Shopping for a CEO's Baby (Shopping for a Billionaire Series Book 16), стр. 25
“Horsey!” she says.
Dec obliges, looking down and laughing as he moves her, inch by inch, across the floor. A sudden flash of our childhood, Dad in a tux and Mom in an evening gown, hits me. Dad never goofed around like this. He was always too busy, impatient, showering attention on Mom but treating us like soldiers in the McCormick Men army he controlled.
Dec's got it right.
We don't have to be like our dad.
Emotion chokes me, and my grip on Amanda tightens. She frowns.
“What's wrong?”
How does she know?
“I'm just...” I shrug, the words thick in my throat. Her eyes track mine and she softens.
“He's a good father, isn't he?” Giggles float up like bubbles from little Ellie, her face turned up in a full smile at her daddy.
Who is my brother.
Who is nailing this father thing.
“He is. I hope to be as good at being a dad as Declan is,” I say.
He freezes. Damn. He heard that.
Then he turns to me with an expression I have never seen on his face before, and trust me, I know my brother pretty damn well. I've seen it all.
“Thank you,” he says in a voice as strangled as mine. “That means, well...” He clears his throat. “That means a lot to me.”
Amanda nudges me. “This is the part where you hug him.”
“What? No.”
“You're having a moment.”
“I paid him a compliment.”
“You did it without being competitive, Andrew. In your family, that's the very definition of a moment.”
“DADDEEEEEEE!” Ellie screams as Shannon bends down and peels her off Declan's shoe.
She catches my eye and says, “We're late. Help? This is the part where she becomes an octopus.”
“Huh?”
“Separation anxiety is in full force. She'll scream for twenty minutes after we leave, but then she'll be fine.”
“Twenty minutes?”
“It'll pass in no time,” Shannon says cheerily.
“Plenty of beer in the fridge if you need it,” Dec says. “Limit yourself to two, though. That's my daughter you're watching.”
“EEEEEEEEEE!” Ellie's reaching for Shannon as she tries to hand her off to Amanda, who is doing her best, but no match for frantic octopi.
“Let me hold her.” I step in when Ellie starts kicking and firmly grab her torso. Dec reaches over and pries her limbs off Shannon like a professional poison ivy puller following a root to the end. Finally disengaged from her mother, Ellie's in my arms.
It's like holding a twenty-pound bag of cats.
With tentacles.
“Have fun!” Dec shouts over the fray as Shannon blows kisses and runs out the door.
Click.
“EEEEEE DADDEEEEE MAMAMAMAMAMAMAMAMAMAMAMAMA!!!!”
And here we go.
Our first night babysitting.
“WHAT DO WE DO?” I shout to Amanda as I pat Ellie's back. I think it's her back. I'm patting whatever part of her is under my hand as she squirms.
“Put her down.”
I start to crouch. Ellie clings harder, still wailing.
“No, no, hold her.”
“But you said to put her down.”
“She needs to be held.”
“But–”
“AAAAEEEEEEEEEE!!! MAMA!!”
I'm starting to understand Declan's smirk when I told him it couldn't be that hard to babysit, when he asked.
Amanda's eyes catch mine and she's tearing up.
“What's wrong?” I ask in a louder voice than I want to use because of Ellie's screams.
“Look at her! She's terrified!” Amanda's hand goes to her belly. “It's just–I guess it's primal? I feel, I feel...”
And then my wife starts sobbing, too.
Great. Two women bawling their eyes out and I can't make either of them feel better.
Where was that beer again?
Suddenly, Ellie stops crying, watching Amanda with fascination. She tucks her index and middle finger in her mouth and starts sucking.
With her other hand, she points to Amanda's face and says, “Owie?”
“Are you hurt?” I ask her, looking over her hands, arms, legs.
“Manna owie.”
“Manna?”
Amanda smiles through her tears. “She started calling me Manna a few weeks ago, Uncadoo.”
I give her a sour look as Ellie giggles and points to me. “UNCADOO!” she screams, shredding my right eardrum.
Amanda starts laughing and crying at the same time, hand rubbing her belly.
“Ellie, say uncle,” I instruct. This shouldn’t be hard.
“Unca.”
“Say an.”
“An.”
“Say Drew.”
“Doo.”
“Now, say Uncle Andrew.”
“UNCADOO!”
If nothing else, the exercise in futility amuses my wife, which makes my humiliation worth it. Sort of. With a long sigh, I look at my niece and say, “Fine. Uncadoo it is.”
“Dow.”
I carefully set her down. She toddles to the front door and points. “Mama?”
“Mama will be back tonight.”
“Daddy?”
“Daddy will be back tonight, too. We're here to play with you,” I explain, crouching down to her height.
“I'll get a snack,” Amanda whispers, wiping her eyes. “Shannon said she'll do anything for a yogurt treat.”
“Yogurt treat?”
“I'll show you.”
Ellie walks up to me, eyes shining, the tears drying on her cheeks. Long, thick eyelashes frame eyes just like my brother's. She has Declan's coloring and eye shape, but the contours of her face are like Shannon’s. It's so weird to see Dec's features superimposed on a toddler.
What'll it be like to see me in my own boys?
“OHGURT!” Ellie screams, right in my ear, like a laser blaster to the trigeminal nerve. The kid can be harnessed and weaponized if this whole toddlerhood thing doesn't work out. Damn.
Ellie walks over to the high chair and lifts her arms to Amanda. “Uppie, Manna!”
Amanda bends to pick her up. I rush over. “I've got her.”
Amanda frowns. “I can pick her up.”
“You shouldn't. Not in your condition.”
“I'm not that out of shape!”
“I don't mean your muscles. I mean the babies.”
“I can pick up a twenty-pound toddler, Andrew. Our bodies are designed for pregnancy and for managing toddlers at the same time, you know. It's basic evolution.”
“You sound like Pam.”
She pauses. “I think I did hear that from Mom.”
“OHGURT!” Ellie repeats as we click her into place. I grab the foil pouch from the counter.
“Yogurt dots?”
“Freeze-dried yogurt.” She takes the package from me, opens it, and sprinkles some on the tray. Ellie acts like wild geese at a pond after someone throws stale bread their way.
“Here. Try