“As he was about to fall asleep on his feet, I think he was done arguing.” Bennett slid off his leather jacket and tossed it onto the entry hook. Holding out his arms, he reached for the precious package that crashed her cranky head into her mother’s sternum.
Quinn smiled and passed her to him. Cradling her close, he held her like a little football and rocked her in his arms. Sweetest little thing he’d ever seen. Dark, onyx eyes like her father, burgundy fuzz atop her head and bow-shaped lips already hinting at a wicked sense of humor like her mother. She was everything Quinn deserved. Amazing and sweet and fricking adorable. Lowering to the corner cushion of the couch, Quinn pulled her legs under and melted in.
“You did good.” Bennett tapped his fingertip on the little one’s nose.
Reading him as easily as she always had, Quinn’s smile was affected by the lines across her brow.
He bit his lip and shook his head before she could say it. “No. Let’s not go there. You were right all along. I was set on the perfect life and thought that was you and me. This…” he glanced around the house, toward the main bedroom where Ryan had escaped, and down at the infant in his arms, he shook his head. “this is incredible. We would never have had it quite like this.”
Tiny black irises with silvery-blue flecks swam with sleepiness in his arms. Stroking a finger over her little nose a few times, adding a softshh, she fell asleep in his arms. Propping her up against his broad shoulder, Bennett moved to the recliner and savored the genuine innocence that couldn’t be beat.
“You’re a natural.”
“She’s a good baby.”
Wrapping a throw blanket over her legs, Quinn sighed. “I know nobody else is even close to ready, but I wish she was going to have a little friend. Like we always had each other.”
“We were lucky. While our parents planned the next skirmish or toasted together at the holidays, you and I were the only kids.”
“And eventually I was egging you on until you cussed and spit and Lizzy and Jonathan were horrified.”
He laughed, careful not to wake Skye. “My parents were so pissed when we figured out how to get those swords down.”
“Even worse, the weekend after I turned eighteen? You were, what, twenty? Lana was nineteen. Our first big mission together, and we marched straight into the lair a few blocks down from your old apartment? Fighting alongside two vampires?”
“Your dad was livid. When Quentin found you and Lana in sleeping bags on my living room floor, a naked vampire in bed with me, and her brother in the kitchen sipping his evening coffee with blood for creamer?”
Laughing to the point of snorting, Quinn threw her head back and took a few minutes to calm down enough to respond. “I don’t think I’ve ever been as afraid of a demon as I was of my dad when he found us that way.” She pushed her lava-red hair out of her face and added, “You never said how Lizzy reacted when he told her. She had to have been pissed.”
Gnawing in his chest, he flashed back to last night’s dream. His subconscious felt the need to torture him regularly, near nightly the last few months. “Yeah, you could say that. Mom was full of warnings, mostly about how deceitful vampires can be, and Dad gave me the man-to-man lecture about not letting my dick do the thinking. I didn’t speak to them for weeks, convinced they were too narrow-minded to see that true love knew no borders.”
A scowl stirred Quinn’s midnight blue eyes.
He shook his head, taking a long sniff of the sweet baby smell of Skye’s fuzzy head.
“I know it sounds crazy, but why don’t you look her up? I know you–”
“She made her feelings quite clear,” he whispered, careful not to disturb the snuggly package that nuzzled into him. “You know me. I thought she was my fricking soulmate, but I was an inexperienced fool. Then I thought you were the love of my life, but I was wrong again. Oh-for-two.”
“Seriously. You and I have been best buds for forever. It was only natural to see if there was more. We were wrong, but it was a worthwhile experiment. You were different back then. With her.”
“I grew up.”
Swinging her hips as she strolled up the stairs, Lana grinned and aimed straight for him. “So sneaky up here, stealing all the baby time for yourself.”
Bennett forced a smile and rose to his feet, passing off the sleeping bundle, only a little smug when she pouted at the loss and Lana had to sing her calm. He stalked into the kitchen to pour a scotch big enough to knock him on his ass and into dreamless sleep tonight, wishing his demon hunter blood would let him get drunk, just once.
Chapter2
Pioneer Square, Seattle
Sun-kissed chestnut hair tickling her shoulder blades, electric blue dress hugging her hips and clinging to her torso, Adair clicked past the bouncers as they opened the velvet gate for her. In full swing, the Seattle club was hopping. A bass-heavy techno rhythm vibrated the floor beneath the carefree dancers that were grinding in the dim light.
Pink and blue spotlights glowed over the common areas, diffuse against the matte black floor. A cluster of hot-young-things fell silent until she passed. Whispers. A dark-haired one jogged to catch her. “Hey, if you’re not here with anyone and, you know, want some company, come on and join us for a drink? Or a dance?”
Adair trailed her hand across his shoulder. “Not tonight.” Leaning to whisper in his ear, she closed her eyes and scented his tangy pulse under his skin. “Go. This isn’t the club for you and your friends.” Open only a few days, the club already reeked of her bloodsucking brethren.
Withdrawing, she continued her path until she reached the corded-off stairs. To the guard, she smiled, flicking her tongue over a sharp canine. With a subtly fang-bearing smile in return, he opened the gate, greedily sweeping his gaze down the length of her. Jackass.
