“Daphne?”
Oh my God, it’s my stepdaughter.
And wow, is she looking fine tonight.
35
Daphne
I walk into the Bemelmans Bar, the sounds of gay naughty talk ringing in my ears as I go. Not that there’s anything wrong with gay sex; I just don’t want to witness it up front and personal, especially not with my boyfriend—ex-boyfriend—as one of the stars.
I order a cosmo from the bar and then wind my way to an open table. I’m pretty sure that Heartbreak 101 means getting shit-faced after finding out that your boyfriend of five years is gay. It’s in the manual, I’m sure of it. Chapter 3, subheading C.
I smile to myself, amused. What could Chapter 3, subheading A - B be?
A) Spend lots of money on new shoes that don’t go with a single item in my closet, which means …
B) Buy all new clothes for my closet.
These are damn good subheadings if I do say
so myself. I take another swallow of my cosmo and try to decide what to do. I don’t have to be back to the ER until tomorrow at noon, so if I stay out a little late tonight, it’ll be fine. That was the whole reason why we planned my special birthday gift for tonight.
I take another sip of my cosmo and sigh. Maybe I should go home instead and just call it an early night.
God, I sound so old. Maybe my age is catching up with me. Long hours in the emergency room, operating on trauma cases, doesn’t exactly help.
Something catches my eye and I look up, trying to figure out what I should do. Maybe—
Hold on, is that Dominic?
I stare, open-mouthed, up at the bar, as he asks the bartender for something, and then gets handed a towel. He starts patting his head and shoulders down, and even in the dim lighting, I can see he’s wet. What the hell?
What is my dad doing here? And why does he look like he just took a bath? I stand up and make my way over, and as I get close, I realize he smells like he just took a bath…in gin.
Has my stepfather—well, ex-stepfather—become an alcoholic?
“Dominic?” I say wonderingly.
He turns to me mid-pat and his eyes get huge. “Daphne?” he breathes. We stare at each other for just a moment and then he pulls me against his hard body in a full-body hug, which feels just as sexy as it does welcoming.
Which is…
Wow. Let’s just say unexpected, shall we? Dominic was married to my mom for eight years, until she decided that she was lesbian and wanted a divorce. (Seriously, what is up with people in my life figuring this out waaaayyyyy too late in life?)
I was only 18 at the time, and to have the only dad I’d ever known—I’ve never met my real dad—removed from my life like that was…
Well, fuck-awful, truth be told.
Whereas, seeing him again is … amazing. Maybe a little too amazing.
He pulls back and stares down at me, the towel dangling from his right hand as he smooths his hair back with his hand. “God. Daphne. I just … I didn’t expect to see you here.”
“And I didn’t expect you to smell like you’d taken a gin-and-tonic bath with your clothes on,” I say with a laugh. “What happened?”
“Oh.” He waves the towel around nonchalantly. “Heather. She and I had a difference of opinion on where our relationship was going. Basically, she wanted one, and I didn’t.”
“I can see why that’d be considered a difference of opinion,” I say drily. I look up at him through my eyelashes. Damn, was he always this handsome? I remember thinking he was cute for an older guy when I hit my teenage years, but…well, he was old back then. I mean, who looks at their dad and thinks DILF?