Being Their Baby (15 page)

He let her face go with a rough push, propelling her body to the right, causing her to stumble back. She decided to just give him what he wanted. since his next move would be to punch her and steal her jacket. He’d done that before to take her first paycheck two years ago.

He smoked casually and leaned up against the door, with a cruel, thin-lipped smirk on his stubbly face, watching her open her jacket and fish for the wallet she hid within the inside pocket. She pulled out all of her cash, knowing that if he saw green inside the flap, he was just going to take it anyway.

She shoved the wad of money toward him. “That’s it,” she spat, her jaw throbbing unbearably. “Enjoy the next few drinks, asshole, because I’m tapped dry. I’ve got enough to worry about without you waltzing in to take
my
hard-earned money while
you
piss all yours away.”

He raised his eyebrows at her as if amused, and took the cash out of her hand and stuck it slowly into his pocket.

She was sure that he was going to try to slap her again, but then it seemed like he was actually about to walk off. Halfway through his turn, however, he turned back and backhanded her again, spinning her body toward the wall behind her. “Bitch,” her grandfather grumbled.

Suddenly there was a loud smashing noise. Sophie whipped her head toward her grandfather in time enough to see Charlie Hobbes—all 6′6″ of him, choke-holding Roy up against the wall high enough that his legs were kicking.

Charlie was a daddy, all the way through—he was grumpy at home, but he always had control of himself. This, however, was not the Charlie she knew. This was a Charlie that must have seen the second smack and then lost his mind.

“Charlie!
No
.” She realized how a bear-tamer would feel if the bear had suddenly gone on a tourist-killing rampage. She grabbed his large forearm quickly. “No!”

“He hit you,” he growled, his eyes not leaving Roy’s.

She shrugged, like she always did in highly tense situations. “He’s my grandpa! It’s not a big deal, Charlie! Put him down!”

God, she could just see it on the news—Charlie going to prison for killing a drunk who was currently pissing the front of his pants. All because of
her
.

Charlie blinked, suddenly confused. “This piss-ant’s your grandpa?” he repeated, sounding dazed.

She nodded.

Charlie dropped Roy to his feet, where Roy took a loud, wheezing breath. Charlie grabbed the front of Roy’s jacket, then threw him up against the wall again. “Get in the car, baby girl,” Charlie told her, his eyes still narrowed on Roy. With his other hand, he pointed behind him toward the office’s lot where his black Lexus sat, the motor still humming.

She shook her head. “No, Charlie. Just let him go.”

“I’m not going to kill him,” he assured, and then added with a glare into Roy’s face. “I just want him to see Jesus a little.”

“Charlie, come on,” she said, and realized she was shaking. It was cold outside, but she didn’t think she was chilled. She just couldn’t stop shaking. “He’s not worth it.”

Charlie glanced at her and then back at Roy, who flinched. “If you touch her again, if you come by here again, if you happen to
run into her on the street
, I will hunt you down and you will think you got fucked by a train. Got me?” He slammed Roy into the wall once more, making Roy’s teeth chatter.

“Yeah,” Roy gasped.

When Charlie let him go, Roy collapsed onto the ground, dry heaving.

Charlie put his arm tenderly around Sophie and led her away toward his car. He walked her to the passenger side, carefully guided her into the seat, buckled her in, then locked her door before closing it and walking to his side. Charlie was still looking over to where Roy huddled on the ground, glaring at him.

When he got into the car, he closed the door, then quickly pulled away. He didn’t say anything at all for at least two blocks, where he pulled over, put the car into park, unbuckled himself in a rush, then blanketed her with his body.

For a second she wondered if he was taking measures to protect her from the earthquake that was no doubt going on, but then she seemed to be shaking a lot more than he was. He was
holding her
. After a long moment, when she felt her shaking subside a little, he pulled back and looked at her face. “Are you okay, sweetie?” he asked, his voice sounding panicked. “He didn’t…
touch
you at all, did he?” He brushed loose strands of her hair away from her cheeks, then thumbed across what she was certain was a new welt on her cheek.

She swallowed and forced her tone to remain neutral. “No, he didn’t touch me or anythin’—you know, besides the face. It’s okay, he… Well, he does stuff like this. I’m really okay.”

“Jesus!” he hissed, pulling his hands off her face. His face was twisted with blatant disgust when he slapped the steering wheel in front of him. “I should have ripped his nuts off!”

He looked behind him toward the office building, apparently considering doing just that. She grabbed onto his elbow. “Please, let’s just go home.”

He was still glaring at the street two blocks down.

She swallowed, afraid that he was going to go back and do something that would end his career. “Daddy? Please, just take me home?”

She hadn’t thought she’d ever be to the point where she’d call Charlie “Daddy”—not really, no matter what Josh advised and no matter how much Elizabeth would have liked it. She worried that it would sound just all wrong. She hadn’t ever even said the word before. She didn’t have fathers, dads, grandpas, nothing. She had
Roy
, she had
Steve
. Her mother hadn’t the foggiest idea who her biological father was, but narrowed it down to one of three guys, none of whom she had any relationship with.

That’s why it was so weird that “Daddy” actually felt easier on her tongue than “Charlie.” She had said it just to get his attention, and it worked… but now she realized that “Daddy” fit Charlie like a well-worn leather glove.

He turned to her and swallowed, the muscles in his neck flexing as he did so, and then he gave a nod. “Yeah,” he said, “let me drive you home, baby girl.”

They had a very silent trip home, although she could tell his brain was everything
but
silent. He was squinting like a man who had a lot on his mind. When they’d left the city, she could even say that he looked depressed. She smirked and looked out the window, thinking how funny it was—she was the one smacked around, but he was the one who acted like he’d just been raped.

“Why’d that jerk come to see you, anyway?” he finally asked, as they passed a rather enthusiastic sign that greeted, “
Welcome to Duxbury!
”

“Money,” she replied simply. “It’s always for money… And to be a general dick.”

“You mean, he comes by your work
often
for money?” he asked her, steel in his voice.

She shrugged. “Normally he bugs me at the bus stop every now and then. Not too often. He hadn’t bugged me at work before. I think the holidays approaching brought out some desperation.”

His eye twitched. “What’s ‘not too often’?”

“Normally he doesn’t go for the face,” she replied, evading the question.

“What’s
not too often
?” he ground out again.

She looked out the window. “Probably three or four times a year.”

She heard a growl that nearly didn’t sound human. “And how much do you give him?”

“Does it matter?” she replied. “It’s my money. I can do what I want with it.”

“Let me phrase this a different way,” he said after taking a deep breath. “How much do you make a year?”

“Twenty thousand,” she replied.

“And how much of that do you use on
yourself
? Including anything you go or do with friends?”

“I don’t have
friends
,” she snorted. “I go, I work, I come home, I eat, I sleep, I repeat. I have more free time right now than I used to, since my weekend job canned me right before my birthday.”

“So out of twenty thousand, how much do you spend on
you
?” He didn’t seem to want to let this question go.

“I dunno,” she said. “With bus fare, and lunch, I probably blow about eight dollars a day.”

“All right, and where’s the rest going? Please, God, say that you
save
most of that,” he added with a frustrated huff.

She didn’t even have a bank account!
Savings
? “Yeah, savings,” she said, which, he’d said himself, was what he wanted to hear. He didn’t want to hear that her paycheck was gone as soon as she walked out the door with it. Her stepfather or mother would grab the cash right out of her wallet. Luckily, she stashed a little bit away, or else she probably couldn’t have afforded lunch, either.

“Well, I know the look of someone who does drugs,” he decided, “and you’re not on them. So fill in the mystery.”

“It’s not a mystery,” she replied. “Steve and Ma wanted me to chip in, so I chipped in. That’s why I dropped out. Ma’s got three babies under the age of nine, you know, and Steve’s always between jobs… I mean, they didn’t have me drop out for shits and giggles. I needed to help out. Welfare wasn’t cutting it.”

“And
they
kicked
you
out?” he recalled, aghast. “After all that?”

She rubbed the back of her neck. “Yeah… They probably weren’t thinking that through,” she granted. She closed her eyes and pressed her forehead against the window. “I don’t want to talk about this right now. I’m tired.”

“All right,” he replied. “When we get home, I’ll put you down for a nap.” That actually sounded, even though childish, alluring nonetheless. Unfortunately, he added, “And
then
we’ll talk about what I want to see happen.” That sounded a little more ominous than a nap.

She whirled around in her seat to look at him, shocked. “What? What, am I, like, in
trouble
or something?”

“No, sweetheart. You’re not in trouble.” He sighed. “I just want… This sounds bad, but I really don’t want you seeing your family again. If you feel you must, I want to be with you if you see them. And…” He hesitated, which made her nervous.

They were driving up the hill they lived on. He was quiet, using both hands on the wheel, and then he blurted, “And I want you to stop working for a while.”

“But—”

“I want you to get your diploma, Sophie.”

“But—”

“Being our baby girl isn’t just for our kicks. I mean, obviously we do get enjoyment out of it or else we wouldn’t keep doing it,” he admitted. “I want to feel like I’ve helped you accomplish something you didn’t think was possible before. I want to take care of you. Be there for you. Let me do that.”

Sophie sighed. “You’re getting ahead of yourself. Liz is gonna break up with me soon,” she announced.

“No, she’s not,” Charlie replied firmly, as if it was the most ridiculous thing he ever heard. “Did she tell you that? No, don’t answer that. She didn’t tell you that. Why do you think that? What could
possibly
make you think that? The spanking? That means she’s trying to strengthen you and your relationship, not the reverse.”

“I’m a pain in her ass, and I’m too time-consuming, and she doesn’t have the time. We’ve been dating for over two weeks and we’ve barely spent ten hours together.”

“Give her a break. She’s doing the best she can. There’s a reason why she doesn’t bring girlfriends home. She wants me to pick them out and get them comfortable, and then she comes in to do what she wants when she wants to do it and when she has the time. With you, she chose you. She couldn’t even help herself, she wanted you so badly. She didn’t even ask my opinion. So, we’re going about this in reverse order from what’s normal. There’re gonna be some hiccups. Don’t take it personally, and don’t worry.”

“So… You’re not gonna get a girlfriend of your own? Like, another ‘little’?”

“No,” he replied promptly. “We’re so busy as it is, it takes all three of us to keep just one little well taken care of. Especially when I used to play football… I’d be gone sometimes weeks at a time.”

She considered this, and must have said, “So you’re stuck with me,” out loud, because he responded very firmly.

“No, baby girl. Nobody gets
stuck
with you. You’re a very savvy, hard-working young lady with a lot of potential and who’s as pretty as a doll with a sexy hind-end. You’re exactly our type; a perfect fit.
You’re
the one who’s stuck with
us
. We’re all locked in on you. We’re trying not to scare you to death so much that you leave us.”

She grinned, biting her lip, somehow feeling very encouraged by that. She liked the idea that they didn’t just get stuck with her, like people who get adopted by stray animals. In fact, he sounded like he was much more concerned about her leaving
them
. “So,” she said with amusement as he pulled into the driveway, “if you were to introduce me to anyone, would you say I was your
girlfriend
?”

He parked the car, turned to look at her with a raised eyebrow, then didn’t answer and got out of the car. She blushed, assuming she had asked something silly, or possibly something very immature.

He came around to her side of the car and ushered her out. “Our lifestyle is a little too different from average to try to fit the usual titles on this, don’t you think?” he finally said, his voice slightly chiding, putting out his hand for her to take.

She smiled, curled her hand around his fingers, and let him lead her into the house. His hand was so big, so warm, so callused… She liked it. She was trying to remember if she’d ever held hands with a man before meeting Charlie.

Josh was running into from the back entrance of the house, blinded because of the shirt he was pulling on over his head.

“Why are you changing
into
scrubs?” Charlie asked with curiosity. Sophie couldn’t help but wonder as well; Josh was normally out of his scrubs before she came home from work, unless he had something scheduled.

Josh, not glancing up, grabbed something out of the fridge. “People never have babies when they’re supposed to. They wait until I get
home
, and
then
they think, ‘Oh! You know what would be fun to do for the next ten hours? Go into labor two months early!’ It’s a conspiracy, Charlie.” He came around the corner, stuffing a Twinkie into one pocket and a Pepsi into the other, weighing his scrubs down. He tied the shoelace-like strings at his waist a little tighter to compensate before looking up and seeing Sophie.