Once he’d tossed the rag back in the bathroom, he rejoined her in bed, pulling her to spoon with him. The heat radiating from him soaked into her, relaxing her muscles. His heavy arm rested just under her breasts, and she snuggled in closer, stifling a giggle when the hair on his legs tickled the backs of her thighs.
After all they’d done, she should be exhausted. Instead, her mind was racing through every possible scenario the future might bring. Not many of them were ones she’d enjoy. Not now that she’d experienced life with a Daddy.
Once he snuggled in, pulling her close, and she melted into him. This was the part she hadn’t quite understood in her books. The quiet. The warmth. The way his arm fit around her as if they had always known her.
“Why don’t you already have a Little?” The question popped out before she could stop it. Surely someone else had seen what she saw.
Connor yawned. “Sorry, babygirl. Um, I don’t already have a Little because I never found the right woman. Your turn. Why did you keep insisting on going back to the Society compound instead of staying with Winnie like she wanted you to?”
Shot to the heart.
Still, there was no harm in telling him the truth. Or at least part of it. “I run the nurseries for the Society. I have to approve the children are ready before they feed back into the maincompound. The nurseries are self-contained, and children stay there until they turn twelve. Then they’re handed over to other members, men and women, who are responsible for teaching them their proper roles in the Society.”
She put that day off as long as she could. She stayed because the person they’d replace her with wouldn’t do the same. Holding the children back came at a cost.
“That’s messed up.” His fatigue was causing his words to slur. “I bet you’re good with kids. You want some of your own one day?”
Her heart warmed at the thought of her children. She considered all of them hers. “I love them. I’ve always dreamed of having a big family with lots of children.”
He grunted. “Not for me. No kids for me. Ever.”
Her heart skipped a beat. She twisted to look at him. That couldn’t be right. “You don’t want kids one day?”
It took him a minute to respond that time. Sleep was pulling him under. “Nope, none for me. I come from bad stock. I’m broken.”
That made no sense. He couldn’t be so good with everyone around him if he were as broken as he thought. “But you’re such a good Daddy to Littles. It would be a shame for you not to have kids.”
He shook his head. Well, wobbled his head, but she knew what he meant. “Littles are totally diff… diff’rent from kids. I’m a bad bet. Can’t take a chance on messing them up. Every child deserves loving parents.”
He sounded so sure. Like, his words could be carved in stone, kind of sure. Something terrible must have happened to him as a child. She grew up in the Society, but she still wanted children.
Her heart broke for him and whatever he must have endured. It broke for her, too. She’d hoped she and Connor mighteventually find a way to be together. But a life without children? She couldn’t imagine a future without children of her own.
His even breathing told her he’d fallen asleep. Memorizing the weight of him at her back, she imagined building a whole life around that feeling. Life with Connor as her Daddy would be everything she’d always longed to have. And she would have done everything in her power to be the same for him. But she wasn’t sure she could be truly happy without children one day.
Besides, there were other factors to consider. Now more than ever. A friend still held in the Society’s western compound needed her. She’d promised to be there, and it was a promise she had to keep.
Tears burned the backs of her eyes at the unfairness of life. Brushing his hair out of his face, she leaned over to press a kiss to his forehead, desperately afraid that her heart was no longer her own. She watched through the night. His face was peaceful when he slept, more angel than dark.
He woke early the next morning. She hadn’t figured him as a morning person, but he was in a great mood.
“Time to get ready for the day, babygirl. We have a lot of driving time in front of us.”
He thought they were both headed to Darling. There was no reason to tell him anything different. Arguing wasn’t the way she wanted their final minutes together to be spent.
The clear blue morning sky was cloudless and perfect. They fussed around getting ready to leave, just like they would every morning if things were different. He’d brushed her hair and helped her dress. Her stomach growled as she brushed her teeth,so he found a Disney show on television while he ran to the office to pick up something for them to eat for breakfast.
She kissed just before he left, like she wasn’t planning to walk away. Like she wasn’t memorizing the taste of him.That was, until he took over and kissed her until she saw stars. He was a great kisser.
After he closed the door, she pulled out the shirt he’d given her to wear the night before and put it on over her dress. It smelled like him. Like soap and road and something that was just Connor. But she only took it because it was January, and cold outside. That was what she told herself anyway.
With tears stinging her eyes, she took one last look at the room. It didn’t look like much, but to her, it was finer than a room in a palace. For one night, she hadn’t been owned, she’d been chosen. And that made it beautiful.
Tears falling freely down her face, Bliss squared her shoulders. Leaving the only place she’d ever felt safe enough to stay, she walked out the door and into her future.
Alone.
CHAPTER SIX
