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She nearly rolled her eyes. He asked the question a lot. What would he do if he knew her hunger at the moment had nothing to do with food? “Yes, Dr. Knox.”
“Good.” His eyes narrowed. “Did you clean up in here again?”
Had she? She liked to make herself useful by keeping things tidy, and considered it the least she could do, but the last hour was too blurry to recall. “I don’t know.” She looked around. Hunter tended to leave a trail of debris behind him when he walked out of a room—an empty glass on an end table, his phone and wristwatch on the coffee table, a discarded pair of shoes by the chair. Right now all surfaces were clutter free and the floors clear. “Maybe a little.”
“Stop doing that.” He sounded genuinely irritated. “I don’t need a maid, and you don’t need to spend your energy cleaning. I hereby institute rule number two—no picking up after me.”
She cradled Joy against her shoulder and sat beside him. Just for a minute. Constant walking kept the baby’s cries to a minimum, but a few moments of sitting and Joy would really pitch a fit. “I think it’s instinctive.”
“Resist the instinct.”
He was irritated. For some reason, the fact made her smile. “What was rule number one again?”
He leaned close and trailed his finger over Joy’s wet cheek. At this proximity, his body heat radiated over her skin, and she resisted an instinct to curl into him and soak up his warmth. She didn’t resist the urge to breathe, however, and accidentally inhaled a lungful of his scent now mixed with a base note of healthy, bed-warmed male.
“Taking care of this baby means taking care of mama. If she’s just going to cry for a bit, anybody can tend to her. Doesn’t have to be you.”
“You have to work tomorrow. You need your rest more.”
“I’m fine. How many hours have you slept in the past few days? Twelve? Fifteen?”
Counting them up would require more effort than she could possibly put forth at the moment. “Enough. I feel like an awful mom because I can’t figure out what’s wrong.”
“If she always had trouble settling down after meals, I’d wonder if there was something going on with her, but she’s golden at every other feeding, so I think she’s just restless. Have you thought about letting her cry it out?”
Cry it out? Did he not know Joy’s sobs tugged apron strings tethered to her heart, her soul, and every single one of her apparently useless maternal instincts? “I can’t just let her cry. What kind of a mother lets her baby cry?”
“The human kind. You’re exhausted.” He plucked the irate infant out of her arms. “And we’re both awake, which is stupid. I’ve got her. Go get some rest.”
God help her, she was tempted, but the sight of him cradling Joy against his bare chest held her in place. The baby, unfortunately, lacked proper appreciation for strong arms and well-defined pecs. She fidgeted, hiccupped, and then gave an unhappy wail. Poor Hunter. He deserved a heads-up on the marathon he was signing up for. “She likes to be held and walked,” she warned, at the same time the baby’s cries increased in volume.
“No worries.” He got to his feet. “I know how to walk.”
Hell yes, he did. Joy’s bawling diminished to half-hearted whimpers as he ambled across the room, talking in a slow, calm voice. She couldn’t hear what he said—or couldn’t focus on it, at any rate. Watching him move absorbed all her attention. She tried to look away, but her eyes refused to give up the view of those powerful shoulders, the long line of his back, and the two dimples riding just above the low-slung waistband of his sweats. Every step settled the sweats lower, until they clung precariously to the swells of his perfectly sculpted glutes. He turned to stroll back toward the sofa, and she nearly swallowed her tongue. Tight abs rippled, channeling her gaze over his stomach, his navel, past the strip of white skin demarking the line beyond which the sun never crossed, but her gaze trespassed the boundary without a second’s hesitation. Her breath caught in her throat. Another step or two and the man would have no boundaries left…
He absently reached down and hitched his slipping waistband up a notch, without so much as a pause in his baby whispering. She let out a shaky breath. Joy seemed content, but now she wanted to cry.
“We need one of those hands-free things,” he said.
“A sling?”
“Yeah, also a swing, right over there.” He gestured to the space beside the sofa. “Maybe something that plays some tunes and rocks at different speeds?” He grinned down at the baby. “How’s that sound, pretty girl?”
Joy responded with a weak whine.
“Yeah? Tell you what. You hang out with me tonight, let your mama get some sleep, and I’ll hook you up.”
“Don’t bribe her. That sets a bad precedent.”
“It’s not a bribe.” He flashed a grin. “It’s a reward.” Joy gave a gurgle, which Madison recognized as a sign of her tantrum winding down. Hunter cocked an ear toward her little head, as if listening. “What’s that? You like pink? I’ll see what I can do.”
The integers on Total Due to Hunter Knox tally inflated before her eyes. “No pink swing. No stuff at all. I’m serious.”
“She’s a three a.m. thrill-seeker. A swing might be just the thing to rock her back to baby Zen without one of us doing laps around the living room.”
Well, shoot. When he put it like that…“I’ll get one tomorrow.”
“Then she’ll have two. You’re spoiling her.”
