A Lie for a Lie (All In) - Helena Hunting Page 0,89
good or a bad change—so thank you for being patient with me while I figured all of this out.”
“Thank you for giving me a chance to prove I’m the same man I was a year ago.” I press my lips to her temple and hold her, grateful for this second chance.
Since Kody seems content in his crib—for now—we leave him there while I show Lainey the bathroom connected to the nursery. There’s another door leading to a bedroom on the other side, so all three rooms are connected.
“If you want to stay in here, you can.” I don’t want to push Lainey for more than she’s prepared to give.
Lainey nods and bites her bottom lip. “Where’s your bedroom?”
“I’m actually connected to Kody’s room too, through the closet.” It was a design feature I didn’t understand at first. But I realized later that the guest bedroom I’d planned for Lainey to stay in was actually meant to be a nanny suite. I take Lainey through the walk-in closet full of new clothes for Kody to the door on the other side, which takes us to my bedroom.
She crosses over to the bed, which is exactly like the one from the cabin in Alaska. Even the comforter is the same. She runs her hand along the edge of the footboard. “What if . . . I want to stay in here instead?”
“I can take the other room if this is what you prefer.”
She glances over her shoulder, lip caught between her teeth, looking shy and nervous. “No. I mean, what if I want to stay in here with you?”
I bridge the gap between us and wrap her up in my arms. “I missed you every day for more than a year. I missed the smell of your shampoo, the way you feel in my arms, the sound of your voice, the softness of your skin—and even though your dad might kill me if you stay in here with me, I’m willing to take that risk.”
Lainey chuckles. “I’m a twenty-six-year-old woman—and a mother. I think we all know I’m not the innocent little girl he would like to pretend I still am. And I’ve missed the way my heart feels when you’re close to me—so please, be careful with it this time around.”
Despite the fact that Lainey might still be a little on the right side of fluish, when she tips her head back and her gaze settles on my mouth, I dip down with the intention of kissing her.
She turns her head a few inches so I make contact with the corner of her mouth. “I don’t want to make you sick.”
“My immune system is stacked—I’ll chug a bottle of vitamin C and chase it with hand sanitizer if I need to.”
Before I can make a move to kiss her properly, Kody lets out a loud cry.
Figures I end up cockblocked by my own son. “I’ll get him—you lie down.”
“What about my parents?”
“I can handle entertaining them. You need rest, and they’ll want to visit with Kody.” I make an adjustment in my pants on the way to Kody’s room. I close the door behind me so Lainey has some quiet and enter the nursery at the same time as her dad. He reaches the crib before I can and picks up Kody. “Where’s Lainey?”
“Taking a nap. The flu took a lot out of her.”
He nods and looks around the room. “This is, uh . . . an expensive-looking room for an infant.”
Kody keeps crying—not loudly, but still squawking all the same. I want to take him, but I don’t want to deprive his grandfather of the opportunity to soothe him either. It’s definitely not an easy situation to navigate. “Maybe we should take Kody downstairs. I don’t want to disturb Lainey.”
Simon follows me to the main floor. I’m not 100 percent on what all of Kody’s different cries mean, like Lainey seems to be, but I can tell by the way he’s bopping his face on Simon’s shoulder that he’s probably hungry. I root around in the baby bag until I find one of the bottles packed in the separate cooler space and put the spare in the fridge.
Simon frowns. “I thought Lainey was breastfeeding.”
“She is, but she pumps so he can have bottles when he’s at his day care. It also means I can be involved in feeding him and she can have a break when she needs it.”
I offer him the bottle, but he shakes his head. “I never