Mom stands aside as I walk into the foyer, Étienne fidgeting in my arms.
“Dad, I need your help.”
He stops the moment he sees the baby in my arms. “What?” he snaps.
And Claire bursts into tears. “Please help us!”
I grit my teeth against the pain. “You have to take Étienne for a while. He’s not safe with us.”
He shakes his head, fury pulsing in the veins sticking out of his neck. “I told you, son. I told you your lifestyle would catch up to you.”
“You have no idea what I’m going through. Please, watch him for us. We have nowhere else to go.”
Mom’s already by my side, stroking my arm. I push my baby into her arms even though it feels like I’m tearing out half of my soul.
“Of course we’ll watch him. For how long?”
“I don’t know.” My voice cracks as I look at Dad.
Jesus Christ. The disappointment. I can’t take it.
“You disgust me.”
“Étienne!”
“No, Maria! I don’t give a damn if they named their boy after me.”
Claire flinches. I feel my limbs grow cold.
“You’ve brought all this danger on an innocent boy. How can you live with yourself? You poison everyone you’re around.”
It hurts. I can’t fucking help but feel flayed alive by his words.
“I am doing the best I can for my son. That’s how I live with myself.”
I turn my back on him, and to my surprise I see Claire taking a step forward, a defiant gleam in her eyes.
“How can you say things like that about your son?”
“Claire—”
“You’re awful. I’m not sorry you won’t be in our son’s life.”
She brushes her cheeks angrily as my dad gives her a bemused smile, and then storms past me, right out the open door.
Did my wife just tell my dad off?
I bend over, giving my shocked mother a kiss on the cheek. “She’s really stressed out. Thanks again.”
“Good night,” she says in a tight voice.
Christ.
I walk outside, closing the door behind me to see a small form in the darkness, almost glowing in the night in her white dress.
“What the hell was that?”
Her cheeks and eyes burn, but she still looks beautiful, and I wrap my arm around her waist.
“I love you, and I hate seeing him treat you like shit.”
It hits me again how much I love her. I love her for standing up for me against my dad. I love her for her smile, her laughter. Most of all, I love that she makes me feel like a good man.
She kisses me first, devouring my lips with her hungry mouth. I back her against my car, heart already racing when she squeezes my hard cock through my slacks. I smile.
I love her for that, too.
CLAIRE
A hot line moves down the top of my spine, all the way down my back, and then a rough hand grabs my hip. My hand freezes over the rack of newborn clothing as the tiny onesies remind me of him. My baby boy who I’ve been away from for weeks. Who needs me.
The impatient hand tightens around my waist and a sultry voice whispers in my ear.
“Claire, you’re not listening.”
I’m thinking of the pale man with yellow eyebrows. Frank Boucher, the name that repeats itself in my ears.
I fucking hate him.
The way he stared at me with that devastated look on his face, as though I had hurt him.
You took my son away from me.
Luc stands in front of me, demanding my attention.
“Don’t think about him.”
His warm fingers lift to my face and he grabs my neck, igniting a flurry of pleasure.
He tries to distract me every day from the fact that I’m aching for my baby boy. Luc ties me up, fucks me hard, but my soul burns for Frank Boucher. I want that dull face bashed in.
Luc’s fingers graze the sensitive skin right under the hem of my t-shirt, and his tongue parts my lips, sinking inside my mouth. Then I realize we’re making out in the middle of Macy’s, in the children’s department, and that bump in his jeans isn’t his wallet.
He pulls back, grinning as my face probably turns a bright shade of red.
“We’ll get our son back tonight.”
My heart leaps. “Really?”
“I think if he wanted to do something, he would have done it already.”
Dullness flattens Luc’s eyes as he takes my hand and tugs me down the aisles, away from the racks of baby clothing. It’s way too early to go shopping. His knuckles burn white as he pinches my hand, the bones crushing against each other painfully.
“I hate that fucking bastard. I hate that he put his hands on you. If John hadn’t made it very clear that I’d get a bullet to the back of my head if I touched that cop, I would do it, Claire.”