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Emily started to reach for Cassie, but Ian shifted his arm away. “Go on back to rest. I’ll feed her breakfast and then I’ll check on you to see if you feel like eating. You’re exhausted and working too hard.”
Cassie raised a brow. “Working too hard? Are you the pot or the kettle?”
Laughing, Ian shrugged. “Does it matter?”
Cassie pushed away from the couch and sighed. “Thanks, Ian. Really. I don’t know what I would’ve done without you here last night.”
After a light kiss across her forehead, Ian looked into her eyes. “There’s nowhere else I would’ve rather been.”
As Cassie got back into bed, she knew Ian wasn’t just saying pretty words to try to win her over. The man was full of surprises, and she found herself falling harder with each passing revelation.
And now here she was, 100 percent in love with a man who lived on the other side of the country, who would be leaving in a couple of weeks to go back to his life. And, of all the rotten timing, her ex had decided to show up now.
Cassie curled into her pillow and fisted her hands beside her face as the tears threatened to fall. Somehow this would all work out. She had faith, she had hope and, for the first time in her life, she had love. All of that had to count for something...didn’t it?
* * *
Once Cassie had gotten a little food in her, she seemed even more tired, so Ian insisted on taking Emily for a few hours and then checking back. There was no way he could leave her alone with a baby, but he still had work to do.
Single parents worked while caring for their babies all the time, right? Shouldn’t be too hard to send some emails and make a few phone calls.
After fighting with the straps on the stroller and narrowly missing pinching Emily’s soft skin in the buckle, he finally had her secured and ready to go. Diaper bag over his shoulder, Ian set out across the estate, pushing Emily toward his trailer.
Bright purple flats covered her feet as she kicked her little legs the entire way. Ian knew he was smiling like an idiot, but how could he not? Emily was an absolute doll and she was such a sweet kid. He was actually looking forward to spending time with her.
Max Ford and his wife, Raine, were just stepping out of their trailer as he passed by. Max held their little girl, Abby, who was almost two now.
“Look at this,” Max said with a wide grin. “You seeing how the family life fits you?”
Ian didn’t mind the question. Actually, he kind of warmed at the idea of it. “Cassie isn’t feeling too great, so I told her I’d take Emily for the day.”
Max’s daughter pointed down to Emily. “Baby.”
Laughing, Raine took the little girl and squatted down to the stroller to see Emily. “Her name is Emily,” Raine explained.
“You’re pretty serious about Cassie,” Max said in a softer tone. “Happened pretty quick.”
Ian shook his head and raked a hand over his hair, which was probably still sporting a messy look after sleeping on the sofa all night. “Yeah, it did. But I can’t help it, man. I didn’t see this coming.”
“You plan on staying after the film is done?” Max asked.
Ian watched the interaction between the two little girls and Raine and his heart swelled. “I honestly don’t know,” Ian said, looking back to Max. “How hard was it for you with the transition?”
Max’s gaze drifted to his family, and a genuine smile, not what he used for the cameras or his on-screen love interests, but the one that Ian had seen directed only at Raine, transformed his face. “When you want something so bad you’d die without it, there’s no transition. It’s the easiest and best decision I’ve ever made.”
Yeah, that was kind of where Ian’s mind was going. Having Cassie and Emily in his life made him feel things on a level he hadn’t even known existed inside him.
Ian said his goodbyes to Max and his family and stepped inside his trailer. After settling Emily on a pink fuzzy blanket from her house, Ian placed her favorite toys all around her. Standing back to admire his feat of babysitting, he went to boot up his laptop, grabbed his phone and sat at the small kitchenette. Thankfully, the trailer was all open and small, so Emily couldn’t leave his sight.
After answering a few emails, Ian glanced at the little girl, who was chewing on one toy and pounding the other one against the side of her rainbow-striped leggings. So far so good.
As he dialed one of his clients, rising star Brandon Crowe, who was on his way to Texas for filming, Ian scrolled back through his emails, deleting the junk so he could wade through and find things that actually needed his attention.
“Hello.”
