You Can Count On Me (Christmas Daddies, #2)

by Fae Quin

You think you’ve seen everything by the time you hit thirty-seven. But then a familiar tiny blond eleven-year-old shows up at your house just after dark, wielding a baseball bat in one hand and an inhaler in the other. And he threatens you with it—the bat, not the inhaler—until you agree to take his dad on a date, and you realize you were wrong. You definitely haven’t seen everything. Nope. Not even close.

I’d lost. Tears of frustration prickled at my eyes as five minutes later I dabbed the last of the tomato sauce from my shirt in the bathroom and Trent waited out in the hallway.

“Pops says violence is never the answer,” Bubba quoted again, but his eyes were full of mischief this time. “But Theodore Roosevelt said ‘speak softly and carry a big stick.’ And he was the president, so…” He shrugged as if that explained everything.

Quicker than I could blink, I was halfway to the playground, alarm bells ringing in my head, and anger unlike anything I’d ever felt before burning hot and ashy in my chest. I ate up the distance faster than if I’d been flying, my vision going red-hot with rage. No one touched what was mine and got away with it. No one.

Rooster was solid and warm. Cinnamon sugar. He smelled like cinnamon sugar. I held on tight. And the way he melted against me had my heart racing and my toes curling in my boots. I’d never been so viscerally affected by someone else’s touch. Never felt sick with need, desperate and grateful—like the innocent brush of his lashes against my skin or his soft as sin lips against my throat was enough to make me burst into flames. No sparks. My. Ass. Goddamn fireworks were going off inside me.

I’d never been the jealous type before, not that I was now, but the idea of sharing Rooster with anyone—no. No. Hell no. I’d rather die.

Please God, help me so I don’t beg to lick his ass. Amen.

Real

I pushed his hair back. I watched his lashes flutter, and I thought, maybe if I was lucky enough, Trent would be the first person to stay with me. I could make a home here with him.

Wasn’t like I was about to tell Trent’s damn mama that the only books I read were ones that had more sex than plot and a whole lot of dicks. Even monster ones. Especially monster ones. With knots.

“I’m terrified because you’re everything. You’re everything I’ve ever wanted. And for the first time in my life, every action I take is wrong, wrong, wrong. I don’t have sweet words. My silver tongue gets tangled. You make my hands sweaty, and my heart race. I feel like I’m in goddamn grade school when you’re around.”

And he terrified me, because what was I supposed to do if I loved him…if I loved him, and he didn’t love me back?

He stared at me real hard, all pretty green eyes full of stars, and he said, “I wish you were my dad.”

😭