“Don’t know.” Her chin started quivering at the mention of her mom.
Oh great, you jerk. You had to go and remind her.
He remembered her crying for her mom last night and decided he needed to distract her.
“Do you want to come down to the kitchen with me to get it?”
“Are you going to carry me again?”
He smiled at her hopeful question. “Sure, sweets.” He helped her bundle into her robe and slippers and carefully lifted her. “You let me know if you think you’re going to throw up. I don’t want any on me.” He made an exaggerated, disgusted face that made her giggle.
“You’re funny.” She hooked her arms trustingly around his neck, and he swallowed around the lump in his throat.
Man
. He was finally starting to get what people saw in kids. He must be tired; he was feeling all emotional.
In the kitchen, he set her on a stool and got her a small cup of ginger ale to sip on while he made coffee. They were sitting together with their drinks when Ken heard Cory moving around upstairs. After a minute, his feet came thumping down, and he whipped around the corner, shouting, “Bailey?” He skidded to a stop at the sight of the duo at the breakfast counter, a worried, almost frightened look on his face.
“Uncle Cory!”
He paused and exhaled a deep breath, and then crossed the kitchen at a slower pace. “Morning, pumpkin. You feeling better?” He gave Ken a slightly hostile, questioning look as he gathered her in for a hug, feeling her forehead at the same time. “Wish I had a thermometer.”
“Oh! Shit, I got one last night, but I forgot to get it out.” Ken shot Bailey a glance. “I mean, shoot.” He grimaced an apology at Cory, who just rolled his eyes. He rummaged in the bag and came up with the thermal scan thermometer the pharmacist had recommended.
Cory slowly took the proffered package. “Wow. When you go shopping, you go all out, don’t you? What else is in there?” Cory peered into the sacks, and then started unloading the bags, frowning all the while, pulling out travel games, coloring books and washable markers, the requested crackers, two more kinds of pain relief, Pedialyte, a stuffed crocodile—that Bailey immediately grabbed—and a package of pretty hair bands. “To hold your hair back,” he mumbled as Cory looked at him in disbelief before walking to the fridge/freezer and perusing the new selection of drinks, yogurt, applesauce and three different ice cream treats.
And popsicles.
Their little patient was gamely trying to stay awake, interested in all the loot, but she looked exhausted to Ken, so he bent to pick her up again. “Want to tuck Mr. Croc in? He’s had a long night. Look at that yawn.”
Cory snorted and she giggled again. “Silly Uncle Ken.”
A sudden intake of breath had him looking back. Cory’s jaw was clenched, and he looked pissed, but it wasn’t the time or place, so Ken just ignored him as he carried her as they all headed back upstairs. “Do you, uh, have to go potty first?” She nodded, and he set her down in front of the bathroom door. “Here, I’ll hold Mr. Croc while you go. You can… go by yourself. Right?”
She sounded just like her uncle when she snorted, and that eye roll? Pure Cory. “Of
course.
”
He awkwardly waited outside the door until she was done, and then let Cory take charge and herd her down the hall to her room. She crawled into bed—which was down to just a sheet at this point. Hopefully she was done being sick.
Cory closed the door behind them and led the way back down to his room. He pointedly waited for Ken, who got the message and entered the bedroom.
To Ken’s surprise, as soon as the door was closed behind him, Cory verbally attacked.
“What the
fuck
do you think you’re doing?”
Chapter Two
C
ORY
could feel himself nearly vibrating with fury. How dare Ken get involved in Bailey’s care? Never mind that he’d literally handed her off to him the night before. That wasn’t the point. The point was that they had an agreement—Ken could come by for a fuck session and even crash afterwards as long as he was
out
by morning. Thanks to Becky, poor Bailey’d already had a parade of “uncles” in and out of her life, and Cory had sworn he wouldn’t let that kind of instability happen to her while under his roof. It was hard and confusing and unfair for Bailey to get attached to someone and then have them disappear.
And Cory wasn’t under any illusions. Ken wasn’t the long-term, domestic type. He’d made that very clear. In the five months since they’d first hooked up—making their own fireworks on the Fourth of July—they had yet to have a date out in public, other than clubbing, and that was generally meeting there, and then going to one of their homes together.
He supposed part of that was his own fault. It’s not as if he was burning up the phone lines planning romantic outings with the guy. And yet, there was something about him. Ken wasn’t Mr. Right, but he did just fine as Mr. Right Now. And part of being Mr. Right Now was knowing when to make himself scarce, which he seemed to have forgotten today.
“I was just trying to help,” Ken retorted, “since you were doing a great imitation of Sleeping Beauty.”
“You’re supposed to be gone by now,” Cory gritted, not in the least impressed by his wit. “Getting to know Bailey is
not
part of the deal. Got it? Our lives—separate. You’re not her uncle or her daddy or anyone she needs to know about.” Ken winced at that, and Cory knew it sounded harsh, but he plunged on, needing to get this over with. “I appreciated your help last night, but there’s a line there for a reason. For her sake, don’t cross it again.”
Or you will be gone so fast your head will spin
.
Ken looked mutinous and about ready to escalate when the huge yawn he’d been holding back cracked Cory’s jaw. Jesus he was tired. The burst of vitriol had apparently sapped all his energy. His visitor’s expression instantly softened. “Why don’t you go back to bed? You look wiped. Seriously.” Ken walked up and urged Cory backwards until his legs hit the bed. He instantly crumpled to a seated position. Kneeling down, Ken pulled Cory’s slippers off and pushed him down onto his pillow, sucking the will to fight right out of him.
“Will you stay?” he mumbled, refusing to think about why he shouldn’t want him to, just wanting Ken’s warmth. That’s all. A warm body.
Ken didn’t respond, just climbed in on the other side, moving as close as he could get without actually touching him. Cory let out a deep breath, and next thing he knew he was opening his eyes to the soft light of a cloudy morning.
This time, Ken was gone—like he should be.
Good
.
It wasn’t disappointment he felt weighing his chest down like a rock.
B
Y
THE
time Cory called work to take a sick day, the day was half over, so he almost didn’t bother. No one had called, so obviously he wasn’t missed.
Yeah, right
. He took pleasure in that thought until his boss returned his call.
“Where the hell are you? You need to be here.” Cory winced. Lori, the resort VP where he worked as a high-end restaurant floor manager, wasn’t known for tact with her subordinates. Or her volume control.
“I called in sick.”
“Since when? I never got the message. Never mind. No one here knows what they’re doing without you,” she accused. “Are you going to be back tomorrow?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“Damn it. Do you know what tomorrow is?”
The fifth day of Hanukkah? My cousin’s birthday?
“Sunday?”
“Yes, Sunday. The busiest fucking day of the week, especially during brunch. And these idiots under you are
not
prepared to handle Sunday brunch without you there.”
“Why don’t you schedule a floating host and an extra server just in case?”
A string of curses. “You sound pretty sure you’re not going to make it.”
“Yeah, well, vomiting is like that. You never know when it’s going to run its course.”
“Fine,” Lori huffed. “But you call me either way
. Before
your shift, not halfway through it.” The connection cut off mid-word as she yelled for her assistant right in Cory’s ear. Luckily he knew better than to hold it in place.
T
RAPPED
in his house babysitting, Bailey thankfully sleeping soundly, and no idea where Becky was or when she’d get back, Cory was starting to go a little stir crazy. The reams of laundry were thankfully almost done, and he had stock going for some chicken soup. Noticing there had been a dusting of snow the night before, he decided to go scrape the driveway and sidewalk for lack of anything better to do.
He bundled up and stuck his phone in his pocket to ward off Murphy’s Law, just in case his sister called. One last peek at his sleeping niece, and he headed outside to work.
It was the dry, fluffy kind of snow, the kind you can’t even make snowballs out of, so it was easy to push along in rows, tossing aside at the very end. Mindless work, and it didn’t keep his brain from wandering to the little one hopefully sleeping peacefully in the house. He couldn’t help his automatic smile at the thought of the little girl who might as well be his own, with how crazy he was about her. He sobered. But it was a tenuous arrangement at best, and Becky could yank the rug out from under all of them if he wasn’t careful.
Becky.
His eyes rolled automatically at the mere thought of his sister. Cory loved her, sure, but she didn’t make it easy. She’d always been flighty and self-absorbed, and then had gone wild after the death of their mom when she was fourteen and Cory had been in college. She’d turned up pregnant the summer before her junior year of high school. Their dad, not the most paternal sort to say the least, had thrown her out, and she’d landed on Cory’s doorstep in the middle of the night with a boyfriend in tow. Once he’d determined this wasn’t the future father—unfortunately she’d didn’t know exactly
who
the father was, just that she’d only met this guy a couple weeks prior, so
he
was out—Cory’d given him the choice of either leaving on his own, or with the police for being with an under-aged girl. Showing a more highly developed sense of self-preservation than Becky, the guy had wisely abandoned her to her brother.
Assuming that while Becky was pregnant, she’d settle down a bit, Cory was dismayed at her ensuing conduct, and had finally put his foot down. Either she toed the line at his house, or she’d have to move out. It was a gamble—and he knew he wouldn’t have followed through on the threat, for the baby’s sake—but surprisingly, Becky straightened up for a while. She worked on the classes for her GED, took a few shifts a week waiting tables at Cory’s restaurant, and stayed sober until Bailey was born.
Cory managed to keep her mostly in check until she was eighteen, and then in a fit of pique over something stupid like household chores, she up and vanished one day, taking Bailey with her. Cory had been frantic trying to track her down, not wanting to believe she’d actually endanger Bailey, who was just a toddler, but wanting to at least know they were safe. An agonizing month later she finally got in touch—for money. Thus began an arrangement of sorts; Cory would pay her a monthly stipend if she called him weekly and let him know where they were and that they were okay.
She moved from man to man for the next few years, and she was young and pretty enough to attract slightly better than the worst sort. But it was still no kind of life for a kid. So when he’d caught her between guys and running out of money, Cory had begged her to come live with him, especially since Bailey would soon be starting kindergarten. She needed stability, he argued, not changing schools every time Becky changed boyfriends. She’d been resistant by rote, but it hadn’t taken much arm-twisting to make it happen.
Now Bailey was safe and loved and was thriving in the familiar routine. Becky? Cory sighed. She was getting reckless again, and he feared she was back into drugs. She was pulling disappearing acts like this more and more often, coming back tired and strung out and broke.
Cory took a particularly hard scoop and then unnecessarily banged the shovel on the driveway. He hated to even think it, but he’d about given up on Becky. But Bailey? He poured all his heart and energy into making her happy and secure. If he had his way, she’d never move again. And if he needed to get legal to do it, somehow, he would. In fact, he’d looked into it, but was leery about approaching his sister for anything other than the basic temporary guardianship they had in place so that he could make health care decisions if Becky wasn’t around. The permanent guardianship, which he felt would become necessary more and more often lately, involved a much longer and intense legal process, one Cory feared might make Becky defensive or scare her into flight. With Bailey. And he couldn’t chance that. Yet.
Done with the shoveling, Cory shed his outer layers in the garage and went to check on the soup. Seeing the “emergency items” Ken had picked up still sitting on the counter, he began to put them away. He reached for his cell phone subconsciously before catching himself. It had been very sweet of Ken to go above and beyond like he did, and it was a huge surprise to find that Ken liked kids well enough to be so comfortable interacting with Bailey. That said, he couldn’t allow Ken to be over when she was present anymore. He didn’t want to have her get attached and then be upset when things came to an end.
And they would. Cory was done with hookups, even semi-regular ones. Sure, the sex was amazing, and he’d been lulled into seeing Ken on a pretty consistent basis, but Cory wanted something more stable, more rewarding, more permanent. It was one thing to have a fuck buddy in your twenties, but quite another to still be doing it in your thirties, with a kid in the house. No, he wanted a partner. Someone he could lean on and support in return, in every aspect of their lives.
Hence
The List
. Cory thought of his list in big capital letters, like a marquee sign, accompanied by an announcer with a deep, echoey voice. To date, it was just a mental checklist of must-have qualities in potential partner material. It was beginning to get a little long, though, so maybe he’d have to write it down sometime so he wouldn’t overlook anything important.