Page 92 of Rescued by the Single Dad

Shaking her head, Brooke did the exact same thing, pulling apart the Oreo carefully so one side was covered in the cream, the other was empty. “It’s just ... that’s exactly how I eat my Oreos, too.” Then she dunked the barren side into her milk.

Talia beamed and leaned over to knock her cream covered side against Brooke’s cream covered side. “Cheers to Oreo twins.”

Brooke’s heart thudded hard. She was falling in love with this little girl—and her dad—and it was getting more and more difficult to think about leaving them. “Cheers to Oreo twins,” she said, a lump in her throat. Then she took a bite of the cookie and let the sugar rush mask her worries.

Maybe it didn’t have to be temporary.

Maybe she could become more permanent in their lives.

Maybe this was where she was meant to be.

Maybe Clint could love her, too.

Maybe ...

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

He didn’t announce his and Rocco’s arrival, but it struck him as weird and slightly disconcerting when they stepped through the front door and nobody was downstairs. However, murmurs upstairs quickly quelled his worries, and he quietly headed toward Talia’s room while Rocco used the bathroom off the downstairs hallway.

His heart cracked hearing his daughter mourn her mother the way she did, but it also swelled close to bursting when he listened to Brooke comfort Talia. How she was real and open and gentle with his daughter. It couldn’t have been easy for Brooke to look at pictures of Jacqueline, but she did it anyway, because it was what Talia needed. She was a selfless woman with a heart of gold.

Talia wasn’t Brooke’s daughter, or Brooke’s responsibility, and yet, she’d gone to the little girl when she was in pain and eased her suffering in a way not even Clint was sure he could have done. Because yes, his mother had passed away, too. But only recently. He had her for all his life.

Talia lost her mother at the age of three, and Brooke lost her mother at fifteen. That was different. They still had growing up to do without their mothers. Big, monumental life events that traditionally involved a mother.

Talia had Clint and his brothers, but Brooke hadn’t had anybody. At least not anybody who really gave a damn—besides her younger brother.

He’d blanched a little when Brooke told Talia how her mother died, but she didn’t go into detail. She was honest, but not specific. And Clint appreciated that. Talia would want the truth—she always wanted the truth, no matter how hard it was—but she was also only eight and didn’t need to be burdened with something that gruesome.

It was also not something Brooke probably wanted to relive, either.

Desire burned through him when Brooke came around the corner. All he wanted to do was kiss her. Wrap his arms around her and carry her off to bed to tell her with his body, just how he felt about her. Because he wasn’t sure he could ever put into words just how amazing he thought she was.

But Talia was there. Brooke’s brother was downstairs, and they had a wannabe killer to find.

So he took what he could, which was physical contact, and scooped her up to carry her downstairs.

It didn’t even occur to him that they would need to hide their ... whatever it was from Talia and keep letting his daughter think Brooke was staying in the guestroom. He was a dick for putting Rocco on the blowup mattress in the study, but there wasn’t really any other option.

Rocco headed to the bathroom to shower, so Clint took off downstairs to go find Talia and Brooke. They were chatting in the kitchen with their milk and cookies.

Joy filled him with a pleasant warmth when he took in the beautiful scene. At how normal all of this felt, even though it’d only been a few days.

“Barnacle was a jerk at school today,” Talia said, glancing up at her dad. “He made fun of me for not having a mom and teased me for making a Mother’s Day gift when I have nobody to give it to.”

That pleasant heat in his chest turned into an uncomfortable prickly sensation that flickered its way up his neck and into his face. His fists bunched at his sides. “Is that so?”

Talia didn’t seem too put out, though, so he reined in his ire. “Yeah. But his parents are divorcing, so he’s trying to make other people feel his pain. His heart hurts, and he doesn’t want to be the only person whose heart is hurting.” She turned to Brooke. “Right, Brooke?”

Brooke nodded. “Right, sweetheart. I mean, the kid’s got enough strikes against him with a name like that.”

Talia snickered.

Clint snorted. “Brooke’s, right.”

“Compassion over anger is what he needs right now,” Brooke added.

“But we all agree it’s a terrible name, and his parents are terrible people for naming him that, right?” Clint asked, unwilling to let the name abomination go quite yet.

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