Page 18

Chapter

Fourteen

“ D addy? Daddy, why sleeps wif Papa Colton?”

Abby came barreling in, Iago standing there with a blush.

“She needed you, you know?” Iago whispered. “I took her to go potty, though.”

“Thanks. It’s all good. C’mere, Abby.” He opened his arms up.

She climbed up on the bed, then launched into his arms.

“Oof.”

Oops. Her leg must have hit Colton.

“Gentle, baby girl. Papa Colton has an owwie leg, remember?”

Her face fell. “Poor poor Papa!”

“Thanks, sweetie. Good morning. Iago, you want to go grab a coffee or something, we’re good.”

“Okay, Boss. See you later, Abby!” And he shut the door and fled.

“Bye bye.” Abby curled into his arms with a sigh. “Daddy, my tummy needs eggs and coffee.”

Colton blinked. “Coffee.”

“C. H. O. C. C. I. E. M. I. L. K,” he spelled out.

“Ah.” Colton grinned. “I could use some of that too. I love eggs, Abby.”

“Me too!” Abby beamed at him. “And…bacons?”

“If your Daddy says so, sure.” Colton raised an eyebrow at him. They were doing a lot of facial expression talking. “Do you want to eat in here with us, or go sit in the big room with all the guys?”

“I—” She looked confused, like she couldn’t quite figure out what the right answer was.

“How about we eat in here for brekkie, baby girl, with Papa Colton, and then today we can see everyone for lunch or dinner. You liked that last night.”

“Okay!” She nodded, relaxing. She worried like he did, about doing the right thing, making the correct decisions.

Colton nodded easily. “Well, you two tell me what to order and I will. Then I’ll hop over to Xavi’s to get us coffee.”

“You hop wif you leg?” She tilted her head, blinking at Colton.

Colton’s warm laugh sounded so good. “Well, that’s more of a hobble. I was using hop to mean I would go fast.”

“Daddy, call Xavi and say bring me coffee? Poor Papa.”

“How about I go get it, sweetie?” He did adore her, even if he wanted to stay in bed.

“Okay.”

Colton blinked, mouthing, “You okay with that?”

He guessed maybe he shouldn’t be. Maybe he should just stop. “Let me call down and order.”

Xavi answered the phone. “Hey. You okay? Iago’s in here and I told him you’d be ordering. He’ll be up with three coffees.”

“I’m fine. You rock. Thanks, man.”

“You’re welcome. And he’s adorbs, you know?”

“I do.” He chuckled. Xavi would never hook up with another omega, but he admired. “Xan thought so too.”

“Ooh, really. We’ll have to gossip. Did you spend the night together?”

“Yep.”

“Was it amazing?”

“You know it.” Better than.

“I’ll need all the vicarious stuff later.”

“Sure.”

“Daddy! I want to fly!”

“Oops. I need to give someone their morning foot in the belly.” He grinned, because if Colton’s eyebrows gyrated anymore, they would fall right off. Thank goodness they weren’t naked.

“Later. Enjoy the caffeine.”

“We will.” He hung up. “Iago will bring our coffee. Come on, sweetie. We’ll fly.” He laid on his back and held out his hands.

“Hey, I didn’t mean you couldn’t leave her with me. I just didn’t want you to feel weird.”

“No. No, I—We’ll talk later. Flying now.”

“FLY!” Abby cried out, grabbing his hands.

He chuckled, then pulled her up against his feet as he bent his legs, then rolled up, thrusting his legs into the air as she spread her arms and legs to “fly”.

“Oh my God, that is the cutest thing I’ve ever seen.”

“Isn’t she?” His baby girl was the most perfect little one on earth.

“She is.” Colton settled back in the sheets, watching them and laughing. He ordered food, Abby giggling, him calling out their order, and it was like Colton had always been there.

Which was a dangerous feeling.

Dangerous and deeply satisfying.

God, he was screwed.

“Okay, breakfast is ordered,” Colton murmured.

“I fly wif you, Papa Colton?”

“Oh, honey, Papa Colton’s legs can’t do that. But I bet I can do it with my arms.” Colton grinned at Abby.

“Papa Colton is wicked strong, baby girl.”

“Fly wif you! Fly wif you, Papa!” She climbed right into Colton’s arms, her expression overjoyed.

“Okay, are you ready?” Colton rolled to his back, then lifted her. “Zoom!” It wasn’t as high as his legs could get, but there was way more control, and Colton zoomed Abby around in the air.

“Daddy! Daddy, look at me!”

Sebastian’s chest hurt with loving her. “I see you, baby. You’re flying!”

He didn’t know what he was supposed to do, how he was supposed to feel, so he…he just went with it. He didn’t have a choice. This was his little girl, and Colton was saying and doing all the things he could possibly want.

He just hoped it was real.

Not that he thought that Colton was being dishonest. As hard as it was to hear, all the wasted and lost time wasn’t their fault.

But Colton was still a traveling man, right? He’d be off on another job soon.

The thought made him a little queasy, but what was he going to do?

People worked.

So did he. In fact, he needed to get back to readings. He had clients that started again next week, and Abby had a routine. They had lives.

He would just have to figure it out, he guessed, as it went.

“Daddy, pay attention. Look at me.” Abby glared at him, her Maxwell eyes focused and sure.

“I am looking at you, demanding girl.” He reached up and tickled one of her feet. “See?”

She squealed and laughed, and Colton eased her onto the bed between them.

“Was that so much fun?” He’d bet Colton was exhausted.

“So much fun,” she agreed, snuggling in and taking up way more room than her little bitty body ought to. “Eggs?”

“They’re coming, I promise.”

It was hard to be three years old and hungry.

“Okay. I go play with my babies now?”

He didn’t want to get up, and of course they’d to have done all this in Colton’s rooms and not his. “In a minute. We have to go to our room to do that. This is Papa Colton’s room. This isn’t where the babies live.”

“Oh.” She gave him a curious glance, a tilt of the head. “The babies live with the ghosties.”

“This is true. The babies are on an adventure.”

She frowned at Colton. “You like vee-ventures?”

Colton turned to face her, expression so serious. “I do. I’ve been on a lot of adventures, but I’d like to be at home too. Because, you know, home is the best. Home is where your bed is.”

“And your babies!”

Colton winked at her. “Exactly. And my baby.”

She smiled wide. She was not a little girl who was worried about her place in the world.

He wished he wasn’t worried about his.

“Daddy? I’m a good girl?”

“You are my best girl.”

The knock came, and it was Iago, dropping off coffee, and then the food came, and that distracted his girl. She sat at the little table, a pillow as her booster, and while he kept an eye on her, it gave him and Colton a chance to wake up together.

“I didn’t mean to say I didn’t want her if you went to get coffee, baby. I just don’t want you to feel pressured into leaving her alone with me if you aren’t ready.”

“I know, I know, but it made me feel like a bad father. I mean, I don’t have any reason to trust you, and that makes me feel shitty like…

Like I’m thinking with my dick and not my head.

I guess my heart and my dick believe you’re all right.

Except, my head does too. It’s just—I have to be cautious.

I need to be careful with me, and I need to be careful with you.

I need to be that way with her most especially, and I kinda failed that here.

To be honest, I’m a little embarrassed about it, you know. ”

He shouldn’t have done it. He shouldn’t have even suggested it. They didn’t even know each other anymore. Not only that, but he’d let his little girl stay with strangers last night because he wanted to get laid.

Not that he’d known he was going to get laid, right?

“I’m sorry, that wasn’t my intention at all. I just didn’t want you to feel pressured.” Colton shrugged at him, totally interrupting his train of thought. “This is all new.”

“That’s an understatement and a half.” He had to grin though, because that was true. It was all new. “So what happens now? Tonight’s the big filmed walk-through?”

“Yeah, we’re bringing in a medium, and he’s a great guy. I’ve never met him in person, but I’ve worked with him online quite a few times, and we’ve been corresponding.”

“Oh?” Sebastian ignored the jolt of jealousy. “Where’s he from?”

“Santa Fe originally, and then I think he spent quite a bit of time in California. Now he’s sort of a nomad.”

“Yeah?” Sebastian couldn’t imagine. He really wasn’t the nomadic type. He didn’t even normally go as far as Denver, or Grand Junction, for that matter.

“Yeah, like seriously he lives in a travel trailer kind of nomad. He’s a wild little guy, but deeply decent, very spiritual, and very into helping.”

“I don’t guess any of those words are bad.” He wasn’t sure he liked this very spiritual guy. “Do you really think he can help?”

“I think he’s going to try. I think I am too, so that’s something.” Colton looked away, like he was thinking and then glanced back at him. “Did you mean it?”

“Did I mean what?” He was lost.

“That you were interested in me staying for a while?”

Oh. “We need to talk about that.” Because he had meant it, and he did mean it now, but…

“It depends on what you mean by a while. If you’re going to stay for three or four days and then go permanently, I need to know that, so I can prepare Abby for it.

I need you to know that when I said a while, I meant a while.

When you say a while, what do you mean?”

“I mean as long as you’ll let me.” Colton took a deep breath. “There’s nothing to hold me in California, baby. My parents are there. That’s a good thing to avoid. Gent has offices there, but he also has a place in Aspen, so if I need to meet with him someplace not Zoom, I can do that.”

He blinked. Okay. Okay, wow. That was—A lot. But he found himself smiling. “So, you want to hang out here?”

“I do.”

“Okay. I’m—” He took a deep breath, just like Colton had. “You can stay with us. I’d love for you to.”

“I would love that too.” Colton glanced at Abby. “We should sit down tomorrow night and set some ground rules. I know I can be…alpha-y. And you two have a routine.”

He nodded. “I appreciate that. I do. Okay. Today, we enjoy breakfast and you go to the house and film, right?”

“Right.” Colton chuckled. “Let’s get the business part out of the way. And the solving of the ghost problem. I want it safe in the house for Abby and you.”

“And you,” he put in gently. “If one of them pushed you down the stairs or something, I would never forgive myself.”

He’d seen Colton’s scars now, which made the “I was in the hospital in a coma after a cave-in” so real. He couldn’t bear it if his house was the reason Colton got hurt again. It had taken him too long to get better the first time.

And that was purely beyond the selfishness of wanting Colton with him and Abby, learning how to be whatever they decided to be together.

“Daddy! Is my coffee cool enough now?” Abby was at the table swinging her legs and nibbling instead of shoveling her portion of breakfast.

“Let me check.” Xavi never made her hot chocolate super hot, but if he had to split the milk with more than her drink, she had to wait for it to cool down. And Colton had gotten an almond milk latte.

“So, still almond milk?”

Colton grinned. “I prefer to waste my lactose on ice cream or cheese. And not start the morning with heartburn.”

“Luckily, little bit there isn’t showing any signs of that problem.” He would hate for her to lose out on her milk obsession. She really loved her “coffee”, and her froyo, and her cereal with milk, and her whipped cream.

“Yeah. One of the few things my mom gave me.” Colton wrinkled his nose. “But if I really want it, I just take a pill. Mom? She gets the bloat like a cow-eating larkspur.”

“Ow.” Though he more than kind of thought that Colton’s mom deserved to be in pain all the time. She’d denied her grandchild and denied her son the knowledge of her. That was the height of cruelty.

“Yeah.” Colton’s tiny smile said he thought the same thing.

“Let me take her the ‘coffee’.” He made quote fingers. Then he took Abby her drink, sitting down with her for a moment at the table to see what all she’d eaten. The bacon was all gone, but the eggs…

“Can you take one more bite of eggs, baby girl?”

“They’s cold, Daddy.” She wrinkled her nose, looking so much like Colton it made him laugh a little bit. Maybe a lot, at least in his head.

“There’s a microwave. We could heat them up a tiny bit,” Colton said. “Mine could use a little warm-up too.”

“Then let’s all warm-up our eggs. I need my hash browns warmed up. Papa and I got talking.” Colton was batting almost a thousand. Beginner’s luck.

Abby nodded and beamed at them. “I like Papa. Do you like Papa too, Daddy?”

He chuckled softly. “Yes, baby girl. I do.”

“Oh, good.” She sipped her hot chocolate while they warmed up the food, and he tried not to worry too much.

He had no idea what the nighttime filming might bring, but right now? Right now was good.