The Curve Ball - Samantha Lind Page 0,18
Evie so I can clean up my dishes. She doesn’t like that too much, and by the time I’ve got everything put away, she’s got a good cry going. I rescue her from the swing, and she immediately calms down once in my arms. “Is that all you needed, baby girl?” I ask her. She lays her head against my chest and snuggles in as I take her into the living room. I pull out the floor contraption thing that Jillian said was for tummy time and place her down on it as I lay on the floor next to her. She looks around, taking in her surroundings before letting out one hell of a wail of a cry. “Do you not like that?” I ask, swooping her back into my arms as I sit upon the floor. She once again settles down, so I back up until I’ve got my back against the couch and place her on my legs. I let her grab my finger once again, and she pulls it to her mouth, chewing on it with her gums.
“How’s it going?” Riley’s voice fills the silence awhile later. I look up and find her standing a few feet away, just watching the two of us. She’s dressed in some shorts and a flowy tank top, nothing special, but damn does she look like a million bucks. She’s got her hair down; she dried it, as it’s cascading around her shoulders in perfect waves. I take her in from her bare toes and the cutest fucking feet I’ve ever seen on a woman. When have I started thinking feet were cute? My damn mind is going crazy. My gaze moves up her long legs, just beginning to show a slight tan to them, seeing that we’re just coming into spring and the hot summer weather hasn’t quite shown up yet. My eyes roll over her hips, thin waist, over her curves, finally landing on the smile that’s filling her face.
“We’re good,” I finally croak out, realizing I hadn’t answered her question. “Just spending some time together that doesn’t include being shit on.”
“Give it a little bit of time, and that will be a long distant memory.”
“One I hope never repeats itself,” I say as I tickle Evie’s belly, getting a broad smile from her. I do it again and light up when she lets out a little laugh along with her smile. My heart cracks open at the sound, and I think I can get used to this whole dad schtick.
I look up and see Riley has her phone out and pointed in our direction. She turns it around and shows me the picture that she snapped of Evie and me together. Looking at the image, you’d never guess that this was a new thing for me. I look like such a natural in the picture, and that scares the shit out of me. “Can you text that to me?”
“Of course,” she says just as I hear my cell ding with the incoming text. “Hey, do you care if I send pictures of Evie to my mom? She wanted to see her, but I wanted to check with you first before I did so.”
“Of course,” I tell her and let her question sink in. I’ve got a daughter to protect, and that means from the ugly that can be social media. “Thanks for asking first. I didn’t even think about sharing pictures of her, so maybe we’ll keep her off social media for now. Especially until we have the official test results and court orders.”
“Absolutely, and I’m sure that once word gets out that you’ve got a kid, the media is going to be all over it. It will probably be hard to keep it all a secret once your attorney files anything with the courts. I’m sure your name coming up in court documents will flag some reporters’ search on you.”
“Yeah,” I tell her, thinking about the media shit storm that will cause. “I might need to reach out to my PR rep to get ahead of everything, ask the media to give me privacy right now.”
“That probably wouldn’t be a bad thing. Do you think that Erica would possibly go to the media? Try and sell her story?”
“It’s possible, money will make most people talk.”
“Justin, I just want you to know that I’d never talk to anyone or sell you out. I just wanted to be upfront with that right now. I know what it’s like