What a Bachelor Needs (Bachelor Auction Book 4)(25)
“I did tell you that I wouldn’t make it over last night,” he said, as he poured his brother a coffee and handed it to him.
“You did.” Seth turned his attention to the kitchen décor and winced. “You sure you only want to remove a wall?”
“For now.” It was all Mardie could afford and Jett was trying to respect that, no matter how much he wanted to do more for her.
“If you want this cupboard gone and the wall down now, there’s going to be noise,” Seth said next. “Is the lady of the house at work or asleep?”
“She’s still sleeping. You could always come back at ten.”
“Contrary to popular belief, I do have other things to do besides humor you and your latest conquest.”
“Don’t call her that.”
That drew Seth’s gaze to him again.
“Call her Mardie.” Not conquest. Not the latest in a long line of women who’d passed through his life. Mardie was different.
“Does this mean you’re serious about her?” Seth had his not-so-happy face on. “You only began to get to know her on Monday.”
“So?”
“It’s Thursday,” Seth deadpanned.
So it was.
“Have you ever considered that you might move a little too fast for safety?”
“It hasn’t killed me yet.”
“There are worse things than death. What do you know about this woman?”
“I know where she lives.”
Seth just stared at him.
Too early for bad jokes, then. “I know what she hopes for and what she fears. I know that she demands honesty in relationships, and that she’s not afraid to call me on my bullshit. I feel like I can be myself around her, and that she doesn’t need me to be anything else. I like it. She fits. No one else ever has.”
Seth drank some more coffee and between one mouthful and the next, decided that this was okay by him. “So her name’s Mardie. What’s her last name?”
“Griffin. And her little girl’s called Claire.”
“Do you want both of them?”
“They’re a package deal.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
Seth and his hard questions. “Yes, I want both of them. That’s not an issue.”
“Who’s the father?”
“Boyd Prescott.”
Seth’s face told him what he thought of that.
“If that ever becomes an issue for Boyd, I will deal with it.”
“Feel free to ask for help with that one,” was all Seth said.
Seth was a legend.
*
Twenty minutes later, they had the cupboard out of the way and had started tearing into the wall with sledgehammers. Plenty of carnage, plenty of noise, along with headphones and safety glasses and sweat. Which was why Jett didn’t initially register the presence of an older man and a little girl watching them.
When he did, he stopped, and off came the safety gear.
“Morning,” said the older man. “Early start.”
“Always,” said Seth, as he too downed tools.
And then Claire let forth with a string of loud mumumums and started wriggling her way out of the older man’s arms, her attention focused wholly on getting to Jett.
The older man handed her over without a word and then Jett had his arms full of baby-scented, smiling little girl. He looked at her with her bright, brown eyes and her two tiny pigtails adorned with little pink bows, and that was just…
That was just…
Adorable.
Beside him, Seth let out a guffaw, and stepped forward, hand outstretched towards the older man. “Seth Casey.”
“Ray Griffin, Mardie’s father. You the handyman Olympian?”
Seth’s grin widened. “That would be my brother here. He babysits as well. He’s a man of many skills.”
He was.
Jett had many skills – ask anyone.
Carrying on a conversation with Mardie’s father, whilst a beaming poppet perched on his forearm wasn’t one of them. “Friendly little thing, isn’t she?”
“Not usually,” Ray offered dryly. “Guess she’s seen you around a bit. That your truck out front. The one covered in snow?”
“He had to abandon it.” Seth came to his rescue as legendary brothers should. “Yesterday’s snow front hit hard.”
Jett nodded. “It did.”
Claire started blowing raspberries at him. Jett figured she knew the story he was spinning was bullshit and that he’d spent the night right here with her mother.
Little girls were scary.
And then just when it couldn’t get any worse, he heard footsteps, followed by a sleepy voice coming from somewhere in the hallway.
“Jett Casey, there had better be coffee made and ready to drink in that kitchen, because I distinctly remember you saying something about sleeping in. You promised, when you woke me up with kisses at four a.m. and we—” Mardie rounded the doorway, all sleep soft and disheveled, rubbing at her eyes with the back of her hand and wearing nothing but a watermelon colored tank top and white panties.
“Dad!”
“Daughter.”
She closed her eyes with a wince, and opened them as if this time the view would be different.