Southern Seducer (North Carolina Highlands 1)

I’ll obviously support you in whatever you decide. I know Ryan and I don’t exactly get along, and you can make of that what you will. But I want you to know that I’ll always have your back. I only have your best interests at heart. You gotta know by now that I adore you.

Then again, maybe that’s part of the problem.

I’m rambling now, so I’ll stop before I say something really stupid. I hope I don’t upset you. I miss you already.

I’m sorry—

B

Chapter Twenty-Five

Beau

The baby wakes up at the same time I do.

Fucking early.

Tucked into my body—we’re on our sides, still naked, her back to my front—Bel stirs. She moans. Not with pleasure.

She’s tired.

The baby is crying loudly enough for us to hear the monitor in the kitchen.

I kiss Bel’s shoulder. “I’ll get her.”

“You sure?”

She’s warm and adorably sleepy. I bury my nose in her neck and inhale. God, I love her fuck-me perfume.

“Of course. Is it time for you to nurse her?”

“Yes.” Bel reaches over and turns on the light. “My nursing pillow is in the living room. If you wouldn’t mind—”

“I’m on it.”

Getting out of bed, I notice my being doesn’t ache the way it usually does. Don’t get me wrong, my knees still crack. Thighs are still sore from leg day at the gym and the very athletic sex I had with Annabel last night.

But the black ribbon of defeat that usually threads through my physical pain is missing.

I put my hand on my chest, feeling around for it.

“You okay?” Annabel asks, rubbing the sleep from her eyes.

“No,” I reply, bewildered. “I’ll be fine.”

I grab my briefs off the floor and put them on, one leg at a time.

“You don’t have to get dressed,” Bel says, laughing.

“I know. But I don’t want to scare Maisie off the first time I’m over here.”

“You saying there’s going to be another time?”

Ducking out the door, I pretend not to hear her question.

I return a few minutes later with a howling baby in one arm and Bel’s nursing pillow in another.

Still naked, she’s propped up against the pillows with her blankets spread across her lap. She looks like an angel in the soft light from the lamp.

She buckles the pillow around her waist, smiling as I pass her the baby.

“Sorry about this,” she says, guiding the baby onto her breast.

Immediately, Maisie goes quiet as she sucks hungrily on Bel’s nipple. Bel sets a burp cloth underneath her other breast, presumably to soak up any leaks.

“Sorry for what?”

“The screaming baby. The—” She grabs her phone off the nightstand and hits the button on the side. “5 AM wake-up call.”

“Hey. She slept through the night again, which I know is a big deal.”

“Good point.”

“My insomniac ass is usually up by now anyway.” I nod at the baby. “You want me to give y’all some privacy?”

“Actually.” Bel looks up at me. “I’d love you to stay. Having some company while I nurse is a treat.”

I lie on my side in the bed with my ankles crossed. For a second I think to myself, wait, maybe I should feel weird about staying. This is a very private moment. An intimate one.

But then I think, nah. I love being a part of Bel and Maisie’s morning routine.

I just love feeling like I’m a part of something, period. Something outside of work.

During my pro days, I enjoyed being a part of a team. I guess I really liked the family aspect of it all. Traveling together, eating together. Knowing each other’s habits and hang-ups. It’s another reason I threw myself into developing Blue Mountain Farm after I retired. I traded my football family for my farm family.

And while my real family is a part of Blue Mountain Farm, they’re the family I grew up with. Not the family I created.

Being here with Bel and her baby makes me realize just how much I want to build a family of my own.

And it hurts like hell, knowing I can’t.

Bel strokes her palm over Maisie’s hair, gentle and slow. The baby’s eyes close, and she curls into her mommy with her tiny hand resting on Bel’s breast.

There’s an ease to their connection that makes me think they’ve been in this exact same snuggle position a hundred, a thousand times.

“You’re doing really great,” I say. If I can’t have a family of my own, I sure as hell am going to support my best friend in her effort to make one. “I know the experience hasn’t been what you thought it’d be. But you’re a great mom, Bel.”

She turns to look at me, eyes soft. “Thank you for saying that. I feel like the world is way too comfortable passing judgment on moms by pointing out where we’re falling short. But no one ever gives us a pat on the back when we get it right. I feel like I’m not good enough a lot of the time.”