Page 143 of Daddy By Design

“What?” I glanced up at him.

“You’re staring at my hands.”

“There’s a lot of scars here.”

“Welding tools aren’t exactly kind to the body.”

I turned his hand over to see a series of burns along his forearm and twisted it back for the webbing of scars over his knuckles. “Do you miss it?”

I could feel him tightening up, but then he blew out a slow breath. “Sometimes. But after the accident, there’s nothing in there. I used to see pieces of a car in the junkyard and know exactly what it would become. I couldn’t pull the scraps apart fast enough to get them reshuffled into what I saw in my head.” He flexed his hands. “Why I have so many burns. Impatient.”

“Then why did it stop?”

“I don’t know. The first time someone paid me for a piece, it was asinine, to be truthful. I went from a shitty co-op space in Brooklyn to living in Manhattan. This woman talked me up.”

“What’s her name?”

He sighed.

I could tell he didn’t want to tell me. I was a designer. I knew that word of mouth was king.

“Kim Tomlinson.”

Or, in that case, queen. Dear God. “Well, then.”

“I take it you know who she is?”

“Pretty sure she was at the bottom of that People Magazine cover in my bag.”

He reddened. “Yeah, well. We got involved for a while and she paraded me in front of her rich friends.”

“You used to go out with Kim Tomlinson?” My stomach jittered.

And now he wanted to be with me? Kim was one of the most beautiful and influential women in the world.

“Yeah, it was not a smart move.”

“It wasn’t?”

“It was fun for a while, but she treated me like a damn show pony.I was stupid. All I saw was that people wanted to buy my work, then came the oh, I have an idea. Can you make this?” His whole body tensed. “Then I was a trick pony.”

“And you forgot how to do things you loved.”

“Pretty much.” He pulled his hand away.

I knew there was more to the story, and the urge to deep dive his life on Google was terrifyingly strong. But I wasn’t sure I could see him wound around a gorgeous socialite without losing my damn mind.

I wasn’t exactly sure what that said about me.

I knew one thing, though. I was freaking exhausted. “I should go home.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m dead on my feet and it’s been a very long day.”

He backed up. “Take a nap with Gizmo.”

“I...”

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