9

Adrian POV

“You made it!” Brittany calls out from the front door. I can hear her excitement at Missy’s arrival from the open window in the kitchen as I’m standing out back, manning the grill. Dad smoked his usual tri-tip, but Hailey wanted hot dogs so I’m out here flipping them and some chicken on the grill. 

I hear Hailey squealing in excitement, making my face pull into a goofy grin. I love the sound of her laughing. 

“It’s all for me?” her little high-pitched voice rings out. I looked up and saw Missy’s figure moving beyond the kitchen curtains. 

“It’s all yours! I got this too. I hope you like fruit punch,” Missy’s soft, soothing voice sounded almost as excited as my little girl’s. Curiosity gets hold of me and I find myself moving to the screen door to see what she had brought with her. 

“I love chocolate ice cream and Rapunzel!” Hailey squeals, jumping on her feet while clutching a Rapunzel-shaped juice jug.

“You didn’t have to get all this,” My dad smiles, holding a case of Pepsi and a six-pack of my favorite beer. Missy is holding a tub of ice cream and Brittany is setting a bag full of chips on the counter.

“Thanks for inviting me. I didn’t want to come empty-handed,” Missy smiles shyly at my dad while resting a hand on Hailey’s little shoulder. Her face glows when she smiles. My heart beats heavily and I find myself smiling too at the sight of it. 

“Funny you brought beer. Dre just made me hide all his thinking you wouldn’t approve,” Britt snickers. I could strangle that brat.

Missy laughs, “Why?”

My sister shrugs, “Your guess is as good as mine.”

“Maybe he wanted to make a good impression?” Dad chuckles, sliding the drinks on the bottom shelf in the fridge.

Okay, I’ve heard enough. I walked back to the grill, trying to tame down the redness spreading on the back of my neck and face. Britt and dad didn’t have to go and tell her all that.

“Daddy, look!” Hailey came barreling out the back door, waving her juice to me.

“What’s that, baby girl?” That goofy grin is back on my face hearing her call me daddy. She will always be my baby girl, no matter what her mom or a damn test says.

“Miss Missy got me Rapunzel and ice cream!” I smirked at the adorable way she addressed Missy. Miss Missy. I’ll have to add that to the name bank to start calling her.

“Did she?” I looked up, meeting Missy’s eyes as she and Brittany followed Hailey out to the backyard. 

“She got you somethin’ too,” Brittany smirks, throwing me a beer.

 I caught it one-handed and waved it at Missy, noticing she had one in her own hands.“Thanks.” 

She smiles brightly, making my heart go crazy in my chest again. That smile combined with her dark chocolate eyes is lethal.

“You know the way to a man’s heart. Are you trying to get in my good graces? I still got that key to your house, so you just let me know.”

She scoffs, her olive skin turning a brilliant pink, making me giggle like a 5-year-old boy picking on his school crush again. 

“As if,” she rolls her eyes, pushing one of those delicious hips off to the side and she folds her arms across her chest, “I ran into someone at the store and he told me what to get.”

“He?” my smile drops a little, “Who’s he?”

“Chris?” she says like it's a question, “He said he knew you guys well and helped me out.”

Jealousy is brimming in my chest, but I try to quickly stamp it down. What do I have to be jealous of? She just talked to a guy in the store and I’m pretty sure she hates me. Seeing the way she acts with Hailey has me going to a strange place in my mind, though. A place with both their smiles lighting up my every day.

I got to get control of myself. I’m still dealing with enough shit from Monica. I don’t need to be jumping the gun with some other chick who probably has issues of her own. 

Chris is a good guy. If she is getting close to him, good for her.

Brittany pulls Missy over to our lawn chairs, and she giggles watching Hailey twirl in a circle with her bubble wand, making bubbles float all around her. 

“You like kids?” Brittany asks her, making my ears perk up. 

“I love kids. I used to help in the pre-school and nursery at church every Sunday and Wednesday and went on mission trips to Mexico to build schools. I actually wanted to open my own daycare or child development center one day for underprivileged families.”

“So why’d you move to the middle of butt-crack nowhere? Are you gonna try to start one here? We don’t really have an impoverished community.”

“Well,” she bites her full bottom lip, pulling Hailey to sit in her lap and fixing a pigtail that came undone. “I moved to San Francisco for school. My parents died last year, though, and I took a leave of absence. Then the guy….” she sets Hailey back on her feet and encourages her to go play. I’m not even pretending to grill the food anymore. I’m staring up at my sister and Missy hanging on her every word. 

“The guy I was dating and was about to move in with, I walked in on him with another girl. I left the city the next day.”

Brittany gasps and offers her condolences while rubbing her arm.

Missy offers her a sad smile, and my heart breaks. Sounds like she’s had a pretty fucked up year. No wonder she’s so turned off by my joking around with her. She definitely doesn’t need my added crap to deal with. She has problems of her own. I at least have my family to help me. She has no one. No wonder she has so many walls up around her. 

Dad walks up behind me, a foil pan in his hands with his sliced tri-tip on one half, offering it to me so I can put the hot dogs and chicken on the other side. 

“Poor girl,” he mutters quietly so only I can hear. “She’s been through a lot. Sounds like she’s got no one to depend on now but herself, but she doesn’t let it bring her down. She’s a fighter, that one.”

I nod. I know what he’s doing, but I can’t. No matter how attracted to her I am, I can’t be the one to support her when I can’t even support myself. I had to move back in with my dad for fuck’s sake to be able to pay Monica off so I could still see Hailey. 

When I left Monica after catching her earning her tips the messy way at the casino she worked at, I tried to take custody of Hailey. I was already having a hard time coping with the craziness of the bigger city and keeping up with working full-time while going to school and supporting a family. 

I only moved with her because she told me she was pregnant. I liked her, and we had been together casually for a while, but I wouldn’t have left my dad to manage his business on his own if Monica hadn’t told me she was pregnant with my kid. When I caught her cheating, I thought that was my opportunity to take my daughter and go back home. Dad was having a hard time managing and I’d been arguing with Monica about going back. 

That's when Monica told me Hailey wasn’t even mine. I didn’t believe her shit, taking Hailey anyway and we lived happily here with my dad for months. When the custody case hit the courtroom, Monica didn’t seem nervous or scared of losing Hailey. She seemed almost smug. She hadn’t paid any of the court-ordered child support, and when she asked for the paternity test I knew why. She wasn’t lying. Hailey really wasn’t biologically mine. 

Giving her back to her mother was the hardest thing I ever had to do. She was mine no matter what the test said. Monica couldn’t even give them an idea of who her real father was. Why couldn’t I keep my paternal rights when I loved her so much more than her biological mother did?

Monica has been blackmailing me with Hailey for money ever since. My lawyer, an old friend of my dad’s, has been mediating an adoption so I can legally have her again, but Monica keeps demanding more and more from me. 

I can’t let Hailey's mother take her to Las Vegas. There is no telling what would happen to my baby girl with all the men her mother brings around. I can’t lose this job with Missy. Once I receive the full commission, combined with the money me and dad have been saving together, I should have more than enough to convince Monica to sign the fucking papers. 

Yes, I’m attracted to Missy. I'm more attracted to her than I would like to admit, but I can’t jeopardize losing my daughter because of a crush. I need to get my act together and just work to get the job done. Once I have my daughter and she is legally mine, then I can worry about other shit. 

I look back at the women as dad tells them to come in to eat, taking a long swig of my beer. When Missy squats down, her plump ass straining against her jeans as she lets Hailey climb on her back, that growingly familiar pang shoots through my heart again as they both giggle and run for the kitchen door. 

Dad looks over at me, giving me a look like he can read my thoughts. 

“It’s okay to do something for yourself, son,” he pats my shoulder as he walks by. “She’s a sweetheart. Hailey loves her too.”

“I can’t, dad. She has issues of her own. She doesn’t need mine on top of her own. Maybe after I legally have Hailey….”

“The way Chris and some of those other boys are snooping around her, you might not have that long to wait. Britt called her over to us on Friday night for your sake. Chris was laying it on thick. We love her, Hailey loves her and I can tell you are more affected by that girl than you want to admit. Why don’t you take a chance on yourself for once?”