“I don’t know,” she whispered.
His arms around her tightened that much more, giving comfort which she soaked up like a sponge.
“You know more than you think,” he murmured, his hot breath caressing the side of her neck. “If you really didn’t know, baby, you wouldn’t have just called me Daddy.”
She blinked. Was that true?
She almost asked him, except the entire car rocked as Pops jerked open the back door, getting in with a loud, “Brrr!” before slamming it again. “It’s cold as hell out there. I—” He stopped suddenly, frowning over seat at them while she crawled out of Brock’s arms and off his lap as surreptitiously as possible. She didn’t make it, and the scowl that crossed the old man’s face had her blushing furiously as she moved back into her own seat.
“Someone in this car needs a chastity belt,” Pops grumbled.
He smacked his son on the back of the head, which Brock didn’t respond to. She hid her face, mortified.
“One more time,” Pops told them both, “for those who seem to be hard of hearing. Take. It. To. The. Bedroom. Got it?”
Brock nodded once, his hands resting on his thighs.
“I’m sorry,” Stace added.
Snorting, Pops turned his attention to putting the baby back in her car seat. She still had a paper goat treat cup in her clenched hand and what looked like her fist in her mouth, although it was just as likely to be a goat treat. “No one’s asking you to be sorry,” the old man grumbled. With the click of Lily’s seat belt, he turned to pat Stace’s shoulder. Just as meaningfully, he gave Brock another slap up the back of his head. ”Just get her into bed already. Hell, I had your grandma in the hay on day three of making her acquaintance. She had my ring on her finger fifteen minutes later.”
“Fifteen minutes?” Brock drawled. “You should be ashamed.”
“Ha, ha,” Pops fake-laughed back. “We didn’t waste time back then. There’s just no knowing when the next horny guy on a better looking tractor might happen by. Believe you me, if you can’t curl her toes, the next guy will.”
Sinking lower in her seat, Stace covered her eyes with both hands next.
“You’re embarrassing her, dad.”
“I ought to be embarrassing you. Take your damn pants off already.”
Chapter 12
The empty pie and ice cream dishes were soaking in the sink instead of washed and put up, and ‘Die Hard’ was about a quarter the way into the movie when Lily gave up with a yawn, lay her head down on the cushion of Stace’s soft breasts, and went to sleep. They lost Pops at about the mid-way point in the movie.
“Good night,” Stace softly offered when he eased out of his chair, passed over what little was left was left of the popcorn, and headed off to his own bed.
“Night,” he grumbled back, waving one hand. Brock didn’t need to see it to know it was more of a disgusted gesture than one of well-wishing and sweet dreams.
That Stace didn’t know what to make of it was as clear as the line that furrowed her forehead and the faint hurt in her eyes as she tried to find all the worst meanings in his father’s retreat. Should he tell her now how much his father was hoping they’d get together, she’d probably not believe him. What was it about the minds of Little boys and girls that automatically wanted to jump to bad conclusions in everything, and never good ones. Hedidn’t know half of what she’d been through, but he suspected she was reacting exactly as she’d been trained to. And since she’d been trained to always second guess what she was being told, he knew nothing he said would—on its own—fix anything with her.
Actions on the other hand...
He waited until Pops stopped beside Lily, bending down to run his wizened hand gently over her tiny blonde head, before shuffling off down the hall into his bedroom. The door softly shut a few seconds later, and finally they were once more alone.
“He really likes her,” Brock said softly, watching from the couch as she rocked both herself and her baby on the recliner across from him.
She immediately tried to mask what she was thinking when she glanced to him.
He pointed to Lily in her lap. “He really likes her. Pops has always liked kids, but I’ve never known him to be quite this cuddlesome with one.”
She blushed slightly, turned away as if to watch the movie again. Her hand was tracing light little heart and circle shaped patterns on her sleeping daughter’s back, and although the movie was just leading into the dramatic ending of Bruce Willis dropping the villain off the top of Nakatomi Plaza, Brock knew for a fact she wasn’t watching it. She was sitting in her recliner, not ten feet away from him, rocking herself, but thinking about him. He could practically see reflections of himself in every blink of her eyes and flush of her hot little cheeks.
“Baby girl,” he called softly to her.
Almost reluctantly, she looked at him again. Her chest rose and fell quicker than before. She licked her lips, the timid dart of the tip of her tongue making them shine in that all too enticing way.
He beckoned to her. “Come lie down with Daddy. Let’s watch the rest of the movie together. Would you like that?”
