing shit the hard way.
Unfortunately, Elizabeth and I have had this conversation more times than I can count and it always ends up the same way. Me pissed that she won’t permit me to help her grow her business in the way that I know how and her apologizing for making me angry by wrapping her pretty lips around my dick. That is definitely the easiest solution to shutting me up, but sadly that’s not the way this conversation is going to end because Knox just started waking from his nap. I can hear the echo of his raspy baby babble through the five gazillion monitors Elizabeth has placed all over the damn house.
“Ah, there he is,” she says, sounding almost relieved that she has an excuse to end our conversation.
When she rises from the bed, I place my palm firmly against her chest, getting a quick feel of her right tit for good measure. Her nipple pebbles from my brief touch and a petty part of me dies inside. Elizabeth’s breasts are round and full from breastfeeding and look amazing, it’s a fucking shame neither one of them have been in my mouth for days.
“I said I’ve got him.”
“Okay,” she reluctantly agrees.
When I enter the nursery, my little bruiser is on his feet, hands wrapped around the railing, with a huge grin on his face. I can’t help but give him one in return. He has his mother’s smile and my deep-set eyes. Other than Elizabeth, I don’t think I’ve ever loved anyone or anything more in my life. You can’t help but adore this little bundle of baby brute force. He’s already got the great makings of a Masterson man—he’s irresistible and unstoppable. Nobody can say no to him.
“Hey, little monster, why aren’t you letting Mommy get any rest? You know you’re cock blocking me big time, right?”
I grin as Knox raises his arms and babbles something totally incoherent that only his mother ever seems to understand.
“Roman!” Elizabeth hollers from our bedroom. “Watch your mouth. Don’t curse in front of the baby.”
Knox giggles as if he understands every word I’ve just said and his mother’s response. Hell, maybe he does. I wouldn’t put it past Elizabeth to have given birth to a genius.
“Relax, nerd,” I say, practically laughing myself. “Go back to sleep or something.”
“He’s probably hungry.”
“How can you be hungry, dude?” I ask him in a small voice. “You just drank from my favorite tit.”
He babbles a string of nonsense words together with the most stern look across his face. I’m pretty sure this little boy just cursed me out. I pick him up and sniff his butt. Great, I smell nothing putrid. I slide my finger inside of the diaper to feel if he’s wet (he’s not)—perfect. So the only thing left to do now is feed himagainlike his mother suggested, although I’m not sure where he’s putting all of it.
“You must have one hell of a metabolism,” I whisper in his ear as he babbles with great inflection.
“Is that so?” I say in response, chuckling to myself. I don’t have a clue what he’s talking about, but it’s definitely something.
