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CHAPTER 13

ALEXEI

When I get to the hospital, my mother’s procedure has been pushed because of an emergency. Since I don’t have Emery’s phone number, I have to text Forrest.

Alexei

I need your sister’s number

Forrest

Isn’t she with you?

I’m at the hospital…she’s at home with Inessa, and I’m going to be later than I thought

Shit, is everything okay?

Yeah, just delayed

He drops her contact card in a reply and doesn’t ask any further questions.

I add her to my address book, then send her a quick update.

Alexei

This is Alexei

Emery

How’s your mom?

Procedure is delayed

Okay

Might happen at 6 pm, they say

How is Inessa?

Managed to trick her into having a nap by pretending to sleep on her floor

I have done that

Now I’m cleaning up the mess we made in your kitchen

She attaches a photo. Flour is everywhere.

I stare at the picture. Someone else might see mess, but I see Inessa having a really good time flinging flour this way and that way. In the background, her highchair is covered in smooshed blueberries and pancake crumbs, too.

Alexei

I’m sorry I missed pancakes

Emery

Batter is in the fridge and lasts for a few days

Might not be back for bedtime

I’ll do my best

I flip back to my messages with her brother. I start to type out a few things. Your sister is amazing. How do I thank her for stepping in to help? What does she like?

But they all feel too revealing.

And they are things I either need to say to her directly, or figure out for myself.

* * *

It’s midnight by the time I finally get home. I let myself in quietly. The text updates from Emery stopped around nine, and just in case she’s passed out on Inessa’s bedroom floor, I don’t risk messaging her again.

The house is pretty dark, but the light in the stairwell leading upstairs is on—so that’s where I expect them to be.

But when I go into the kitchen to grab something to eat, a low voice from the family room says, “Don’t turn on the light, okay?”

I turn around and dimly make out Emery’s face peeking over the back of the couch. Bright sunshine in the darkest hours of the night.

She stretches, looking rumbled and warm and so fucking sexy it makes my throat close tight.

“Bedtime wasn’t as easy as nap time,” she admits softly when she joins me in the kitchen. “Inessa is passed out on the couch, and she took me down with her.”

“That’s okay,” I manage to say. “Thank you for spending all day with her. I know it’s a lot.”

“I just did what any EBUB would do. Slapped on a jersey I’ve never worn before and tried my best.”

It takes my brain a minute to catch up. EBUG. Emergency backup goalie.

“Back up babysitter,” she mutters when I don’t respond.

“I get it.”

“It was funnier in my head earlier, when I was Googling how to put a toddler down for a nap.”

“It’s funny.”

“Then you should laugh,” she says lightly.

I sigh and lift my hand, reaching out to touch her. It’s instinctive. Instinctively stupid.

She takes a big step back, just before I wrap my fingers around her arm.

“Sorry,” I mutter before I shove my hand back in my pocket.

“We made turkey meatballs and spaghetti for dinner, if you want some leftovers? They’re in the fridge.” She covers her mouth, but the big yawn that escapes is unmistakable.

“You’re tired,” I say. “There’s a bedroom in the basement you can use.”

“You said that earlier.”

Oh, right. I scrub my hand over my face. “And, if it matters to you, the door between it and the rest of the house locks.”

Her lips part in surprise, then she nods. “Got it.”

I tip my head toward the living room. “Today… I know my daughter…”

My voice catches on the words.

The last time we were alone together in the dark, I didn’t have a child.

Emery holds my gaze for a moment, and I’m not the only one who has profoundly changed in the last two years. The last time we were alone, she didn’t have this sizzling confidence.

It’s unnerving.

It’s also very, very attractive.

Lock it down, Artyomov.

“My daughter can be exhausting,” I finish. “I know how much work it is to watch her. Thank you.”

Emery’s eyebrows lift, as if to say, that is an understatement.

“She’s fun.” She pauses, trying and failing to school a comical expression on her face. “More fun when we’re cooking. Less fun when I’m trying to convince her to do something she doesn’t want to do.”

I nod. Accurate.

“But we survived the night.” She takes a deep breath. “Do you want me to heat up the meatballs for you?”

“That sounds good.”

Silence stretches between us as the microwave counts down.

“Is your mom still okay?” she finally asks. “And how’s your dad doing?”

I’d already texted her that the procedure went well.

But the rest of the night…waiting with my father, trying to convince him to leave the hospital for at least a few hours…

That didn’t feel within the scope of what we could text about.

“One of the nurses found him an extendable chair to sleep on. I might drag him back here tomorrow. He needs a shower.”

She laughs easily, the corners of her eyes crinkling.

My mouth turns up, and the brightness in her gaze intensifies.

“Oh, you can laugh at your own jokes,” she teases.

“It’s not a joke. He really stinks.”

She tips her head back, her throat working on a silent cackle, and my smile falls away as I stare at the long, creamy expanse of her neck.

Intense, visceral need claws at the inside of my chest.

The microwave beeps.

“I’m going to move Inessa to her bed,” I say quickly, before striding into the living room, leaving my off-limits temptation behind me.

My daughter is curled up in the corner of the sectional, a favourite blanket tucked in all around her.

Her hair smells like shampoo, and she’s in clean PJs. The living room might look like a bomb went off in it, and they might not have made it back upstairs, but Emery did better than I would have on my own tonight.

“To bed we go,” I murmur in Russian.

Inessa rolls into my chest with ease and doesn’t wake up as I carry her upstairs, not even when I put her down in her little princess bed.

I leave her door open and close the baby gate at the top of the stairs before returning to the kitchen. I tell myself I don’t need the baby monitor. I’m just going to eat really quickly, maybe find out where Emery got that newfound confidence, and then crash in my own bed.

And perhaps leaving the monitor upstairs is a little insurance that I don’t do something stupid, like crowd her against the counter and kiss her neck until she laughs for me again.

But it’s not necessary.

When I get back to the kitchen, the meatballs are on the counter, my emergency back up babysitter is gone, and the basement door is firmly closed.

My pulse hammers thick and heavy in my neck.

I need to be careful here. Emery is the best childcare option I have, and step one here has to be convincing her to stay for the next few weeks. But if she says yes, then the last thing I can do is let any latent chemistry spark between us.

The way she split is almost definitely a sign that chemistry is one-sided, anyway.

Fuck.

I grab a fork.

The meatballs are fucking delicious.

She survived a day with my tiny hurricane of a child, and she cooks like a goddess. Nothing else matter. The more boundaries I build around my worst instincts the better.