She barked out a sudden laugh. “You’re right. We definitely can’t miss that.”
“And when’s the last time you went somewhere and just had fun?”
“Fun hasn’t exactly been on the agenda lately,” she said, raising those brows.
God, she looked fucking fantastic sitting there in the front seat of my car. All legs and sweetness and sexiness.
“Then I guess we’d better jot it down. Tonight Faith Linbrock is slotted for some fun.”
So what if I used her maiden name? Couldn’t bear the thought of her branded with Joseph’s.
“Is that so?” It was almost playfulness in her tone when she said it. Like she felt comfortable enough with me to maybe entertain it. I was determined to give it to her. Even if it was just for a little while.
“Yeah, that’s so,” I tossed back out.
“Fun and birthday cake! I’s want a big piece,” Bailey shouted from the backseat.
I swore, the kid pulled an affectionate chuckle right out from the center of me. “Have you seen Mack? I think he might eat it all.”
“Mack wooks wike a dragon swayer.” Bailey’s voice got quiet in wistful awe, and I glanced in the rearview mirror at the way her dark, dark eyes went wide in some kind of fantastical excitement.
The kid.
“I don’t know about that. I bet he keeps dragons as pets,” I told her.
Hell, the guy was a dragon.
“You better not wet him get my unicorns.”
Faith was worrying at that bottom lip when she turned her attention toward her daughter, letting that warm gaze slide to me, trying to keep from laughing at the cuteness of it all.
“I’ll be sure to tell him.”
“And cake!”
“Whatever you want, sweet one.”
Faith released a strained sigh as I pulled to a stop in front of the house she grew up in.
Both of us feeling the pressure.
It was crazy that it felt like Faith and Bailey had become the center of my life, and I’d yet to have to face her parents.
The times they’d come to the house, I’d made myself scarce.
Just like Faith had called me that first day.
A trespasser.
There when I didn’t belong.
A fucking coward who didn’t want to face them. To see the hate and questions in their eyes.
The house looked exactly the same as it had then.
I was pretty sure I was feeling about the same as I had then, too. I tugged at my collar, which suddenly felt too tight.
I might as well have been wearing my jeans that had been three inches too short rather than this suit that had been tailored to the last centimeter.
Might as well have been anxiously walking Faith to the door for the first time rather than pulling to the curb in a hundred-thousand-dollar car.
Guessed it didn’t matter how much fucking money I made. It never erased who I was at my core. The surface shined but the heart remained the same.
Because there was Faith’s father, standing on the porch in the same spot he’d been that day. That day, there had just been the flickers of fatherly concern in his eyes, suspicion of any boy who would walk his daughter home.
Tonight? There was outright hate. Rage bristled across his skin as he came out to guard over his family.
The guy had always been a couple of inches shorter than me, though then, I’d been nothing but a scrawny kid who was just getting ready to grow into his skin, even though there had been no denying I could scrap it out in a fight.
No one knew how much strength there really was in self-preservation until they were fighting for their life.
Her father’s eyes narrowed as he looked me over where I filled up the seat behind the wheel.
I refused to allow myself to go back to those days when I wanted to cower and shrink under scrutiny, a feeling that had grown and mutated to become this underlying rage.
Yeah, I’d grown into all that strength and hostility. Had learned how to harness that intimidation and make it work for me.
Turned it into an empire that had earned me millions.
But none of that could change what I’d done, and if Faith’s father wanted to throw a couple punches, I’d stand there and take them.
God knew, I deserved them.
Faith reached out and grabbed me by the forearm. “Don’t you dare get into it with my daddy. The last thing Bailey or I need is to see the two of you fightin’. You hear me?”
I blew out a sigh, scraped my fingers across my lips, and did my best to get it together. To remember my purpose. Why I was here. What I was protecting.
“No fightin’. You hear me?” Bailey parroted.
God, these two women. Bossy and right.
“You really think I’m going to get into a fight with your dad?” I said, brows lifted to my hairline, like I was completely offended by the idea.
Faith shot me a look that called bullshit and reached out to open her door. “I mean it.”
At the backdoor, she ducked in and unbuckled Bailey, who scrambled out, shouting, “Hi, Grampa.”
Faith started up the walk behind her, and I reluctantly unlatched my door and stepped out into the approaching night.
The man seemed to have to tear his hatred from me, every inch of him softening as he turned his attention to the little girl who beat a path for him.
She clamored up the two short steps, tripping a little but still smiling when he swept her into his arms.
“Hey, Daddy,” Faith called.
“How’s my girl?” he asked, his eyes soft as he glanced to her before they bored into me from over her shoulder.
“Good!” Bailey shouted, thinking he was talking to her.
He patted her little leg. “Well, things are about to get better since you get to spend the whole night here with me and Grandma.”
He took that opportune time to send me a warning glare.
Just fucking great.
With just that glance, the guy made me feel like a worthless seventeen-year-old kid.
I ducked into the backseat and grabbed Bailey’s suitcase, keeping my head held high as I rounded the front of my car.
The screen door unlatched and Faith’s mother stepped out. She’d aged too, graciously, her cheeks softened and a few new lines creased her face, but the kindness she’d always shown was still there.
Just like her daughter.
Like it was fundamental to them.
Part of their makeup.
“My . . . look who is here. Jace Jacobs.”
“Good evening, ma’am.”
I mentally cringed. Yup, there she was, making me feel like that seventeen-year-old kid, too.
Not the powerful mogul who commanded every meeting. Took what I wanted. Made it mine.
“I knew you were gonna do big things with yourself. Look at you, so handsome.”
Redness hit my cheeks.
What the hell?
It seemed this whole line of women knew how to hit me at the knees.
I set Bailey’s suitcase down on the top of the porch. “There you go, sweet one.”
“Thank you, Jace,” she said in her little drawl.
“You’re welcome, Button,” I said, that nickname coming too easily. Sliding right off my tongue with affection.
Damn it.
I was getting in too deep. Getting too close. I had to be careful, or I was going to fuck this all up.
I was pretty sure Faith’s mom swooned right there, while her father slit my throat with a metaphorical knife.
Breaking the tension, Faith strode up the two steps, dropping a kiss to her father’s cheek and peppering a bunch of them on Bailey’s. “Be a good girl for Mommy, okay?”
“Okay, Mommy. You be a good girl, too.”
I would have laughed if her father weren’t clearly stabbing me over and over in his mind.
Faith’s mother took her by both of the cheeks, searching her face. A real mother. The way a mother should be. The way Faith in turn had become for her own daughter.
Sometimes it chafed, seeing it displayed so profoundly. So real.
“You go and have some fun and don’t worry about a thing. You deserve a night out, you hear me?”
Faith reached up and grasped her mom by both wrists, giving her a squeeze, something transpiring between the two of them. “Okay, Mama.”
Her mom smiled a wistful smile. “All right, then. Go on.”