Callie turned to me. “How long does the DNA test take?”
“They said up to two weeks.”
“Okay.” Eilidh pressed a kiss to Millie’s head. “Then you’ll need help for two weeks. If Millie is yours, then you can think of getting more permanent assistance, but for now, you’ve got me.”
Feeling, too much feeling, crashed over me and I could only stare at the beautiful woman holding my probable daughter in her arms. After everything that had happened between us, Eilidh could put all that behind her to help me?
“Eilidh—”
Lewis cut me off. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“It’s not up to you, big brother.”
He squeezed the bridge of his nose in frustration. Remembering the promise I made to him, I shook my head. “I don’t need your help, Eilidh.”
Eilidh huffed. “Don’t argue with me or overanalyze it. I’m the only one here who doesn’t have a full-time job and a child. I was obsessed with playing mum to Mor when she was a baby and I’ve had lots of time with Harley these past few weeks, so I feel confident I’m able to look after Millie.”
“And you can always call on me or Lewis or Regan, who is an actual qualified childcare professional,” Callie pointed out.
“Exactly.” Eilidh gave me a nod, a decided smile curling her mouth. “While you work, I’ll take care of Millie and I’ll even socialize her by taking her to Mum’s daycare.”
“I … I can’t ask you to do that.”
“You didn’t. I’m making the decision for you. If you need to work today, you should go to work.”
“And tonight we’ll come over and cook,” Callie offered. “Keep you company.”
Gratitude overwhelmed me. “I don’t know what to say.”
“Aye!” Harley cried, her plump wee legs springing her forward to her dad.
It broke the tension as we all laughed. Lewis lifted his daughter into his arms, grinning. “I think you understand every word we’re saying. Do I have a genius on my hands?”
She clapped her hands together. “Aye!”
We all chuckled again and the terror that held me captive these past few days released me, allowing me to breathe again.
Twenty
FYFE
Iwas shattered. The last few nights, Millie had kept me awake with her teething. Before the teething ring arrived, I’d let her chew on my fingers because it was the only thing that seemed to stop her crying. While the cold teething ring soothed her, as soon as she woke up, she started bawling again. It broke my fucking heart. Callie told me it should only last a week or two before settling but that she’d have bouts of teething until she was two or three.
It didn’t surprise me the way my friends rallied around me.
What did surprise me was Eilidh’s support. She seemed to have put what was between us behind her to help out with Millie. Seeing her swoop in to rescue us … well, it was humbling. I already knew Eilidh Adair was a special person, but she was bloody extraordinary.
I’d had Millie for five days. The DNA results still weren’t in, but a contact had tracked Pamela’s vehicle. She’d sold it to a garage in Edinburgh. From the car we had her last known address, but that was it. He’d hacked the medical records at the hospital in Inverness to find out Millie’s date of birth as well as Pamela’s. Millie was born last September, so she was ninemonths old. Pamela had ghosted me around February of that year after we started hooking up at the end of December.
Pamela’s birth date allowed us to get more information about her. My guy was close to finding her.
I didn’t know how to feel about any of it.
My life and the life I thought I’d have had been thrown into a complete tailspin. And yet … I’d bonded myself to this wee human. Or she’d bonded herself to me. All I knew was that only my voice and Eilidh’s seemed to settle her, and when she cuddled into me at night, I felt like my heart might explode.
Like … maybe, finally, I belonged to someone who no one could take away from me.
And that was terrifying because … what if it turned out she wasn’t mine? Or what if she was and she actuallycouldbe taken from me?
