I should probably ask Audric for a key.
Taking that unit out and leaving it out was what probably woke Holt up.
It was hot as hell, and I could already feel the balmy heat saturating the house.
I moved toward the window and closed it, then went back to feeding Holt.
Holt’s eyes stayed on my face the entire time he ate, and when he was finished, and I propped him up on my shoulder to burp him, he turned his cute little face into my neck and wrapped his arms around me as far as they could go.
I leaned my head against the small boy, only just then realizing that it wasn’t only his mother that I desperately missed in my home.
Though, if I was being honest, I’d more than realized I missed him. I just hadn’t wanted to admit it.
Admitting it would’ve opened me up to more heartache, and I was barely surviving as it was.
Fuck, I was a goner.
As I sat there, holding Baker’s son, rocking him back to sleep in the middle of a living room that wasn’t mine, I made a decision.
I would make myself into a man that was good enough for Baker and Holt.
Somehow.
Someway.
And only when I was sure I was good enough, would I make the move.
Until then, I’d do what I could to make her life easier, starting with a stupid air conditioner.
Three days after my first visit, my hands felt wrinkly by the time I was finished washing the bottles and the dishes in the sink.
When I was drying my hands off, I went to the fridge to get the next bottle ready and noticed that there wasn’t a single ounce of food that was edible.
The last thing that she’d eaten looked like a block of cheese that was perilously close to being gone, too.
Getting on my phone, I sent Millicent, my assistant, a message and asked her to place a grocery order to be delivered to Baker’s place.
Millicent:
On it. Also, go to bed. It’s past three in the morning.
Me:
Working on it. Had to clean some dishes.
Millicent:
Since you’re up, I sent you a file. Review it and let me know what you think.
I pulled up the file and grinned.
More dirt on the board.
I was only a bit shy of being able to buy every single one of them out of their shares.
Soon, the entire caboodle would be mine, and I could do with it what I pleased.
In the meantime, I’d bide my time until everything was perfectly set in place for me to bring it down around everyone’s ears.
