“No fucking way. But having Claire has given me some perspective. If there’s a guy sniffing around her when she’s eighteen who I think isn’t good enough for her, I might do something similar.”
“No, you wouldn’t,” I countered. His hands moved to my hips, settled there. His strong thighs were my seat, and this close I could see the dark flecks in his blue eyes. He still hadn’t shaved, and the whiskers coming in were darker than that on his head. And chest.
One dark eyebrow winged up. “Oh yeah?”
“Because you’re going to raise a strong woman who can decide if a guy’s worthy of her all on her own. And if not, she’ll throat punch him.”
He frowned, clearly not thrilled with that idea, although the way his mouth turned up at the corner, he’d probably be showing her the throat punch move soon.
“I found a worthy guy all on my own,” I said, setting a hand over Huck’s chest. I felt the steady beat of his heart. I looked up at him through my lashes. “My dad didn’t think it. You didn’t think it either.”
He didn’t say anything for a long time. “Baby girl… I was lost back then. You helped me find my way out. But it wasn’t enough. You needed to go to school. Follow your dream. I’d hoped… thought that after I finished the academy, you’d come to me. I know it’s stupid, but I did.”
“But you brought Claire home.”
He nodded.
“Tell me what happened.”
“Mandy, her mother, was a neighbor. I… I didn’t take our breakup that well. When I wasn’t at the academy, I was lost in a bottle of whiskey. I drank too much. Blacked out. One of those times, I woke up and found her in my apartment. She said we’d fucked.”
I stiffened in his lap but didn’t say anything.
“I remembered nothing. For good reason too because it actually never happened.” His jaw clenched as if talking about it pissed him off. “Three weeks later she came to me saying she was pregnant. I had no intention of marrying her, but she—I thought—was making my kid. I wanted that baby.”
My skin prickled with heat, my cheeks flushing. Pain lanced through me remembering the baby we’d actually made. The one I’d wanted.
“I went to the hospital after the birth and overheard her saying I wasn’t the real father. That she didn’t know who it was, but the Manning name on the birth certificate would ensure she was set for life.” His fingers tightened around my waist.
“Oh my God,” I whispered, imagining Huck, eager for his new baby and finding out it had all been a lie.
“She’d been irresponsible while pregnant, and I got pictures. Proof of it. Then when I learned the truth, I couldn’t let her raise a child. I decided Claire was mine. I learned a thing or two at the academy. Made some friends. I had Kale petition the court for sole custody because of what I’d pulled together. I’ll skip all the legal crap, but a judge’s ruling and a pile of cash had Mandy walking. She’d never wanted a kid.”
“So you graduated and came home with Claire. She’s legally yours.” He nodded. “The birth certificate says you’re the father.”
“Yeah.”
“You didn’t care what people said about you?”
“My family knew. But off the ranch, I only cared what you thought. And you never came.”
Tears welled in my eyes and spilled. He sighed, lifted his hands, and wiped them away with his thumbs. He didn’t know the true reason for the tears. He’d gotten a baby while the one I’d carried, the one he’d really made, had died. I hadn’t known the truth of his situation, but the loss I felt never went away.
“So much lost time.”
He pulled me down so I leaned into him, my head on his shoulder. I stared at my fridge but thought of what could have been.
“I can’t wish things went differently because then I wouldn’t have Claire. I only wish you hadn’t gotten hurt.”
He was always watching out for me. Protecting me. That was why I loved it when he called me baby girl. I didn’t have a daddy fetish, but I knew that whenever I was with Huck, that I was safe. He’d take care of me.
“Everything that happened, happened not because of us. The one thing that was real was us. Then—”
His eyes flared in understanding. “And now.”
“I have no idea what I’m going to do.”
He frowned. “With your daddy? He didn’t mean it.”
“I think he did.”
“It doesn’t make it right.”
“No.”
“You’ve got a strong little business going.”
My lip turned up. “How do you know that?”
His hand slid around the back of my neck, cupped me there. “I’ve kept track of you.”
All this time he’d been watching me from afar.
“You want to run a shop. You always have. You should do it,” he suggested.
And he remembered my dreams.
This man. God, Huck Manning was my beginning and my end.
His fingers tangled in my hair and gave a gentle tug. It lit up every nerve ending in my body. “Baby girl, you take what you want in life.”
I had a feeling he might want me. No, I knew he did. But forever?
I pulled my lips to the side, bit my bottom lip. “I know. I know. I thought I’d do it with my dad. But if I start my own shop, he'll be really mad. Definitely try to blacklist me.”
“A father shouldn’t keep his child from fulfilling her dreams. Or tearing them down.” His hand loosened in my hair, and he slid it down my back, cupped my butt. “He can try all he wants. I know who the police department will be calling for tow services. And you fixed that tractor when no one else could. Your daddy doesn’t touch farm equipment.”
I grinned then, remembering that old tractor and how no one could get it to run but me.
“I’d say you’d have
