Total pages in book: 157
Estimated words: 155900 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 780(@200wpm)___ 624(@250wpm)___ 520(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 155900 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 780(@200wpm)___ 624(@250wpm)___ 520(@300wpm)
I cleared my throat and turned back to my daughter. “Might be fun for you to go to his same school?”
I didn’t know why I was framing it a question, but I found myself tiptoeing into this thing.
Eyes the same color as mine went wide, so vividly green, though the gold sparkled beneath the rays of the sun. “Don’t even tease me, Mr. Kane, because I fink that would be the best thing in my whole life.”
God, this girl had a ton of bests, and I was set on giving her a billion more.
“That’s good then because I want this to be your home. Where you live.”
“Forever?” Her brows shot for the sky.
“Well, at least until you grow up and you’re ready to move out.”
“Because you love me so much?”
Emotion crested in Emery. A wave of grief and a torrent of love.
Same way as it did with me.
“Yeah, Maci. Because I love you so much. Because you’re my best friend, but you’re more than that.”
“What am I?” she asked, so innocent.
I scooted closer to her, my hand trembling like crazy when I reached out to run my fingertips down her chubby cheek. “You’re my daughter, Maci. I’m your daddy.”
Confusion knitted her little brow. “I don’t got a daddy.”
Air wheezed out of my lungs, my spirit screaming for what I’d been missing but had had no idea that I was. “You do, sweetheart, just neither of us knew it.”
“Because you loved my mommy?”
Fuck.
How the hell was I supposed to answer that?
Emery sustained the brunt of that question. I knew it in the way a tormented moan clawed up her throat. One she tried to keep hidden.
I paused, wanting to be cautious, to make sure I didn’t damage my daughter more than she already had been. I knew questions would arise as she grew older. As she understood what having a child meant, but I figured it was unnecessary to go into those details then.
“Well, unfortunately I didn’t get to know your mommy all that well, but I know enough about her from you and your auntie Em to know that I absolutely would have loved her. I know she was amazing, just like you and our Em.”
“I fink when she gets back from heaven, she should come live here with us.”
Sorrow clutched my chest. Sorrow for Maci. Sorrow for Emery who physically bowed at her statement.
My palm spread out over Maci’s cheek, my hand covering the entirety of the left side of her face. My thumb stroked over the plumpness, and my voice grew rough with the pain I was experiencing for the two of them.
Taking it on as if it were my own.
“I wish that she could, Maci. I wish I could bring her back from heaven, but she has to stay there. But I know she’ll be watching over you. Watching over both you and your auntie.”
Tears blurred my daughter’s eyes. “Never?”
Fuck.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
Stickiness lined my throat, making it nearly impossible to speak. “I’m sorry, sweetheart, but I promise you, I’m going to be right here with you. Both me and your auntie Em.” I glanced at Emery from over my shoulder, and she inched forward, her words just as haggard as mine. “We’re right here, sweet girl. Both Kane and I are right here, with you.”
“But what if you have to go to heaven, too?”
Thought my heart was going to hemorrhage out.
“I will do everything in my power to make sure that doesn’t happen,” I rasped. “The only place I want to be is right here, with you. With your auntie.”
Tears poured down her cheeks.
“Come here, precious girl,” I murmured, and Maci climbed over to us. She threw her little arms around my neck and squeezed me tight, and I pulled Emery into us.
The three of us hugged each other like mad.
“I’ll always take care of you.”
“Because you take care of who you love most?” Maci whimpered it through her tears, her question so sweet in the middle of the turmoil.
“That’s right, Angel Face, you take care of who you love most.”
A silent promise poured out inside me.
A promise to give this child everything that she deserved.
To love her the way my mother had loved me, but without the torment and pain that tainted our lives.
Maci would never have to question her safety at night. Would never have to question the safety of Emery or my love for her.
Because I was going to love them both with everything I had. Sacrifice it all if that was what was required.
Because I’d never fail the ones I loved again.
FORTY-SIX
EMERY
Kane tucked a clean, folded T-shirt into the duffel that he had on the end of his bed. There was an aura about him.
A darkness that spun and stirred the air into disorder.
A razor-sharp edge that made it feel dangerous to touch him. The same thing I’d felt when I’d first met him.