I moved faster.
“Kitten.” My hand pressed flat to the wall above her shoulder, caging her in against the pantry. She froze, wide eyes flashing up at me. “Where are you going?”
“I shouldn’t be here.” Her voice cracked, the words brittle. “Not like this, with her—”
“Don’t do that. Don’t run.” I leaned in, keeping my voice low. “Not after last night.”
Her throat bobbed. “Brooks—”
“Dani, you have to stay for pancakes,” Carolina’s voice rang out from the kitchen. “Daddy, make her stay.Pleeeassee.”
Apparently, the universe was in on the joke, too.
Dani pressed her lips into a thin line, torn between fight and fold. I watched the emotions flicker across her face, one after another like flipping pages—panic, guilt, longing. The urge to bolt was there in the tight set of her shoulders, but so was the softness I had felt last night, the tenderness when she’d whispered my name like it meant something more.
She wanted to run, but she didn’t want to leave.
Not really.
Her gaze darted toward the kitchen, where Carolina’s singsong voice carried on about berries and cartoons. When she looked back at me, her eyes were glassy, full of everything she couldn’t put into words.
“It’s just breakfast,” I said, softer now, close enough that my breath skimmed her temple. “Carolina already adores you, and I know that you want her to have this—to know her sister when she gets here.”
Her breath hitched. For a heartbeat, I thought she’d shove past me, vanish out the front door, and slam it shut behind her. Instead, her shoulders dropped, the tension in her frame breaking like a dam. She sagged back against the wall, lips parting in defeat.
“Besides, you said you were hungry.”
She blew out a shaky laugh that sounded nothing like amusement. “Unbelievable. You’re guilt-tripping me with your daughter and her pancakes.”
I shamelessly grinned.
Dani glared, but the color in her cheeks betrayed her. “Fine, but we’retalkingabout this later,” she hissed, rolling her eyes heavenward. “I guess I’m staying for pancakes.”
I brushed my thumb across her jaw, leaning in just enough to let her know I wasn’t letting go. “Damn right you are.”
Dani
By the time afternoon sunlight slanted across the living room, I was almost convinced I had stumbled into an alternate universe. One where I wasn’t just the weird, goth girlie sneaking out of a hookup’s house at dawn or hiding from awkward run-ins with ex-wives, but rather, someone who might actually be exactly where she was supposed to be. That was the only explanation for the scene playing out in front of me.
Coach Brooks Bailey-Ward—the man, the myth, and the baseball legend—was sitting cross-legged on the carpet with his massive hands splayed obediently across a towel while his six-year-old daughter painted his nails.
Hot pink with glitter.
“Hold still, Daddy,” Carolina ordered with the seriousness of a brain surgeon. “You’re smudging.”
“Not smudging,” he grumbled, though the twitch in his jaw gave him away. “My hand is falling asleep.”
“You’ve only been sitting there for five minutes,” I teased, dipping a brush into the sky-blue polish I’d claimed for his other hand. “Be glad she didn’t want to do your makeup.”
His gaze slid toward me, heavy-lidded and sharp, but there was no real bite in it. Just warmth, and maybe something else? The kind of look that made my stomach somersault even as my brush trembled over his thumbnail.
Carolina, blissfully unaware, hummed to herself while she finished his pinkie. “You look beautiful,” she declared with a satisfied nod.
Brooks raised a brow at me. “Beautiful, huh?”
“Oh, definitely,” I said, keeping my tone solemn. “The glitter really brings out your eyes.”
He groaned under his breath but didn’t pull away. Instead, he let Carolina grab his hand and blow dramatically on the wet polish. Watching the two of them together, so unguarded, so easy—it did something to me I couldn’t quite name.
