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“No, no. Don’t worry about me.” Mason raked his fingers through his hair.
“Do you want to come back and see her?”
“Oh, um…” His blue gaze darted everywhere. “I don’t want to impose.”
I tugged at his shirt. “C’mon, you can see how cute she is without all the yucky birth stuff.”
His neck flushed red. “I’m sure she’s beautiful.”
“I’m pretty partial.” I hurried through the small living room and down the hall to my bedroom. I winced at the twisted sheets and stack of onesies at the bottom of my bed. It seemed like I needed to change them as much as her diapers.
Adriana was kicking and her little fists were flailing as she shrieked from the bassinet beside my bed.
“Okay, sweet pea, you’re good.” I quickly scooped her up and put her on my shoulder. My eyes crossed as her little foot kicked my overfull breast. I swayed in that way I was learning she liked, and her shrieks turned to low volume wails. She shouldn’t be hungry yet, but it seemed like all she wanted to do was chow down.
The doctor told me to let her eat when she wanted to eat, so that was what I did.
I swung her down and lifted my shirt, only hissing a little as she greedily latched on.
Mason was hovering in the doorway, his eyes darting everywhere but never landing on us.
Taking pity on him, I moved to the small rocking chair I had in the corner and grabbed a receiving blanket to cover us the rest of the way. My boobs were too small to be showing much anyway thanks to the oversized shirt I was wearing.
“Sorry I haven’t been in contact.”
He cleared his throat. “You are definitely not to worry about me.”
“Did you give my job away?”
He stared at the ceiling. “About that. I thought I’d stop by to—”
“Let me down easy?”
“It’s not that.”
“C’mon, Ace. You know I was born for that position.” I didn’t know and I was bluffing harder than when I’d pretended to be a poker champion in Rio. That had been a wild summer and felt like a million years ago now.
I glanced down at my daughter and brushed my thumb over her silky dark hair as she drank down like she was starving.
It felt like a billion years in one whole week.
I looked up and saw Mason had finally stopped avoiding me. His lake-colored eyes were a little wild, but a tenderness was there too. He swallowed hard and licked his lips. “She’s so small.”
Her little foot kicked out from the blanket so she was free to twist her ankles. “Not the first baby you’ve seen. Don’t you have a new nephew?”
“Yeah, but he wasn’t that small.”
“Didn’t feel very small when she came out.”
He paled.
I laughed. “From what I’ve heard from other moms, I got off easy.”
Adriana’s head lolled to the side, her little mouth slack. She was already milk drunk. I tugged my shirt down and shifted her up on my shoulder to rub her back. She really was a peanut. Just under six pounds.
I was probably lucky she’d been a week early. If not, I’d be dealing with stitches instead of my insides being rearranged like I’d been in a cage match with an MMA fighter who specialized in kicking.
I gave a regretful sigh when her little breaths evened at my neck. Of course my daughter would fall asleep without evening both of my boobs out. I shifted to keep her on my good side, but the throbbing was getting worse.
