Page 94 of The Daddy’s Girl

My brows shoot upward, but Julian remains unmoving.

“Amelia, promise me that he never hurt you. Tell me he never coerced you into anything.”

Huffing loudly, she leaves my side and shoves him out of the kitchen. My feet remain stationed in their place as she walks him to the door. I hear their muffled arguments but can’t make out what they are saying.

I know the reason she’s arguing with him out of my earshot is because she doesn’t want me to hear what I already know. That Amelia has wanted this for a very long time. A secret she keeps, I assume, because she’s embarrassed. But I find it endearing.

As I continue to make coffee for myself and Amelia, I look back on all our encounters over the past few years, seeing things differently.

The way she’d always sit next to me at dinner.

The way her eyes would find me across a crowded room.

The way she spoke about me to her family, always giving me more credit than I deserved.

I just assumed she was a devoted goddaughter. I had no idea it was the budding blossom of love.

When Amelia comes back into the kitchen, I slide over her latte, leaning against the counter with a cappuccino between my fingers.

“He’s gone. And he promised to stay quiet,” she says before chewing on the inside of her cheeks.

“How do you feel?” I ask.

For a moment as she stares at me from across the kitchen, I worry that the nervous look she’s wearing means she has regrets or is second-guessing this decision. Then her lips relax into a lazy smile.

Ignoring her coffee, she comes toward me. I set my mug down as I accept her in my arms. Wrapping me up in a tight hug around my waist, she burrows her face in my chest.

“I feel…like I’m living in a dream.”

I kiss the top of her head. “Me too, Trouble.”

“I heard what you said…” Her voice trails, and I know immediately what she is referring to. The declaration of love I shared with her brother.

“I meant every word.”

She tilts her chin up toward me, and I lean down to capture her lips. It doesn’t take long before the kiss grows heated. She nips at my lips, and I lick into her mouth, desperate for more. Her body grows warm and pliant in my arms, so I hook my hands under her thighs and lift her onto the counter behind her.

Her legs squeeze me tightly as I grind my growing erection against her. But then she pulls away, panting.

“You know, I was thinking,” she says as I move my lips to her neck, unable to pull them away.

“Yeah? About what?”

“About what you said yesterday…about not knowing if you could be with one person.”

Inside, I start to bristle but focus more on the taste of her skin and the warmth of her cunt as I grind against it.

“Uh-huh,” I mutter in the tone of a question.

I don’t know where she’s going with this, but I hope it’s not another argument where I have to convince her that I’m not the right man to get into a relationship with. I’m willing to try with her. I am.

Suddenly, something dawns on me, so I pull away and look into her eyes. “Amelia, listen to me.”

Her pupils are dilated, and her chest is moving heavily as she nods.

“If we do this…whatever this is…I won’t see anyone else. You know that, right? I would never⁠—”

She rolls her eyes and cuts me off. “I know that. But that’s not what I’m saying.”