Page 42 of Tusk's Fury

I reach over and adjust the blanket covering her shoulder. It’s hiding her breast from the others, but I’m getting to see everything.

Brittany asks, “What’s wrong? Was the blanket slipping?”

I shake my head and blurt out, “No. I just wanted to participate.”

Clara chuckles at my stupidity. But Brittany is smiling. “Careful. If you’re all that keen, you might get assigned to diaper duty.”

“Are girls wicked little poop machines like boys are?”

Brittany shrugs with her free shoulder. “I think it depends on what you feed them.”

“Want me to text Patch and ask him?”

She shoots me a disapproving look. “You can’t keep bothering that man for every little medical issue. Victoria is pooping just fine.”

I am fuckin’ made of eyes when Brittany changes breasts.

There is something so wonderful about watching the woman that I love breastfeed my child. However, I cannot keep my thoughts from going to dirty places to save my life. It’s nothing to do with the baby. Nope, it’s all about seeing Brittany with her breasts out and doing her thing so confidently.

After she’s done, she drapes a towel over my shoulder and gives me the baby, I know exactly what to do to get her to burp. I stand and walk around, patting her back gently. Actually, I might be strutting around because I’m so thrilled to finally have the daughter I always dreamed of having.

I’m fuckin’ thrilled when she burps for me.

“Did you see that, Tex? I taught her to burp.”

He rolls his eyes. “She was doing that before she even met you.”

“Don’t be bitter,” I tease him, “because I have a whole parcel of kids, and you’ve just got three.”

“What the fuck,” he shoots back, glaring at me. “Before today, you were satisfied with the four boys you had. Now that you’ve got a girl you think the sun shines out of her ass.”

I preen a bit. “Don’t talk about my little princess’ ass. I don’t want to be reminded of what comes out of it.”

Yeah, Tex and I joke around like this all the time, so he should have expected me to be a fuckin’ proud girl dad.

When he looks back at Clara, she tells him, “No way. Don’t even ask.”

I laugh when he sulks. Of course, now that he realizes having more kids is better, he wants to increase his numbers as well. Who wouldn’t? The more the merrier.

Loving the way our daughter feels in my arms, I tell Brittany, “As soon as she gets old enough, we’re takin’ her to Disney World to meet the mouse. We’ll get her one of those princess dresses and everything.”

Brittany relaxes back against the sofa. The next words out of her mouth don’t faze me. “What if she doesn’t like princess stuff? She might be a tomboy who likes monster trucks and fishing.”

I feel my face light up with a brilliant smile. “That’s even better. Me and the boys like that kind of stuff too. She’ll fit right in.”

She gazes up at me, with that old look of fondness in her eyes. “You sound like you’ve got it all figured out, and you’ve only been a girl dad for a few minutes.”

“I’ve been her dad this entire time. You just kept her from me because you didn’t trust me to do right by her.”

The smile falls right off Brittany’s face, and an awkward silence fills the room.

As happy as I am, there’s no doubt she robbed me of seeing her belly rounded with my child—of me talking to her in the womb and being there for the birth of my own baby.

I haven’t forgotten that, nor am I going to gloss over how that makes me feel. Brittany needs to sit with the reality of what she’s done until she truly understands the hurt she’s caused me.

I tell her quietly, “It makes me feel like shit that there was no male voice to soothe her in the womb. She should have had that.”

Instead of apologizing, she gets up, gathers her stuff, and walks back to the bedroom that she and the baby are sharing.

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