Page 4 of Off the Naughty List

There was a box he wore every day, in the inner pocket of whatever jacket he had on at the time. A box he’d had for years now. He hadn’t opened it, not in five years, but it looked old and used. It’d been rained on, sat on, and put in the wash once.

He pulled it out right there in the park and showed it to the little girl.

“Do you know what that is?” he asked her.

Her green eyes widened. “I bought it a few years ago, after making one of the best deals of my career.” One hundred thousand, given to her piece-of-shit father, so he’d sign the divorce papers with Piper and renounce his rights to Maya. “For years, I’ve carried it, waiting for the right moment—the moment when I know your mama will say yes.”

“You don’t think she’ll say yes?” Maya practically yelled.

Bennet wet his lips. “It’s not just that. There’s the question of timing, too. I was going to ask a while back, then Carter was marrying Cassie. Then, I considered asking again, but Lucy and Trick were getting hitched. And now…”

“Anna and Finn,” Maya guessed, groaning.

He sighed. “I don’t want to make her feel like I want to marry her just because everyone else is doing it. But yeah. The other part of it is I wasn’t sure she’d say yes. Not at first, anyway. You know why?”

Maya shook her head emphatically. “Because your mother will never marry a man she thinks isn’t right for you. Not in a million years. I wanted her—and you—to have the time to see I’m that man.”I’m your father. He didn’t say that out loud.

“I’m going to ask you first, Honey Bee. Do you want me to marry your mother? Do you want me to be your dad?”

She leaped into his arms, and squeezed him so hard he could hardly breathe. Bennet laughed, hugging her right back.

One down, one to go.

Piper

Piper had planned to sneak her shopping bags inside before anyone got home, but when she walked inside the white townhouse they’d moved into three years prior, Ben and Maya were playing in the music room. She tried to walk as discreetly as possible, but the sound of her heels on the wooden flooring betrayed her presence.

“Mom’s here!” Maya screamed, before rushing to the hallway.

Dammit, dammit, dammit!

She shoved the four bags in a corner, hoping no one would spot them. Naturally, Maya hugged her and immediately said, “Oh, did you get doughnuts?”

“We don’t say that word, you know that. No one is eating doughnuts here.”

The little monster plunged to the shopping bags and shoved her hand inside, pulling out a fat custard cream doughnut.

Piper bit her lip, looking up across the hall to the devilishly handsome man who still made her heart skip every time she saw him.

And he was hers. All hers.

Although he might just kill her if she messed with his diet again.

Bennet had realized he’d put on twenty pounds over the winter. He’d banned doughnuts. And pizza. And a long list of things she pretended to cut out of her diet, too, in solidarity.

“Sorry?”

“Four bags?” He cocked an eyebrow.

Piper winced. “The girls are stopping by later for a swim.”

The extravagant home Bennet had bought after renting out his place included a fully equipped gym and an indoor swimming pool on the ground floor.

“I won’t eat any,” Piper swore. “It’s just for Maya and the others.”

Bennet sauntered over, fixing her with his intense gaze as he crossed the room. When he got to her side, he tilted her chin up. “Liar,” he whispered. He bent down to kiss her mouth, ever so softly. “Dirty, dirty liar.”

She shivered, her body set alight. His touch brought her to life. She bit her lip, desperate for more already.

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