I let out a slow breath as I closed the door behind her, determined to stop thinking about the damn shape of her body. It didn’t matter what Cecilia looked like. She’d be gone as soon as her parents came to get her and then she’d be out of my life again, and things could go back to the way they’d been before her pop called me.
“You know, I’m not really sure what I’m supposed to get at the store, either,” she confessed after we were on the road. “I mean, hypothetically, I know what she needs to survive. Diapers, clothes and food. But what kind? And how many?”
“You’ll figure it out,” I replied, glancing at her in the mirror. “You just need enough to last until tomorrow, right? Once your parents pick you up, you guys can go back to your place and grab the rest of her stuff.” Shit, I was an idiot. “Or we can go over right now, if you want. I should’ve asked if you wanted me to take you home. I guess I’m so used to imagining you in Oregon, I didn’t even think about the fact that you have a place down here.”
“That’s okay,” she said, looking out the window. “I don’t really have anything for her at home.” She huffed. “I’m woefully unprepared.”
“We can go to the store first,” I offered. “Get you set up before I take you home.”
She was quiet for a while.
“I’d rather stay at your place, if that’s okay,” she finally said, her voice low. I knew the effort it took to ignore her pride and utter those words. “Just for tonight.”
“No worries,” I replied, relief hitting me harder than I wanted to admit. “I already made the bed. Someone might as well sleep in it.”
We were quiet for the rest of the ride and I tried not to think about the fact that Cecilia Butler, my Cecilia, was sitting two feet from me, and I was backsliding into shit that I thought I’d put behind me years ago. It had taken me a long ass time to get past the fact that she was no longer in my life. Looking back, I’d always assumed that I’d taken it so hard because we’d been so young when it all went down, but now I wasn’t so sure. Puppy love doesn’t make a man lose focus during a job that he’d done for years.
“So, you guys are mercenaries?” Cecilia asked as we walked into the brightly lit store a few minutes later.
“Something like that.”
“Something like that, or exactly that?” she asked as I grabbed a cart.
“We work for a government contractor that primarily does jobs overseas,” I clarified.
“And you’re the boss, right?”
“No,” I replied. “We’re a team.”
“But you’re the leader.”
“Not really.”
“They call you Chief,” she pressed.
“Just a nickname.”
“But it seemed like Forrest was in charge tonight,” she mused as we headed toward the back of the store. “He was in charge tonight, but they still deferred to you most of the time.”
“No one is in charge,” I said, leaning my elbows on the handle of the cart. “We’re not on a job. When we’re on a job, yeah, I usually take the lead.”
“Mmhmm,” she hummed.
“Does it matter?” I asked.
“Not really,” she shrugged. “Come on, baby stuff is this way.”
I followed her as she navigated the store and purposefully didn’t let my gaze drop below the middle of her shoulder blades.
“Bingo,” she announced when we hit the diaper aisle. “Okay, newborn size…shit. There’s like forty different brands here.”
“Doubt it matters,” I replied.
“How would you know?” She sounded slightly panicked.
I stared at her. “They catch shit, Cecilia,” I said slowly. “They’re all gonna end up in the trash anyway. Any of them should work.”
“Good point,” she muttered. Dropping her purse into the cart, she turned to me. “Hold her for a second?”
Wait a fucking minute.
“Please,” she said. “It’ll be way easier if I have two hands.”
Without waiting for me to respond, the tiny person was pressed against my chest, and I had no choice but to hold on to her.
“Support her head. I’m going to look at the labels first,” Cecilia said as she turned away, completely ignoring the fact that the earth had just tilted on its axis, and I was standing there with what amounted to a seven pound bomb in my hands.
The baby jerked, and I fumbled to catch her little bobble head before it rolled right off the back of her neck. Jesus, she was so small. Her bald head was kind of cone shaped still, and I wondered how long it would be before it rounded out a bit. She didn’t look like Cecilia, but I couldn’t imagine she looked like anyone. Her features were so tiny, and the only distinguishable feature she had were a pair of pouty lips that I assumed must have come from her dad. She curved back against me and I could feel every vertebrate down her spine beneath the thin blanket and nightgown she had on. She smelled like Cecilia.