Page 99 of Cop Daddy Next Door

A few months ago, the idea of a baby had been as foreign as learning another language. Who needed German when you had to readWhat to Expect When You’re Expecting?

I’d been reading it in my squad car now that I was on my own, since Brady was taking his paternity time. The baby was officially four days old, and I’d barely seen Van. She and my mother were taking shifts helping Tabitha every day.

I tried not to take it personally. I knew a lot of things were on her mind right now. Some of it was work. She’d gotten a phone call at the hospital and had been preoccupied ever since. If she wasn’t at Tab’s or the bakery, she was hunkered down in her bus, sketching late into the night.

The last two evenings I’d had to go over there and drag her to our bed—yes, ours. I didn’t freaking sleep well without her. I usually found her curled around her iPad with her digital pencil lost in her curly hair.

Almost as if she shoved it behind her ear and passed out mid-thought.

The only time I could sneak under her defenses was when she was tired. She would curl into me so trustingly and let me carry her home. Exhaustion from the first trimester and pulling double duty at the bakery and Tab’s house was pushing her to the edge.

Not that she’d let anyone see that.

But I did. And it was more than just worrying about her out there alone in the very secure bus. Between John Gideon’s crew and my own research on the best locks for her setup, she was safer there than in most houses.

But I wanted her next to me at night. Not even wanted, I needed her there. While I could bury my face in the beach-scented pillow, it just wasn’t the same.

I kept fighting against the fear she was pulling away from me. A lot was going on, and I wasn’t the center of the damn universe. At least that was what my mother kept telling me.

Someday it might stick.

Loving a strong and independent woman was not for the faint of heart, that was for damn sure.

I glanced at my watch. Three hours left on my shift and then I could go home and twiddle my damn thumbs.

Great. Maybe I could convince Tab to come out to dinner with me between work at the bakery and seeing her sister.

I parked on the street near the park and decided to take advantage of the sunny fall day with an old-fashioned beat walk. I didn’t get very far. The front of Kinleigh’s halted me in my tracks.

The handcrafted bassinet in the window hit me like a bolt of lightning. Maybe that was exactly what I needed to do to show Van I was all in.

I wasn’t the master carpenter that August Beck was, but I could make something for our little one that was one of a kind. My fingers itched for my notebook as ideas flooded through my brain faster than I could catch them.

I crossed the street to Every Line A Story. I picked up a backup sketchbook, eraser, and pack of willow vine charcoal, happy to find my preferred sketching medium now in stock.

Lucky break.

“Oh, hey, Maverick. I see you found my new supplies.”

I placed my mini stack on the checkout counter and smiled at Colette, the owner. “Yes. I usually have to special order it. I can’t believe you carry it.”

Her quick fingers tallied everything up on her vintage register. The old schoolcha-chingnever got old. “Van asked me to stock it last time she was in. Mentioned she saw it in your workshop and wanted to pick some up for you.”

I paused with my billfold open. “She did?”

“Of course. She’s always looking at the supplies in here. She always asks me for the most obscure floss for her embroidery work. I think she’s working on something new.”

Imagining both of us working on something for the baby kicked up the corner of my mouth. At least maybe what she was doing was for the baby.

I pulled out a twenty. “Makes two of us.”

Collette cashed out and tried to hand me the change. I just shook my head. She smiled wider and dumped the few dollars in the jar for art supplies for Crescent Cove High. “The art club thanks you. Oh, speaking of…”

I narrowed my eyes at her.

She shrugged. “I gotta shoot my shot.”

My chest tightened. “Oh, I’m…”

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