Daphne Vs. Daddy

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?

Except…

I guess I should start saying I would, because even smelling like a gin distillery, Dominic is sexy as hell.

And definitely a Dad I’d Like to Fuck.

I mentally scold myself. I cannot, cannot, cannot think like that. He probably still thinks of me as that kid who played with My Little Pony all those years ago. He’s probably going to reach out and pinch my cheek at any moment, or pat me on the head condescendingly.

“We should go sit down and catch up,” he says, gesturing toward the tables. “I want to hear about how life is going for you. What did you end up deciding on for your major in college? And your mom—is she still with her wife?”

“Yeah,” I say, winding toward another open table, since mine had been taken since I started chatting with Dad … Dominic. We settle into a small, two-person table and I take a sip of my cosmo, hoping it will calm my nerves. “She’s really happy with Trish. I know being told your spouse isn’t into your gender is a real hard thing to hear—” God, do I know, “but I always thought that you took that news really well. I’m proud of you for that. I don’t know that I’ve ever told you or not.”

Actually, I know I haven’t. When my parents—okay, stepdad and mom—got a divorce, I’d been heading off to college and uncertain about the world, so hearing that the one part of my life that I thought was stable—my home—was being ripped apart was really hard on me. I spent the first year at college drinking and partying a lot more than was probably advisable.

At least, if you asked my professors, they’d say that. I almost flunked out my first year, after graduating as valedictorian from my high school. I only barely made it into med school. Their divorce so fucked with my head, no lie.