“No. Brock isn’t my husband, no. Just my baby daddy.”
Oh fuck. Did I just saybaby daddyin front of my father? Why were my palms sweating so much?
My father nodded, his expression completely blank and unreadable. “I see. So you intend to raise the child … together … but unwed?”
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Red alert.I needed out of this conversation, stat. What was even happening right now?
‘Pull the fire alarm,’I told Cass.
His grin widened.‘This isn’t school. No fire alarm. You just gotta deal with it.’
Brock had tensed beside me, and I squeezed his hand in reassurance, for my sake as much as his. “Yes,” I replied. “As I’m not married, our child will be born to unmarried parents.”
Keep it cool, Evie. He’s just trying to get to know you.
“I see,” my father said again. “You have no plans to marry, then?”
Why was he having such a hard time grasping the situation? Anyway, weren’t we just talking about the Akuma? How had the conversation turned so quickly?
‘Do something or I’ll never forgive you,’I told Cass, who was red faced, clutching his little potbelly, trying to hold in his laughter.
“No—” I was saying when Brock interrupted me.
“My intention has always been to marry your daughter, sir.”
Say what?My eyebrows hit my hairline and my heart did all sorts of crazy somersaults in my chest. I was sure I wasn’t containing my shock.
“I see that this is news to my daughter,” my father said, and a hint of gentle amusement entered his tone.
But I ignored him for now, turned fully to face Brock.‘You planned to … marry me?’
Brock’s eyes twinkled.‘What did you think I meant when I said I loved you and move in with me?’He chuckled at our private conversation.‘You look as shocked as you did when you first found out you were pregnant.’
‘Well, yeah.’There was so much more I could say, but the words weren’t quite forming. I sought out Cass instead. He would understand. He’d known me long before my life threatened to get all domestic. I widened my eyes at him.
‘Holy fucking fuck. He just said the M word.’Cass sounded as shocked as I was.
‘He did.’
‘He sounds like he means it too.’
‘I know,’I said.
“I’m glad to know that you intend to do the honorable thing here,” my father was saying, as if I wasn’t in the middle of a huge holy-fucking-shit situation.
Brock squeezed my hand. “I’ve not yet asked her to marry me, but I assure you that day will soon come and I’ll do anything to protect her.”
Ohmygod. Did Brock just offhandedly propose?‘What’s happening?’I asked my bestie.‘Do something now!’
“How did the Akuma find you, sir?” Cass piped up, walking around from behind my dad’s wheelchair and taking center stage. “And what makes you think they’ll find Evie next?”
Thank fuck.
My blood pressure started to return to normal as my father took the bait.
“I don’t know how they found me. They shouldn’t have been able to. My kitsune power is gone. Nothing but faint remnants of it linger, not enough for them to track me with it. I managed to hide from them for many years—until a couple of weeks ago. And I know they’re hunting my daughter, because the demons asked me about her.”
Even though I understood that he’d stayed away to protect me, it still stung to know he was alive this whole time and didn’t tell me. If the roles were reversed, I would have found a way to get a message to my daughter.
