on, Cady Bug. I bet you’re hungry. How about something to eat?”
He ran Cady’s hands under the faucet, making her squeal, then strapped her into the high chair and raided the refrigerator for cheese cubes and tiny cooked pasta, all while maintaining a nonstop monologue. The words didn’t matter. As long as he kept talking, she would be distracted enough to stay happy.
“Looks like everything has changed, right, cutie? That’s the truth. I always thought that Jonathan the rat bastard was the one who did your mama wrong—oops, don’t cry, I won’t say the M word again—but I guess I blew that one. And you know how I feel? I feel like a goddamned idiot, that’s what I feel like. There’s some words to toss out sometime when M-word isn’t expecting them. Goddamn. Yeah, that should get a reaction out of her. Maybe even an honest one. Wouldn’t that be a change?”
He was overreacting, but so what? Darcy was his friend. Nothing more—but nothing less, either. He would have thought that as her friend, as the person who had brought Xander into the picture, as the one who had fallen in love with Cady the moment she’d arrived—
“Guess I thought wrong. No surprise there, right, kiddo? That’s right, shove the cheese into your mouth. Nom nom. Eat with your fists while you can. Those days will be gone before you know it.”
He dropped into the chair beside the table, his arms, legs and spirits crossed. Lulu sniffed his knee and let loose with a noise that was somewhere between a whine and a moan. He laced his fingers through her silky fur and scratched behind her ears.
“You know something’s wrong, don’t you, girl? Don’t worry. I won’t let him take you.”
“Ru! Ru!” Cady slapped her palms on the tray and threw a piece of cheese to the floor. Lulu snapped it up. Cady broke into the chortles that always accompanied the game. Ian was supposed to make sure the food made it into the proper mouth, but at the moment he didn’t have the heart.
“Laugh now, sweetie.” Despite himself, he angled his head so he could sneak a peek through the lace curtains at the kitchen window. He should have saved himself the effort. All he could see was a fringe of cinnamon—the top curls of Darcy’s hair. Curls that Xander had laced his fingers through while—
Ian jumped from his chair and forced his feet toward the hall, the refrigerator, the small pantry stocked with baby food and diet pop. Anyplace where he wouldn’t be tempted to watch what was happening in the backyard.
But when he narrowly avoided stepping on Lulu, trailing him with her nose to the ground, he forced his itchy feet to halt. He fell back onto the hard wooden chair. He tipped his head toward the ceiling, where the white blades of the fan stirred the air and his thoughts.
He had to get a grip.
So Darcy and Xander had...whatever. So they had made a baby together. It was none of his business. It had happened almost two years ago. It had nothing to do with him.
Except it felt as though it did.
“I frickin’ hate secrets.” Good thing his only audience was a dog and a baby. Neither of them could point out the irony that he, Mr. Honest-and-Aboveboard, had been keeping a hell of a whopper from Darcy for God only knew how long.
“But that’s different.” He patted his thigh. Lulu, who had been gnawing on his shoe, jumped at the invitation and rested her paws on his knee. “It’s biology. That’s all. I’ve been alone awhile. Darcy is right here and cute and single... It’s good that I’ve started noticing her. Proof that I’m really over Taylor. That’s all. Saying anything to her would have been stupid. Pointless.”
Despite himself, he glanced at the window again.
“Too late.”
* * *
IF EVER IAN had doubted that life had a sick sense of humor, it would have been confirmed by the fact that as soon as Cady finished cramming her mouth full of everything within reach, she gifted him with the Diaper of the Decade.
“I think this is the definition of redundant, kiddo.” He tossed wipes into the trash while using his elbow to restrain the sumo wrestler formerly known as Cady. “You couldn’t have waited a bit longer? Maybe let your shiny new dad do the honors?”
She let loose with a wail of protest.
“My sentiments exactly,” he said, though he was well aware that her only concern was her inability to wriggle free. “I know, I know. You want to move.”
Come to think of it, that sounded like a fine idea. He’d given Darcy plenty of time to...whatever...with Xander.
“Let’s crash the party, Bug.”
Lulu barked her agreement and raced into the hall while Ian grabbed Cady. After a fast detour to the bathroom to wash his hands, they clattered down the stairs.
And there he stopped.
Lulu bounded ahead but Ian stayed out of sight of the back door. The dog yipped and Cady pushed at his shoulders, but still he didn’t move.
What if what he felt for Darcy was more than biology?
No sooner had the thought brought him to a standstill than he walked away from it double time.
“Get a grip, North.”
For one thing, he’d been feeling this...whatever...around Darce for a while. Months, at least. If it really was something more than basic instinct, surely it would have grown or changed or something by now.
For another, he and Darcy and Cady had a good thing going. Yeah, he was pissed right now, but when he looked back on it, they’d done a damned fine job with this friendship. He babysat her kid, she walked his dog, they made each other laugh and had each other’s backs. Only an idiot would want to mess up what they had.
Lulu dropped down from the door and gave him a look that could only be described as get over here and let me out, you useless human. Cady lunged forward in apparent sympathy.
“Fine. I’m coming, okay?”
So. Biology. Biology stirred with some kind of...oh, call it confusion...that Darcy hadn’t trusted him enough to tell him the truth. A bruised ego, a hell of a surprise, some understandable jealousy revolving around the bundle of drool and giggles squirming in his arms.
“You want to walk, don’t you, Bug?” He lowered her to the ground and slipped his fingers into her fists. She shrieked something he couldn’t understand, held tight and slapped one foot in front of the other in her version of a beeline for the door while he duck-walked behind her.
“You’re getting good at this, kid. Soon you won’t need me to hold you up.”
What the hell. He’d been debating moving home to Comeback Cove anyway. Maybe Xander’s reappearance was some kind of message that it would be okay to go. Ian’s work here was done, and all that crap.
They had reached the door—well, as close as they could get to it with Lulu doing her best to claw her way through the window. Darcy’s hot-pink top danced at the edge of his vision, but he refused to look at her. He would hand over Cady and take himself and Lulu to the garage, where he could control the fire.
Decision
