Page 58 of Their Forever Daddy

‘Folly’ turned out to be a beach nearly an hour from Lost River. They ended up at a seafood place that gave new meaning to the term ‘hole in the wall’, and Grant vowed to keep an open mind as they settled at a scarred wooden table with equally scarred wooden chairs.

The view, at least, was excellent. And he wasn’t just talking about the water.

Jesse and Edie opted to sit across from him, which meant he could watch them both as they talked. Despite the similarities in their slender builds, they couldn’t have been more different. His babygirl had opted for a long wig that matched her natural hair color and made her golden eyes pop even more than usual. Though that could also be whatever she’d done with her makeup. As always, it was flawless, and he couldn’t wait to try and ruin it later.

Then there was Edie. Dark to Jesse’s light, but no less breathtaking. It had been more of a shock seeing her made up, but only because he wasn’t expecting her to do anything different. She hadn’t struck him as the type of woman to go out of her way for a man, and he’d found that oddly appealing.

Knowing she had in fact elected to go out of her way for him was intoxicating.

Instead of the jeans and t-shirt he’d seen her in so far, she was wearing a dress that looked a bit like a man’s oversized button-down with a wide belt wrapped around the middle. The look suited her, drawing attention to her tiny waist, but she looked so uncomfortable he wondered if she’d borrowed something of Jesse’s. He’d never seen the outfit before, but seeing as how his babygirl’s closet was the size of some apartments, that wasn’t really saying much.

All in all, the pair of them were striking. Breathtaking, even.

And all his.

Jesus wept.

It was warmer than he’d expected, so they’d opted to sit outside. A breeze from the ocean brought a bit of a chill with it, but he barely noticed. Jesse was laughing at something Edie had said, that loud, cackling laugh she had when her guard was truly down. The first time he’d heard that laugh, he’d fallen head over heels in love with her right then and there, though he’d been far too pragmatic to believe in such a thing as love at first sight back then. But looking back now, he knew he’d been a goner the moment he’d heard her laugh.

By contrast, Edie was smiling but not laughing, her ruby-red lips curving upward as she sipped surprisingly delicately at her whiskey.

Given their respective lives, it amused him that Edie was, in many ways, the more elegant and reserved of the two. Jesse had never really let Hollywood change her, she just was who she was and didn’t give a fuck what anyone thought of her. Which meant she was, mostly, the same loud, bratty, cheerful babygirl in public that she was at home.

Edie reminded him more of himself than Jesse. Content to sit by quietly and observe. But where his people-watching was a trait he’d honed into a weapon over the years, Edie seemed to use it more as a shield.

If she wasn’t talking, people couldn’t get to know her. And if they couldn’t get to know her, they couldn’t learn where to hurt her.

For the most part, they kept the dinner conversation light and breezy. The normal small talk pleasantries of getting to know someone new. Had she lived in Lost River her whole life? Yes, born and raised. Never been more than a hundred miles from home. What about him? A California boy, he’d confessed, offering up a sheepish sort of smile when she teased him about being a surfer dude.

Tales from childhood were shared, the easy kind that didn’t dig too deep into whatever painful past each might be hiding.

By the time they were polishing off the ridiculously large seafood platter they’d shared, Edie had relaxed enough to join her laughter with Jesse’s. Hers was deeper, richer, but he felt that same tug he’d felt the first time he’d heard his babygirl laugh.

Maybe when he looked back in another two years, he’d be able to pinpoint this moment as the one where he’d fallen in love with Edie McDowell.

Pushing that thought to the back of his mind for the moment, he picked up his own drink and sipped as he watched her. And as much as he hated to dim the light in her eyes for even a moment, there were things he wanted to know about her. “So, Edie. Tell us about Ken.”

As he’d expected, she froze in the act of reaching for another crab leg, her eyes wide in her suddenly too-pale face. “Why do you want to know about Ken?”

“He was important to you. So, he’s important to me. To us,” he added with a nod toward Jesse, who bobbed her head in agreement. “Tell us about him.”

Pulling her hand away from the platter in the middle of the table, she swallowed hard as she reached for her drink instead. “What do you want to know?”

“How did you meet?”

Jesse shifted slightly, facing Edie and laying a hand over hers on the table as Edie sipped silently at her drink. He let the moment stretch out, not wanting to rush her. Things like this deserved time and respect, and he was determined to give her both.

“I’d known him forever, really. The way you know people in a town the size of ours without really knowing them.” She glanced at Jesse, who smiled and nodded. “But I never really talked to him until after Jesse left.”

Pain flickered across Jesse’s face, but she stayed silent as Edie turned her head to look out over the ocean, her throat working rapidly as though she were battling back tears. “He found me at the lake on his property. It was where Jesse and I…” A pretty pink blush colored her cheeks. “It was kind of our spot. I never realized it was on his property until he found me there, cussing up a storm. About Jesse, mostly, but in reality, about pretty much anything I could think of to be mad about. I don’t know how long he was watching me, but he waited for me to run out of steam and then he about gave me a heart attack when he said ‘Someone outta wash your mouth out with soap, little girl’.”

Grant laughed. “I bet that went over well.”

A ghost of a smile flickered across Edie’s face. “Back then, I had no idea there was even an ounce of submissiveness in me. When I was with anyone else, I was the one in charge, without question. So, yeah, I let him have it. Asked him who the hell he thought he was and told him he could fuck right off with his sanctimonious opinions of me.”

Jesse’s mouth had fallen open slightly at this point and she was listening with rapt attention. “What did he do?”

“Just stood there for a while, let me rant and rave until I finally stopped on my own. Then he asked me to dinner.” The smile was wider now, more real as Edie turned back to them. “A month later we were married. Which, for me, had as much to do with shutting down the rumor mill that was still running hot with gossip about Jesse as it did anything else. My family was… to say they didn’t approve of my relationship with Jesse was putting it lightly. So with her gone, it just seemed like the path of least resistance to marry him.”

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