Page 65 of Broken Boss Daddy

“I know, baby. Neither do I.” I ran a hand down her blonde hair, praying to anyone that would listen for me to keep my cool and get through the conversation.

“Then why does he have to go? Why can’t he stay here?” Abby asked with that youthful misunderstanding in her eyes.

I wished there was a way for her to fully understand what I was trying to tell her. No words came to me because those were the same questions I asked myself. Though, I thought I had come to terms with the future.

There were plenty of times where I had to remind myself that there was a reason for everything that happens.

“Mommy?” Abby called, bringing my attention back to her.

“Yes, baby?”

“Does Grantreallyhave to go?”

“I’m afraid so. He has to go for work. You know how Mommy goes to school for work?”

“Mm mm.”

“Well, Grant goes to the hospital and he’ll be going to a new one.”

“He can work at this hospital. Right, Mommy?”

“That would be great, wouldn’t it? But I don’t think that’s how it works.”

“I don’t want him to go.”

“I know. I don’t want him to go, either, but I promise you he loves you a lot and will never forget about you.”

“He also can’t forget about Mr. Linky.”

“Mr. Linky?”What in the world…

“Yeah! Mr. Linky! Grant and me were playing with this funny toy one day, and it went bouncy bouncy down the stairs.”

“Did it?” I feigned surprise for her benefit, especially considering the sad look vanished from her eyes.

“It went all the way down! Like this.” Abby jumped off the bed and crouched, bouncing around my room like a frog.

Enjoying her excitement, I watched her go hop all over the floor. “Are you a little froggy?”

“No, Mommy! I’m Mr. Linky!”

For the life of me, I couldn’t figure out what she was going on about. Thinking over all that she had babbled to me about a certain Mr. Linky, I finally figured out what she could’ve been going on about.

“Abby? Is Mr. Linky a slinky toy? Like one of those metal spiral things that you move from hand to hand?”

“Duh,” she said, jumping back onto the bed. “I told you it was Mr. Linky.”

Shea had meant Mr.Slinky. It made a lot more sense. Abby sometimes had a hard time pronouncing the letter ‘s.’ She was even more endearing because of it.

We were both quiet while she calmed down and went back to fiddling with my jeans. I took the moment to admire the person my little one was becoming.

A part of me wished I never told Grant about Abby, or let her love him like a daughter should. That same part constantly told me I shouldn’t have been involved with him in the first place.

But the bigger part in me knew Abby would grow up to be a better person for knowing him, even if it was for a brief period of time. I just didn’t know what it was going to do to my own heart.

Thinking about everything like I had obsessively been doing for the longest time, I was reminded of a conversation I had with one of my friends from college. Laine has been one of my closest friends for years, and although we didn’t see much of each other because we lived in different states, we still knew about everything that happened in each other’s lives.

When I spoke to her about Grant’s leaving, she had asked me why he couldn’t still be a father to Abby just from a distance. A lot of children have those types of relationships with their parents. Except, it wasn’t something I wished my daughter would go through.

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