Baby's Got Bite (12 page)

Chapter Seventeen

While Bennett rested, Linc went up to his studio. The gardens had inspired him to make some changes to a pair of jeans he’d been designing. He wanted embroidered flowers down the seam and one each on the pockets.

He would call them the Bennetts.

His cell buzzed and Marina’s photo popped up. He didn’t want to talk to anyone, but she’d keep calling if he didn’t answer.

“Lincy darling. Can I come for my fitting today? I need to fly to Morocco for a last minute shoot. I won’t be back until next week.”

Crap. He’d forgotten about getting things together for the book. He’d been so consumed by Bennett and the baby that he’d actually neglected his work.

When had that happened? His work had been everything to him.

Bennett would probably sleep for a couple of hours, and he really did need to get the fittings done.

“Sure. Come on in. I didn’t know you were in town.”

“Great,” Marina said. “There was a shoot yesterday for Neiman’s Christmas catalog. I’ll be there in about ten minutes.”

Which, in Marina’s world, was at least an hour. That was fine. It would give him time to put the designs together and stitch up the prototypes. Usually, he’d have someone from his team come in and do it, but he was faster than all of them put together. And he could use the busy work to keep his mind off the morning’s events.

He shouldn’t have been happy that Bennett didn’t seem that impressed by her father’s powers. And she’d told him twice over her chicken fried steak that she was afraid something like that might be inside of her. Even if she could access that power, she didn’t want it.

Thank God for the smallest of favors. If her father had thought to woo her to his side, he’d done the opposite. She was confused, which would give Linc time to plead his case. Twice he’d wanted to tell her how much he loved her, but both times he’d reminded himself why he had to keep those feelings to himself.

He needed to keep his distance so that he could be the protector she needed. Which meant he couldn’t tell her how he felt. He wouldn’t protect her body only to injure her heart.

He found the thread and fabric he needed and started working on the top Marina would be wearing in the photo shoot.

An hour later, his phone buzzed. The doorman wanted to know if it was okay for the model to come up. He already regretted agreeing to the meeting, but he couldn’t avoid work forever. And to be honest, he needed to escape back into its familiar comfort.

“Lincy,” she said as she came inside, air-kissing his cheeks. “Ready for me?”

The double entendre wasn’t lost on him, but he wouldn’t encourage her by acknowledging it.

“Yes, let’s get you fitted.” He turned toward his workroom.

“No time for a little play?” She reached out for his shoulder, but he pulled away.

A few months ago, he might have welcomed her touch and its momentary distraction. But now? There was only one woman’s touch he craved. Scared the hell out of him, but there it was.

“Not anymore,” he said. “I’m with someone.”

She pursed her lip. “You’re always with a special someone,” she said.

Sometimes the truth hurt.

“Ouch. Guess I deserved that. This is different.”

Marina shifted her hip to the side and crossed her arms. “How different is
different
?”

“I love her,” Linc said.

Fuck. There they were, the three little words he’d denied. It felt good to say them out loud.

And to Marina’s credit, it looked like she appreciated the significance of what he’d said, because she smiled and dropped any pretense of seduction.

“I must meet this woman who tamed the playboy’s heart.”

Hopefully, that’ll never happen.

The last thing he wanted was Marina and Bennett comparing notes.

He just wanted the fitting over so he could get back downstairs and tell her. Would she believe him? Shite. He’d need a plan. She would think it was about the baby.

He loved the child and had from the moment he’d heard about him. But he loved Bennett, too. Whether she was giving herself to him, or yelling at him with that wonderful attitude of hers, he loved her with all he was.

And he would protect the woman he loved. Her father? He would handle that now. Bennett would no longer be caught in the middle.

In the workroom, Marina started stripping, but he paid her nudity no mind. He no longer saw naked bodies. They were forms to which he fit his clothes. Not that he didn’t appreciate women—he always would. But there was only one woman who could tighten his cock with a glance.

Nick was right. Linc had fallen for Bennett long ago.

“Ouch,” Marina said.

Crap, he’d stuck a pin in her.

“Sorry about that. Here, slip it off. It just needs a few adjustments. You can get dressed and go.”

He was already in the other room when he realized “needs a few adjustments” was just an excuse for a moment to take out his phone in private and bring up a photo of Bennett.

She’d worked her way into him so fully, so completely he was no longer in control of himself.

He wanted to call her and share what he was experiencing for her, but he couldn’t tell her the depth of his feelings yet without blowing up the situation into something neither of them could handle.

Hell, it was a big enough problem that he was having these feelings in the first place. He couldn’t keep her safe if he didn’t keep his emotions in check.

This was bad. Really bad.

But there was a bigger problem than his emotions. Bennett’s father. He was the person Linc needed to call. He was the person who needed to know how much Linc felt for Bennett and what he would do to protect her.

The phone rang only once before her father picked up.

“Wolf,” he said. Just the one word.

“Fae King.” Linc paused. “Let’s settle this. Once and for all.”

…

Bennett cricked her neck and stepped back from the painting she’d been working on. She pursed her lips. Maybe it needed some tweaks on a few of the animals, but it was a good start.

She was using canvas to work on the style she wanted to use for the mural in the baby’s nursery. She’d taken parts of the gardens they walked through earlier and done some sketches. And then she created some tiny animals. Sweet little things, so far from her regular artwork, it was crazy.

But edgy, which was what she was known for, didn’t really work in the beautiful nursery Linc had created for their son.

She sighed and set down the paintbrush.

The day had been too much of everything. The way Linc and her father had argued, she’d had half a mind to tell them both to shove their overprotective asses out the door and out of her life. But she couldn’t say good-bye to her father, not when she’d just met him.

And Linc? He deserved the chance to be a father to their child. But she wasn’t sure she could be around him and be just friends.

Stupid me. Why do I always fall for the wrong guy?

She stepped away from the painting. Her art was the one thing that could soothe her, but it wasn’t working.

“Knock, knock.” Casey walked in, her arms full of packages. She’d rung earlier and said she was coming down.

“What is all of that?”

“Presents. I was really worried about you, so I made Nick take me shopping after we dropped off your dad.”

“Presents?”

“For you and the baby.”

“Oh.” Bennett smiled as she took a few of the smaller bags from her friend. “Thanks. All of this is for the baby?”

They sat down in the living room. Bennett had the forethought to perch on the edge of a leather chair. She was a messy painter, and there was no telling what might be on her clothing.

“And you. Do you have anything for the nursery? I bought some stuff, but it’s mostly clothes. Did I tell you Nick made me play twenty questions to find out the sex of the baby? Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I just assumed you knew. Everyone else seemed to. You could have just called me.”

“Yeah, but getting it out of Nick was way more fun.” Casey waggled her eyebrows.

Pushing herself with her arms, no easy feat with her increasingly large belly, Bennett stood and motioned toward the nursery. “Come here, I want to show you something.”

They stepped into the small room together, and Bennett bit her lip as Casey looked over the nursery.

“Oh, my God,” Casey breathed. “This is beautiful. You guys did such a great job. I want to live in here. It’s magical.”

“Not us. Linc. He did everything. And he didn’t buy the bedding, he made it.”

Casey’s hand went to her chest. “That’s so fucking sweet.”

“Hey, no cussing in front of the kid,” Bennett admonished.

Her friend gave her the eyebrow.

“I know. I’m not exactly a saint. But I’m working on it. Yes, it was so sweet. I ugly cried in front of him. How’s that for a thank you?”

“Awww. He probably secretly loved that you adored it so much.” She set the packages down. “Some of these are for the baby, but I also bought you some maternity clothes.” She gave Bennett the once-over. “Which you are so not touching until you get cleaned up. What have you been doing?”

“Working on ideas for a mural to go behind the bed. I’ll show you in a minute.”

“Oh, yes! It’s going to look perfect there—I can’t wait. Okay, so it’s a boy. He’s going to need some of these.” She pulled out some cute little onesies. “I got like six different sizes because we don’t have any idea how big he’s going to be when he comes out. Nick said sometimes supernaturals can be a little bigger than humans.”

Bennett cringed. That video from the Lamaze class flashed through her mind. Ouch.

“Yeah, don’t remind me. Oh, I forgot to tell you about Lamaze. I wanted you to be there in the delivery room with Linc, in case he freaks out. But maybe you could just watch some of the videos online. I’m not going to lie, you may rethink the kid thing if you do.”

Casey smiled. “I wanted to know what to do, so I already watched two of them online as soon as you said you were pregs. I couldn’t finish it. All the screaming and pushing. I’ll be there for you, but it’s good to have Linc. He may be the one picking me up off the floor.”

They laughed so hard that they had to hold each other up until they calmed down.

“And I bought a ton of outfits.” Casey held up the tiniest tuxedo Bennett had ever seen. “Nick insisted we buy a Cowboy’s uniform, a Dallas Stars jersey, and this cute little Ranger’s outfit. Oh, and I forgot got about these little shorts and top from the Mavericks. And I thought maybe this could be his coming home from the hospital outfit.”

It was a tiny pair of jeans and retro concert T-shirt. There was also a cute little pair of red Converse. It was something Bennett might wear, if they made the outfit her size.

“Oh—my—God.” Bennett held the Converse sneakers up. “Where did you find these? They’re perfect!”

“I know, right? Where’s Linc? I bet he’d get a kick out of this.”

Bennett put down the shoes and took a deep breath. “Before we go see him…I have something I want to tell you. But I need you to keep a secret.”

Casey’s eyebrows waggled. “You know I’m the queen of secrets.”

“No. No, you aren’t. You can’t keep a secret to save your life.”

“That’s not true. I never told anyone about you dating David.”

“God, don’t remind me.” He’d been one of their clients, which was strictly forbidden at the office. They’d done an ad campaign for his beer company. He was the perfect guy. Took her to all the best clubs and restaurants. The sex was great. Not Linc fantastic, but pretty good. They’d dated for almost a month, and then one night he’d invited her back to his apartment. Where he was holding an orgy. She was pretty open-minded about sex, but she’d taken one look at the scantily clad group and turned and run way.

Casey was laughing. “I can honestly say when you showed up on my doorstep with ice cream, ‘David invited me to an orgy,’ was pretty much the last thing I expected to hear.”

They giggled so long Bennett’s ribs hurt.

“So this secret?” Casey urged.

“I think…maybe…uh…”

“You love Linc?”

Bennett did a double-take. “WTF. How did you know?” She leaned back on her hands. “I just figured it out.”

“You two can’t keep your eyes off of one another. It’s been pretty obvious from the beginning. I think you two are the only ones who haven’t figured it out.”

So maybe she wasn’t imagining his feelings. He might really care about her. “It scares me.”

Casey leaned over and put a hand on her knee. “But he’s a really good guy. And I’ve only known him a couple of months, but he’s never looked at any woman the way he does you. I give him a hard time about the man whore thing. But he really doesn’t sleep with them. Or not much. There was one about six months ago, but it didn’t last long.”

“How do you know about it?” She and Linc hadn’t had a normal kind of relationship where they talked about past loves. Hell, she didn’t like sharing that shit. And she had a feeling he wasn’t much better about sharing his past than she was.

“Nick told me,” Casey said. “We were talking about you on the way over. He was saying Linc has it bad for you. They’ve been friends for more than a hundred years and he hasn’t seen Linc this serious about anyone. And I see that brain of yours working. He loves that baby, but he also loves you.”

“Do you think?”

Casey raised her eyebrows, smirked, and nodded. “Oh. Yeah. I was watching him when we were at the gardens with your dad. He never once took his eyes off of you. And when you weren’t feeling well, his face… God, he was so scared. I’ve never seen him like that. Nick’s right. He has it bad.”

Bennett grabbed one of the stuffed toy planes from the chair behind her. Did he love her? She would never know unless she asked him. More, she had to know if he could love her as a partner, not someone who would control her life in the name of protecting her.

One way or another, they had to figure it out.

“Can you hang out for a while? Let me get cleaned up, and then I’ll see if I can find Linc. I wanted to show him the idea for the mural.”

Casey frowned. “You might have to wait a while. I saw your dad heading up to see him as I was coming down. And boy, he did
not
look happy.”