“I’m very proud of you for taking your punishment so well, Cupcake,” Caden signed.
“Thank you, Daddy,” I signed back and beamed at Caden. Looking after him, I watched him walking into my open kitchen to get our ice cream. But then I caught movement out of the corner of my eye and looked back at Sam, who waved his hand to get my attention.
“While I was in the corner, I was thinking about the lower floors.” Jakob must have said something to him because Sam turned his head a little. I still could see his lips, so I saw what he was saying to Jakob. “Yes, Daddy. I know that corner time is supposed to be thinking about what I did. I just couldn’t stop my thoughts. Wait till you hear what I was thinking about.”
Frowning, I waited till he looked back at me again. “What were you thinking about?”
“The lower floors are empty, right?” Nodding, I wondered what he was thinking. “I was wondering if you ever considered renting it out.”
“No. I don’t want strangers in my home.”
“I understand. But Jakob and I aren’t strangers, right?”
“Um, no?” They weren’t strangers. According to Sam, they were family, and after today I had the feeling that I had found a friend in Sam. He was kind, and I liked him.
“So, I was wondering if you would consider renting the ground floor to us.”
“To you?”
“Yeah. It would be the perfect place to start our private investigation company. We started looking for office spaces, but we haven’t found a good one yet. If the ground floor layout is similar to this one, it would be perfect.”
Jakob frowned but looked around my apartment with an apparent interest in his face. This floor plan was a little different because the offices had been on this floor. Downstairs was where they kept all the machines. It was more industrial than what was my apartment now, but I could picture an office in there. The thought of renting the place out had never crossed my mind, but the more I thought about it, it wasn’t a bad idea at all.
With the possible threat from my family, I loved the thought of not being alone in the building anymore. The idea of having two former police officers in the building would probably be good to calm my nerves. I was thinking about it so hard that I jumped a little when Caden sat back down beside me and touched my leg.
“You don’t have to decide anything right now, Cupcake. But I think it’s a great idea.” Caden smiled before he continued, “Jakob and Sam are working for my law firm, for now. It would be convenient to have them in the same building as my boyfriend. Not to mention I would feel much better about you not being alone in this building the whole time. Not to mention that Sam is right, the place would be perfect for their needs.”
“But it’s an industrial building. The ground floor hasn’t been touched yet. It would need a lot of remodeling.” My eye caught a flurry of movement on the other side of the table. When I looked back at Sam, he was waving like a windmill in my direction.
“It doesn’t matter. We can renovate it. Right, Daddy?”
Sam’s gaze snapped to Jakob. Jakob blinked, and, by the movement of his Adam's apple, he swallowed hard. Then he smiled and made sure that I could see what he was saying to Sam.
“Sam. Slow down. Henry hasn’t even decided if he would be willing to rent it out. You can’t just dump this idea on him and—”
“You can rent it,” I said before I could change my mind. It would be great to have someone else in the building. If it also meant I got to see Caden more often…yeah, well. “I mean…if you want. If you like it.” There went the windmill again until I looked back at Sam.
“Can we see it? I have so many ideas already.”
Caden tapped my leg to get my attention. “You boys eat your ice cream. Then we can go look at the space.”
Sam dug into his ice cream. He was going to get an ice cream headache if he ate it so fast. Not wanting to be left behind, I dug into my dessert as well.
Sam hadn’t been exaggerating about having ideas. When we walked into where the production area used to be, Sam was fluttering around the place like a hummingbird jacked up on caffeine. He chattered on about colors and setting up workplaces and offices. By the end of the afternoon, Caden promised to draw up a contract and send it over to them, and I had a headache from watching lips all afternoon. After I said goodbye to Sam and Jakob, I went into my nursery and lay down on my daybed. Daddy had the duty of showing them out. Sucking on my binky, I replayed the events of the weekend in my head.
It was so weird and so hard to comprehend everything that had happened. I had a playdate with my perfect unicorn Daddy, learned about Robert's parole hearing, found new friends, and rented out the ground floor of my building. Who would have guessed that I’d be a landlord after one playdate? Not that I needed the money, far from it. After I sold the rights for my Lucian Holston thriller, I was set financially for the rest of my life. That brought more thoughts to mind. Then the bed dipped. Caden joined me but had a worried expression.
Since my head hurt and I was too tired to read lips, I turned on my side and signed, “I was just thinking about the rent money.”
“Why did that have you frowning.” Gently reaching over,
