Page 125 of Arianna

A chocolate one.

Thud.

Thud.

Thud.

This man…

“Good, you are up.” He grins at me then the smile falls off his face when he looks down at what I am wearing, an oversized shirt that has risen and barely covers my thighs. Then he looks at Benjamin, who is standing on the other side of the bed, not even looking down at me but focusing on whatever Ellaiza is rambling about. Sebastian bends down, grabs the bed’s duvet, and covers me with it.

“A tyrant and now a caveman. Lucky me.” I sass him.

“Shut it,” he mutters.

I grin at that, and he rolls his beautiful blue eyes playfully back at me.

Who would have thought we would get to this point?

Not me, that is for sure.

“Ellaiza gets two cakes? You are one lucky and loved girl.” I exclaim while I look back at where she is trying to stick her tiny finger in her pink cake.

“Yummy, yummy, Ben!” She says while sucking pink frosting off her tiny finger.

“Ellaiza, where are your manners?” Sebastian says while holding a white paper up toward his daughter.

“Sowwy.” She moves towards her father, snatches the paper from his hand, and shoves it right in my face making me laugh. “Anna’s day tew.” She means Anna’s day, too.

I take the paper from her to see it is a drawing of a circle with tiny dots on it colored in pink and yellow. I hate yellow in most things. I find it offensive how horrid it looks but on this? On the drawing of the sweetest tiny girl I know? I find it beautiful and priceless.

The most valuable thing I own.

Because it came from her.

From her tiny sweet heart.

Choked up with emotion, I grab Ella’s chubby hand, bring it to my lips, sticky fingers and all and kiss it. “Thank you, baby,” I whisper to her, trying to hold back my tears, not wanting to make a scene. Looking into those blue eyes of hers, I say, “You’re an artist, Ella. This is the best gift anyone could have ever given me.” And I mean it.

She smiles brightly and throws herself into my arms, hugging my neck tightly. “Wove yew, mommy.” The room falls silent the second the sweet words slip from her mouth. I am stunned, not because I haven't heard them before but because she has never said it in front of her father.

Shit.

Holding Ella tighter to my body, I look up at Sebastian, who looks down at us with an odd look on his face. He doesn't seem angry or offended by Ella’s use of the word mommy. No. He looks fiercely down at us, almost like a very possessive and determined God.

Soft but lethal.

Without breaking eye contact, I dare say the words I once thought I would never say again. Not without meaning. But God, do I mean it. “And I love you, Ellaiza.” I kiss her once more and drop her down onto the bed next to me, so the men that love her the most in this world can sing happy birthday to her.

Then the air is stolen from my lungs again when Sebastian places the chocolate cake with black frosting on the bed in front of me. “Happy birthday, darling,” he says so tenderly it makes me tear up just as much as the knowledge that he got me a cake. He did this. They did this all for me.

I read what's been written on the cake with white frosting. It reads happy birthday, brat, and instead of feeling offended, I laugh. Aloud and with so much joy in my heart.

Because although Benjamin has made a big deal of my birthday the last two years, I appreciate it greatly…I was still broken, mad, and sad.

But today is different.

Today I get to eat cake, a cake made for me, with people I care for without fear, shame, or sadness.

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