Page 76 of The Damaged Billionaire's Obsession
“You’d think with your twins on the way that you’d shut up and take notes,” Xavier points out. Jordan is sitting at the edge of the pool table nursing a can of Coke. Beyond making funny faces at Lily Rose and patting her back while someone else carries her, he hasn't made an attempt to hold the newborn.
“I’m a natural,” argues Jordan.
“Yeah, right,” I scoff. I know he’s freaking out at how tiny she is, and I feel sorry for him.Before the night is over I'm sure he'll be fully cured of those nerves.
Ryan hasn’t put himself forward, either, though he's been happily fetching toys and wipes and anything else I've needed him to. He scrolls on his phone and in moments 'Baby Shark' comes back on. Brooke suggested we play classical music to help Lily Rose settle but we had to draw the line somewhere. Even Xavier backed us on that.
“We’re all taking turns, you know,” I say, having watched Ryan act like a golden retriever all night.
“We know, baby whisperer. But it's your watch at the moment, so stuff it.” Ryan retorts.
The baby settles with my gentle pats and as we'd like to believe, to the quirky beats of the music. Her shallow breaths calm me. While the rest of the boys talk business and argue about sports, keeping their voices as low as their excitement allows, I enjoy holding the newborn.
It’s the most at peace I’ve felt since that morning in L.A.
Bonnie has gone cold on me. It’s almost funny how hard she tries to avoid me, refusing to make eye contact except to make a snarky comment. It must be tough on her, speaking from my own experience of when I did the same to her, and also considering she’s handling a project I wrote, one which due toher brilliance at the expo, has generated a lot of interest and inquiries from avid gamers and the media, meaning she often needs to confer with me.
Because I can see how much she’s freaking out, I let her be, even though it kills me to stay away. I’ve even made myself scarce around the office.
Bonnie’s hard exterior drives me crazy and arouses me to no end, but the broken woman beneath has been calling out to me like a siren. After finally getting a good glimpse of that woman, I’m riveted.
While it's true that being around her makes me feel restless and out of control, which is physically painful for me, it’s a pain I’m prepared to put up with if it means being with Bonnie.
Whether or not we get together will be her decision. That much I'm willing to give her control over. If and when she does come to me though, all bets are off. I’m taking everything she has and pushing her to her limits.
Our limits.
I sent her a message last week to let her know that I’m here whenever she’s ready and left it at that. I've got nothing back so far.
Jordan leaves the rest of the boys and saunters over to me. I’ve been in and out of town on business in the past couple of weeks, so I haven’t seen much of him.
He watches Lily Rose nestle contentedly against me for a few moments. “How are you doing it? She seems to hate everyone except you. And her dad, of course.”
“I don’t know. I think babies can sense anxiety. You looked like you were about to bolt when Brooke gave her to you.”
“She’s so small.” Jordan puts his hand on her back to emphasize his point.
“Well, I hate to do this to you, man, but you do know that your babies are going to be even smaller than she is, right?”
“No way!”
“Yep. Sabrina can only get so big. Twins tend to be smaller than single babies.”
“How do you know that?”
“I saw Elsa’s twins the day after they were born.” Elsa is one of my dad’s girlfriend’s daughters, who lives in Prague with her husband.
If only Dad would just man up and marry Ingrid, so I can just call Ingrid’s daughters my step-sisters instead of this convoluted mouthful. I get that my dad is permanently scarred from having his wife walk out on him and leaving him with two small children, but Ingrid isn’t his ex-wife.
“Ethan, I’ve been meaning to ask you something,” Jordan says.
“About?”
“What happened with Bonnie in L.A.?”
I tense. “Why do you ask?”
“Ethan, I know it can take you ages to warm up to someone, but could you please cut Bonnie some slack? I’m begging here.”