Page 175 of Double Daddies
“This is the first time for me.” I finally look at her.
My shoulders relax as I see nothing but kindness on her face.
“Lucky you. Maybe you’ll have more success with not doing it.” Scarlett chuckles. “How did we meet? Well, that is a story.”
“Don’t tease her.” Thorin kisses the side of her head.
“Sorry, Daddy. I didn’t mean to. It’s just so new, and I like telling the story.” Scarlett smiles. “You’re my hero.”
Thorin holds Scarlett close to him and whispers something in her ear. I look away when her cheeks start to turn red. Daddy squeezes my hand, and I give him a smile.
“You doing okay?” he asks.
I nod. “Yeah.”
I don’t know if that’s how Scarlett normally is or if she was matching how I was acting to make me feel better. Either way, I’m grateful.
“How we met. I’m not going to go into a super-detailed story for this. Well, I was pregnant and with a bad guy. He wanted to sell the baby if it was a girl or if it was a boy, he was going to raise him to be like him. I didn’t want that,” Scarlett explains. “So, I had my baby girl, Juniper, and left about twenty-four hours after having her. I drove several hours and came here. I don’t suggest that by the way, and then he caught me as I passed out. The rest is history.”
My mouth hangs open as I stare at her. “You drove several hours after having a baby so soon?”
She shrugs. “I needed to. I couldn’t stay there. It was my only option.”
“I wasn’t.” I took a deep breath. “I wasn’t trying to make you feel bad. I just… My mom talked about how she rested and triednot to do anything for the first couple of days to give her body a break. You must have been in a lot of pain.”
“I was, but when I passed out, I didn’t remember anything. Daddy took care of me and Juniper the whole time. Made sure we had everything we needed and were healing well,” Scarlett kisses Thorin.
The ringing of a phone made me jump.
“Sorry, I need to take this,” Papa says, placing me in Daddy’s lap.
I watch him walk to the front door, answer the phone, and talk in a hushed voice. What could he be talking about? Was it something bad? He doesn’t look pleased, but at the same time, he does.
“How are you liking it here? Have you gotten to explore yet?” Scarlett asks. “I wasn’t able to explore for the longest time since I was on bed rest. Then it was walking for only a couple of minutes a day. I was going cabin-crazy by the time I was able to walk enough to look around a little.”
“I haven’t,” I mumble, looking down at my hands.
“She stepped on some glass the first night she was here, which put her on the couch or bed while her feet healed. But she’s better now,” Daddy explains. “No deep cuts, but Aiden wanted to make sure she was healed before she put a lot of pressure on them.”
“Owie.” Scarlett scrunches up her nose. “That can’t have been fun.”
“It wasn’t. It was absolute torture to be sitting on the couch, not doing anything. They wouldn’t even let me crawl on the ground.” I sigh. “Absolute torture.”
Scarlett giggles.
“Can I talk to you and Thorin?” Papa asks, looking at Daddy behind me.
My whole body locks up as I look at Papa, but he won’t look at me. What’s wrong? Why won’t he look at me?
“We’ll only be a second,” Daddy whispers. “Be a good girl.”
Nerves run through my body as Daddy places me on the couch, walking over to Papa with Thorin. I can’t keep my eyes off them, trying to read lips, but I can’t make anything out.
“Whatever it is, it’s going to be okay,” Scarlett gently says, sitting next to me. “These men will protect us with their lives. You have nothing to be afraid of.”
“What if they are talking about something involving me? What if they don’t want me anymore?” I rush out.
Scarlett grabs one of my hands, giving it a little squeeze. “That’s not true. They absolutely love and adore you. I can see it in the way they look at you and take care of you.”
