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Emma’s lips compressed.
“All right. Well, speaking of disasters,” he began brightly, checking his phone. “I’ve gotten three texts from my aunt Phil in the last hour.”
Her pupils flared. “Did you tell her?”
“Not yet,” he said with resigned smile. “I knew it was too much to hope that Sharon and darling Dennis could keep their mouths shut.”
Emma was starting to look nauseated. “Should we go see her?”
“Not today.”
Her head drew back. “Your aunt is blowing up your phone and you’re not going to see her today?”
“No.” Garrett was certain. “Today is for us. Well, for you. I had last night. But you got some big news today, so I’m going to turn off the phone entirely and we are going to go inside your mother’s house and order a fantastic dinner for us and our daughter.”
He paused. “Your mother is going out tonight.”
“Of course she is,” Emma mumbled.
“I think it’s good. Generous even. We get to spend time with Stella alone, so she can get used to us as parents. How does that sound?”
“Like your aunt is going to hunt us down and kill us.”
“Let me handle Phil,” he said, rising and holding out his hand.
They were walking inside when he snapped his fingers. “Bodyguards! In addition to putting Stella in jiu-jitsu, we’re going to hire some bodyguards to keep an eye on her.”
“Oh my God.” Emma covered her face with her hand.
“Okay, how about a tutor with a law enforcement background?”
Emma gave him a very wifely look of derision.
But Garrett was not about to be deterred. His one true love had been run down like a dog in the woods. Because of it, they had missed one thousand eight hundred and twenty-four days of their child’s life.
If Garrett was ever going to sleep again, he needed to make plans and get some security protocols in place.
“I know some mercenaries. Maybe they can take turns babysitting. No? How about a nanny with martial arts training?”
Emma continued to ignore him, heading to the kitchen. But that was okay. He’d keep working on her.
Chapter Fifty-Nine
GARRETT
If any law enforcement officials passed them now, they would assume he had kidnapped Emma. One look at her face and they would think she was getting ready to jump out of the moving car.
They might be right.
The car was climbing up the hill on the way to his aunt Phil’s house with Stella riding in the back seat in her booster seat with the tablet he’d had shipped overnight.
A pair of pink sparkly children’s headphones sat on her head. They had cat ears that flashed with multicolored LED light, a function he’d turned off almost immediately.
“You can wait outside while I speak to Phil,” he assured his wife in a low voice after checking the rearview to see if Stella was listening. “I can signal you once the coast is clear.”
Emma turned to him, a slowly moving backdrop of evergreen trees behind her. “Do you think that will happen today? Or even this year?”
Garrett wasn’t about to lie or massage the truth for Emma. “It will be awkward. She’ll be unhappy at first. But once I explain things to her, Phil will get on board.”