All of Me (8 page)

When he recognized the SUV, he began to make his way over to the curb. Unlocking the doors, Charlie tried to squelch how aroused she was by the smile he flashed at her. Taking a deep breath, she cursed her memory of their highly erotic times together.

Opening the back passenger door, Grant leaned in and gave Stella a kiss before putting in his luggage. “Hello, peanut. Did you miss your daddy?”

Making baby noises of appreciation, Stella tried to hold on to her father.

“Okay, honey, let Daddy go. When we get to the restaurant I’ll make sure to give you a great big hug,” Grant said with a hint of humor as he tried to extract himself from his daughter’s grip.

Shutting the door against her protests, Grant got into the front passenger seat.

“You could have sat in the back with her.”

“I thought we could talk. If you don’t want my company, I can sit in the back,” Grant stated with a hint of annoyance.

Pulling away from the curb, Charlie let out a sigh. She hadn’t meant for the words to sound so harsh. “Its just that she really missed you,” Charlie replied, trying to soften the impact of her earlier comments.

“Well, I’m glad someone did.”

Turning around in his seat to face Stella, Grant began to make soothing noises to calm the agitated baby. Charlie chose to ignore his comment, and when he turned back around, she focused on the road ahead.

“Is there somewhere in particular you would like to eat?” she asked, trying to have a civil conversation.

“Actually, I’d rather just go home. Oh, I’m sorry. I mean back to your place.”

Charlie chose to also ignore the biting sarcasm in his tone. She had given Grant a key so he could come and visit and not always have to call ahead of time. But he always made a point of stressing that it was her place. Frankly, she thought it was pretty childish. She was comfortable with him thinking of her place as home because that was where his daughter lived, but Grant liked to keep a distinction. It was this type of behavior that made her keep a firm lock on her feelings for him. Although they burned hot for each other, and shared a mutual love of their child, petty squabbles always seemed to clutter their relationship.

“Well, I went to the market today. I’m sure I can whip something up.” Not rising to the bait, Charlie worked to keep the conversation light and open. It could have been the residual glow of her Grant-inspired orgasm last night, but she wasn’t in the mood to ruin what should have been a happy homecoming.

“You’re too kind.”

Turning, Grant looked out the window, effectively ending the conversation. Charlie continued the drive in silence, periodically making reassuring comments to Stella when she started to get antsy.

Considering the outing had started with such promise, she was really beginning to dread when they finally got home. Well, she would just have to make an effort to smooth Grant’s ruffled feathers. She knew the only way to clear the air was to have an open conversation, but she wasn’t ready for what the outcome of such a talk could bring. Their lives were complicated, but complicated meant she didn’t have to put her heart on the line. Complicated meant they could continue to dance around the feelings they had for each other and not worry about them being crushed. She could deal with complicated because, if she didn’t, she’d have to acknowledge that she’d fallen in love with the father of her child.

Chapter Seven

Grant played with Stella in the living room in the play area Charlie had created. Although he loved her place, he realized the small, Spanish-style house was growing even smaller each day as Stella got bigger. Of course, the loft he owned downtown was no better. What he really wanted was to buy a larger house where they could have more room. Ruffling the soft curls of his daughter’s hair, he wondered when “they” had come to include he, Charlie, and Stella. As he watched his daughter’s face transform with laughter, he couldn’t imagine spending his life without her and the woman who had given her to him.

Even though everyone, including Charlie, commented on how much Stella looked like him, when he looked at her all he could see was Charlie. It was in the way she examined everything so thoroughly and set her chin in a determined lift when she was annoyed or frustrated. It was even in the way she moved her chubby little baby hands when she talked in her gibberish. So animated and excited, she was so much like her mother.

Where she differed from her mother was in the way she looked at Grant. When his little daughter looked at him, he felt as if he was the most important person in the world. Grant had always felt loved growing up even if his parents had never expressed it as often as he would have liked, but it didn’t compare to how he felt with Stella. Even if she hadn’t mastered language yet, her eyes spoke volumes.

It was because her basic mannerisms were so like her mother that the love she showed him was bittersweet. Grant often wondered what it would feel like to have that same love come from beautiful green eyes as well as blue ones. Sighing, he handed Stella another block and tried to focus on the little that he had. His friends back home were still shocked he had become a family man. Though he’d never considered himself a playboy, Grant had allowed himself to play just as hard as he worked, always in moderation, of course. The funny thing was, as he sat on the living room floor playing with his daughter he didn’t really miss it. Well, that wasn’t entirely true. He did miss the sex. But if he had to be honest, he really missed the sex with one woman. Charlie.

It was that longing that had set in motion his finding out he had a child. Each day he spent with Stella, he was thankful he’d put his pride aside to seek Charlie out. Even though she’d apologized about not telling him sooner, he was sometimes seized with anxiety knowing she might have never shared Stella with him. The thought was completely unimaginable to him. But, once again, it was a bittersweet experience because even though he had Charlie back in his life, it was definitely on a look-but-don’t-touch basis.

Mostly he was okay with it. When he stood at the airport curb waiting for Charlie and Stella, he buzzed with the anticipation of seeing them. Opening the car door and seeing the look of love shining from his daughter’s eyes wiped away any feelings of exhaustion he might have had. Everything seemed so perfect and so right.

Unfortunately, it was that fantasy that blinded him to the reality of the situation. When he sat next to Charlie, he had to admit what he wanted to be true wasn’t. It wasn’t his beautiful wife and child picking him up after a long business trip. Instead, it was his child and her mother. A point that was reinforced by Charlie’s thinly veiled request to have him sit in the back with baby. It actually burned him up with a silent rage that she treated him as nothing more than a donor.

It was the same feeling he’d had when they sat in the lawyer’s office all those months ago and she proposed he give up his rights to his child. The smug smile she’d had while her lawyer friend explained the conditions of her agreement had a white-hot rage forming inside of him. If she hadn’t gone into labor at that moment, he couldn’t even begin to imagine how he would have responded. But when she had gone into labor, and Grant saw a glimpse of the woman she was back in Italy. When she called for him in the hospital and they shared a moment before she brought their daughter into the world, Grant thought it could be different. Later, after they'd returned from the hospital, when he caught her standing in front of the mirror looking at her new body and he practically tucked her into bed, he was sure they would build something together. Not based on the fact they had a child, but on what they had begun to establish in Italy.

Grant was shocked when she awoke from her short nap and it seemed he'd imagined it all. Six months ago she went to bed a woman he’d thought open to the possibility of an “us” and awoke that night the woman from the law firm, cold and distant. From that day she'd kept him at arm’s length but was careful to allow him a relationship with his daughter. He spent every possible day with Stella, watching her grow and marveling at the person she was becoming, but he had to admit he knew even less about the woman who’d given birth to her. The little he did know, he got from her brothers. Honestly, he didn’t know what he would have done without the three men. Initially suspicious of him, they had come to include him as if he were one of them. Not having siblings growing up, he found their camaraderie helped him get through the half-life he had in Los Angeles.

It was a half-life his parents were becoming increasingly anxious about. His father had expressed on several occasions his disappointment that nothing had been finalized between Grant and Charlie. Frankly, Grant was a bit surprised his parents had taken so readily to Charlie and her family. He knew Robert Carter emailed Steven Ambrose on a regular basis. Steven sent new pictures of Stella to Robert weekly. Claire and Eveline chatted on the phone about Stella and cultural events in their respective cities.

Their most recent conversation still played in his head.

“I was talking to Steven the other day, and he told me you and Charlie had become close. When are you going to marry that girl, Grant? Even though Steven doesn’t mention it, I know he is disappointed you haven’t yet.”

“Frankly, Father, I didn’t know you cared,” Grant replied dryly, trying to hide his irritation.

“What would make you think that? Stella needs a mother and a father,” Robert stated with a note of annoyance.

“She has a mother and a father.”

“You know what I mean. This little charade you two are engaging in has gone on long enough. What are you planning to tell Stella when she gets older?”

“I don’t think we need to tell her anything. Stella has two parents who are devoted to her and her well-being.”

He focused his attention back on the paperwork in front of him and tried to send his father the message he was tired of the discussion. Not one to be ignored, Robert pressed on.

“Well, what are you going to do when Charlie meets another man? Are you comfortable with another man raising your daughter?”

Snapping his head up to stare at his father with disbelief, Grant had never felt so angry with him in his life.

“I thought not. Son, this is the reality of the situation. Charlie is a very intelligent and attractive woman. A man would be a fool not to secure her. If you don’t do it soon, someone else will not hesitate.”

Grant couldn’t believe his father had likened his marrying Charlie to a business acquisition. Of course it was typical of his father to see everything reduced down to some profit margin. Confused and hurt, Grant wanted to rebut his father’s comments but didn’t know where to begin.

“Is there a reason why you are hesitant?” Robert asked, still probing his son.

“Frankly, Father, I’m actually amazed you are so invested in my marrying Charlie. I never thought of her as someone you would champion for your daughter-in-law.”

Staring at his son with shock, Robert quickly collected his emotions and formed his features into the blank mask he wore when conducting a lucrative business deal. “What are you insinuating by that comment?” Robert asked flatly.

“I wasn’t insinuating anything, Father. I’m just saying I find your enthusiasm out of character. Charlie isn’t the type of woman that usually socializes in our circles.”

Once the words left his mouth, Grant regretted saying them. Watching his fathers face go from a heightened red to a chalky white, Grant knew he had gone too far.

“Well, I’m sorry you have thought so low of me in the past. I would gladly welcome a woman like Charlie in our family regardless of what social circles she travels in. But from your behavior, it seems you are the one who prefers to keep a distinction.”

Before Grant could apologize, his father walked stiffly from the office Grant used when he had to make a trip to their New York office. Watching his father exit, Grant knew that he had reacted out of his own anger and insecurity. He didn’t have a problem with Charlie being black, but the more time they spent together without their relationship evolving, the more Grant began to wonder if maybe she did.

“Did you want wine with dinner or a beer?”

Grant had been so absorbed in playing with Stella and his own thoughts he hadn’t heard Charlie come from the kitchen.

“Whatever you have is fine.” Grant gave her a tight smile.

“Micah actually brought over that beer you really like before he started his shift.”

Grant smiled at the kindness of his sort-of brother-in-law. That was the joke title they used when introducing each other to their friends. Of course, they never let Charlie hear it because they knew she would have a fit.

“Dear God, I don’t even want to know what that smile is attributed to. I rue the day you and my brothers met. It was bad enough when they thought they were the Three Musketeers, but now they have a fourth. Just don’t let them make you pay for everything. They like to haze the newbies.”

Charlie’s expression of mock horror eased some of the tension he’d been holding on to earlier, until the meaning of her words settled in to agitate him more.

“Have there been a lot of newbies?”

He wanted to snatch the words back as they left his mouth. He really didn’t care about her previous or present sexual partners. But as he thought about Charlie with another man, his stomach seemed to drop. He knew he was lying to himself. Grant didn’t want to think about another man having access to her glorious body.

“My mother always said, never ask a question you don’t want the answer to.” She raised a single eyebrow and Grant knew he had pissed her off somehow. Her body vibrated with a controlled anger.

Grant pushed her a little more. “What makes you think I don’t want to know the answer?” Honestly, if anger was going to be the only expression of passion he received from her, he would rather have anger. It at least meant she felt something for him. Not the detached demeanor she constantly exhibited.

“Trust me, Grant. No man ever wants to hear the answer to that question.” Bending down to pick up Stella, she continued. “Dinner is almost done. I’ll take Stella with me while you freshen up. I’m sure you want to change out of your work clothes. I’ll have a beer ready for you when you get done.” Turning from him, she walked back toward the kitchen.

Watching Stella wave at him over her mother’s shoulder, Grant had to squash down his desire to yell. He was not accustomed to people dismissing him or having his questions go unanswered. Even though a small voice told him it was none of his business, he couldn’t help the purely primitive feeling of possession that overwhelmed him when it came to Charlie and Stella.

Stomping out of the living room and into the hallway, Grant made his way to the guest room/office. Opening the small wardrobe in the corner, Grant pulled out a pair of jeans and an old college T-shirt. As he changed out of his work clothes and threw them haphazardly onto the bed, he tried to control his anger.

Sitting on the edge of the mission-style bed, Grant ran his fingers through his hair. With his elbows resting on his thighs, he thought about the situation he was in. He was sitting in the house of the mother of his child, where he had clothes and other personal items but no other connection to the woman of the house. Grant really didn’t know how much more of this he could take. Maybe he should just pack up and go back to New York. His whole life was there—friends, family, and the headquarters to his family’s business. He knew plenty of women who would jump at the chance to be in his bed.

But as Grant sat at the edge of the bed in a place he never really felt could be his home, he couldn’t imagine leaving. He didn’t want to miss the first time Stella took a step on her own. Or when she said Mama or Daddy. And, if he had to be honest with himself, he didn’t want to miss the woman who had made all it possible for him. No matter how she kept him at arm’s length, Grant knew he loved her. Even thinking the words caused a ripping pain in his chest. He had to admit that had been the motivation in searching her out in the first place. Of course, then it had been the early flames of an emotion that now burned inside him.

“Dinner’s ready.”

Grant saw Charlie standing in the doorway with Stella resting on her hip. He knew it was just his longing for a connection between them that made him place concern in her voice and on her features. Standing up and stretching, Grant started walking toward the pair.

“Well, good, because I’m pretty hungry. Are you hungry, peanut? Let’s see what yummy stuff Mommy has made for us.”

He took Stella from Charlie’s arms and brought her in for a hug that caused his pain to slip away when he felt his daughter’s chubby little arms wrap around his neck and one of her wet kisses on his cheek.

“Thank you, peanut.”

Once in the dining room, he put Stella in her high chair and looked at the table appreciatively. Charlie really was a great cook. He enjoyed how she liked to have themed dinner meals. He could see that tonight’s theme was Middle Eastern dishes.