Kim narrows her eyes at me, mouths, “Be good,” then walks…in their direction.
Maybe she decided to shoot him for me, after all.
Right. Kim also doesn’t think anyone deserves the miracle we were blessed with after so many struggles. In fact, she was opposed to that fucker Jonah more than I was.
She stops in front of them with a smile on her lips, soft, genuine, and so warm that the temperature in the room goes up a notch.
“Hi, Jeremy.”
His expression changes to that of complete politeness like a fucking psychopath. “Hello, Mrs. Knight.”
“Oh, there’s no need for formalities. Kimberly or just Kim is fine. It’s nice to meet you. Cecy was just telling me so much about you.”
He raises a brow, glides his attention to my daughter, then back to my wife. “She was?”
“Why yes. The way she talked about you made me look forward to meeting you.”
“Mum!” Cecily shakes her head.
“I’m curious about what she said.” The fucker sneakily strokes my daughter’s hand. “If it’s not too much of an intrusion, might I stay? I’ve always wanted to know about Cecily’s home.”
“It is an intrusion.” I barge into their circle and wrench my daughter to my side, forcing him to let her go. “And what’s with wanting to know about her home? You a stalker, boy?”
Cecily tugs on my arm and stares up at me with big, pleading eyes. I swear to fuck she got this expression from thatPuss in Bootsfilm and decided it’s how she’s going to get everything she wants.
It doesn’t help that she inherited the color of her mother’s eyes. I’ve always been weak to my wife’s everything.
Kim places the shotgun back in its place on the wall and then grabs my free hand. “Jeremy, this is Xander, Cecy’s very overprotective father. Try to tolerate him. He’ll come around.”
“I will most certainly not. Unless he leaves the property and never shows his face near my daughter again.”
“Like I said. Overprotective.” Kim smiles at him and pinches my side. Hard.
Bloody fucking hell.
“Please join us for dinner.” My wife actually leaves my side to usher the arsehole into the dining room. I follow after, still holding on to Cecily because I don’t trust him in my house and can’t allow him to be in the company of the two most important women in my life.
“You can freshen up,” Kim speaks to him in her affectionate, motherly tone. “Did you just arrive?”
“I landed in London half an hour ago.”
“You must be tired then. You can rest upstairs until dinner if you prefer?”
“I’m not, actually. It wasn’t a long flight.” The bastard has the audacity to smile at my wife with straight white teeth that I’ll knock right out of his mouth. “I’d rather help if that’s okay.”
“Why, of course! Cecily wasn’t much of a help in cutting vegetables and sliced her finger instead.”
“Yeah, she does that sometimes.” He throws a knowing glance at my daughter, then promptly focuses on my wife after he briefly meets my gaze.
“You guys cook together?” Kim asks with a dreamy grin as if this is some happy occasion.
“Most of the time, we do, yeah.”
“That’s so sweet. Hear that, Xan?”
“I see nothing sweet about him exploiting my daughter to fill his stomach. That’s called free labor.”
“Oh, please. Is it free labor if I cook for you?”