Page 25 of Turning Back

The little bottle warmer thing dings and the baby must know that means food, because she suddenly gets very fussy. Rochelle turns away, juggling the baby and the bottle for a few seconds, until she gets everything straight, and then walks over to the couch and plops down with the baby in her lap.

Tiny hands eagerly clasp around the bottle and bring it to her mouth. Seconds later there is the sound of sucking.

I want to touch her. Both of them. I want to walk over to that couch, sit my ass down, and be with them. But I won’t. I refuse to give in that easily.

“We should go,” Bric says. “It was nice, I guess, Rochelle. But you do what you have to do.”

“Do what you have to do?” I say, shaking my head in disbelief. “No. Nope. I want a DNA test. I want that right now, before you leave town, Rochelle. I want a fucking DNA test.”

When I look at Bric he’s got a weird smug look on his face. But I ignore it and pull out my phone, doing a search for paternity testing in Denver. “Here’s one.” I press the contact number and let it ring though.

“You’re doing this now?” Bric asks.

“She’s passing though,” I say. “If not now, when?”

“Rochelle,” Bric says, swiping my phone from me and ending the call.

“What the fuck, asshole?” He opens his mouth and I cut him off. “If you bitch at me one more time about swearing in front of a baby who can’t even talk yet, I’ll punch you in the eye.”

Bric looks back to Rochelle. “You don’t have a room booked, right?”

She shakes her head.

“Then you’re not in a hurry. Passing through can mean a lot of things. It can mean one night. It can mean one week. It can mean one month.”

“Not really in any hurry,” she says.

“So just… hang out for a little bit. Let’s talk about this stuff. Take more time with it. You’re at least staying one night. You already have the room. So we’ll go, let you have time with the baby. Get settled. And we’ll come back tomorrow.”

They both look at me like I’m the one in charge here.

“OK,” she finally says. “I can stay a few days. Try to work this out.”

“Good,” Bric says. “Perfect. You happy?” he asks, looking at me.

No. No, I’m not happy at all. I’m fucking pissed off.

But Bric moves on and says, “You?” He looks at Rochelle. She nods. “Perfect. Then we’ll get going and one of us will call you in the morning.”

Bric turns towards the door and I follow, snatching my phone from his hand as he passes me. I don’t want to look back as I turn the corner towards the short hallway. But I do.

And it hurts. So bad.

God, I want them.

Chapter Five - Bric

When I get back to the Club I head straight for my office. I have two messages from Jordan asking if I have anyone in mind from the Club to take the last girl’s place.

The Club girls never work out. I knew this once, but had forgotten it. Rochelle was around too long. Important things like that slipped my mind, even though they were hard-won lessons back in the early years.

I text him back. No. I’m taking a break.

I don’t wait for his response—I know he’s in court this afternoon, so he can’t answer anyway. So I take out the card the former FBI guy gave me, and call Rochelle’s cell phone using the landline.

“Hey,” she says in a soft voice, picking up on the first ring.

“That baby sleeping?”