Just the thought of it left me antsy and agitated.

Her voice softened. “I don’t know anyone around here anymore, and it’d be nice to have a friend. I thought maybe you and Frankie could use one, too.”

Laughter ripped up my throat.

Cruel and low.

“Sorry, but I have all the friends I need, and I’d appreciate it if you stayed away from my daughter. She doesn’t need anyone else making her promises they have no intention of keeping.”

Before I could do something stupid, I slammed the door shut in her face. Exactly the way she’d been expecting me to do. I leaned my back against the wood, trying to catch my breath, to slow the raging in my spirit, that part of me that hated being such an asshole.

All the while trying to remind myself why it was necessary.

There was something about her that set me on edge. Left me feeling off-balance.

Self-control was not normally something I lacked, and fuck, it wasn’t like she was out there offering herself up like a warm slice of pie.

But just looking at her had me itching for a taste.

I could feel her on the other side, her presence that swept the air unsettled and thick. Like I’d caused her physical pain with the rejection and she was projecting it right back to me.

Maybe she really was just trying to be nice.

Maybe she didn’t have ulterior motives.

But that was a chance I just couldn’t take.

Fear tumbled through his veins and clanged in the hollow of his chest. Frantic, he stumbled through the brushy undergrowth, the world buried by soaring trees. Branches lashed at the exposed skin of his arms and thorns latched onto the fabric of his shirt in an attempt to hold him back.

It propelled him harder.

Faster.

He screamed her name. “Sydney.”

Sydney. Sydney. Sydney.

The howl of wind answered back.

Sydney.

I shot upright, chest heaving as I struggled to catch my breath. To orient myself to the movement that jostled me awake and pulled me from the dream.

“Daddy, Daddy, Daddy! Wakey, wakey, wakey. I made you breakfast.”

Frankie was grinning at me as she jumped on my bed. Brown hair wild and free, just as wild and free as the way she looked at the world. At the way she loved. Wholly and without reservation.

I scrubbed both palms over my face, dropped them just as fast. It was not all that hard to return her grin.

Her expression alone was enough to chase away the exhaustion that constantly weighed me down. The few hours of sleep I managed were restless. Plagued with the curse that darkened my life.

I swallowed back the fear. The terror that one day it might steal her from me, too.

“You made me breakfast?” I asked, voice groggy, my touch tender as I brushed her too-long bangs back from her innocent face. “That’s awful nice of you, thinking of your daddy first thing in the morning.”

She giggled. “Of course I thinks about you, Daddy. And I made a whole big bowl, ’cause Grammy says you could eat a whole cow.”

“Oh, she did, huh?”

She nodded emphatically, her eyes going wide when I hopped up and tossed her over my shoulder. Frankie roared with laughter, the kid dressed in shorts and a tee with that same damned hot pink tutu around her waist.

So fuckin’ cute.

“That Grammy is going to be in big, big trouble when I see her today,” I teased my daughter, who was bouncing on my shoulder as I started running with her down the hall.

She squealed, kicking her feet and holding on to me for dear life. “Oh, no, don’t tell Grammy! It’s our secret.”

“I thought you said you were good at keeping secrets?”

Damn it.

The last thing I needed to do was bring up the conversation she’d had with Rynna yesterday. Just the mention of that woman had fantasies slamming me from all sides. Her face and her hair and that body.

Sweet, mouthwatering sugar.

I’d thought maybe the morning would have scraped the idea of her from my consciousness.

No such luck.

I shoved off the thoughts, refusing to give them voice. That was right when I came to an abrupt stop when I entered the kitchen I’d just finished remodeling.

Frankie scrambled upright, pushing those unruly locks from her face with both hands, a hopeful smile plastered on her face. “I mights have spilled a little milk, Daddy. Is that okay? I’m gonna clean it all gone, but I didn’t want your cereal to get all gross and swoggy. Bleh.”

Her nose scrunched, and her lips turned down as if she’d tasted something sour.

I frowned when I saw a “little” milk was actually the entire gallon minus what she’d managed to pour into the cereal bowl. A pool of white swam between the small table set for two and the refrigerator against the far wall, the emptied plastic container floating in the middle of it.

Tags: A.L. Jackson Fight for Me Romance
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