Dirty: The Complete Series (Secret Baby Romance Love Story) (24 page)

In the meantime, I would just keep my head
down and take things as they came. I thought about my plans for after work and
they looked just as good as ever: I’d go home, get a shower, and have some
grilled chicken and watermelon for dinner, and a cold beer. A good night’s
sleep would put the whole mess with Tuck behind me.

I couldn’t quite push away the image in my
mind of sharing those plans with Autumn, no matter how hard I tried to focus on
just the plans. I definitely would have rather had dinner with her.

Chapter Thirty-One

Autumn

I felt a little nervous as I stepped out of the
shower. I was supposed to be meeting with Cade, but my mom, who I’d talked into
taking care of Adelyn for the afternoon and evening, didn’t know that.

After my argument with Tuck, I had considered
telling Cade that we’d have to wait until the off-season to really see each
other more often, but I knew I couldn’t make myself wait. I liked him. I might
even come close to loving him, if we had a chance to really try.

I dried off and started thinking about the
date Cade and I had arranged. I felt a little bit guilty about hiding the fact
that I was seeing him from even my mom, but until Cade was in the clear with
respect to Dad, I couldn’t be open about seeing him.

We had planned to go to a show that some of
Cade’s friends were playing in the next town over as part of a summer festival.
That was obviously somewhere I couldn’t bring Addie. I shuddered when I thought
of my young daughter trying to deal with the loud noise and crowds and the
alcohol and pot that would come along with the event. I’d managed to talk Mom
into watching her by telling her that I was going to be meeting up with some of
my friends at a different festival. I hated to lie, but I didn’t think I had
much choice.

I got dressed quickly and checked the time. I
had had about an hour and a half between when I dropped Addie off at my
parents’ house and when I needed to leave to meet with Cade, and since we were
doing something a little more special than just going to the mall or seeing a
movie, I wanted to put in a little more effort. I pulled on a pair of skinny
jeans that I’d only just started being able to fit into once again and found
one of the nicer tops I owned and went back into the bathroom to work on my
makeup.

I thought to myself that since Mom had Addie
for longer than usual, I might even be able to convince Cade to leave the
festival before it ended so that we could have some time alone. A rush of heat
washed through me at the thought of being alone with Cade, without even Addie
there to preoccupy my mind; we had so few opportunities to really get physical,
and I wanted
—
needed
—
to feel his body pressed up against mine.

I put on a little makeup: some concealer for a
few spots on my face and the under-eye circles I’d had ever since giving birth,
a little blush, some neutral eye shadow, and a lip stain that I knew wouldn’t
get smeared all over my face if Cade and I kissed. I smiled at myself in the
mirror and turned my face this way and that, making sure I looked exactly the
way that I wanted.

I thought about my daughter. I couldn’t help
feeling guilty about being away from her, even as much as I enjoyed the break.
Cade and I mostly managed to include Addie in our plans, if only because my
parents didn’t note it as much if I was out of the house, sometimes pretending
to be running errands, with my daughter in tow. There was a part of me that
wondered if people were talking about Cade and me in town, the same way that
they’d been talking about the way that Tuck had been bad-mouthing our farmhand.

I checked to make sure that I had everything I
needed: phone, backup battery charger, keys both to the guest house I lived in
and to the car, as well as my parents’ house just in case I got in after they’d
already locked up for the night. I slipped my lip stain into my bag, as well,
and a few other odds and ends I thought I might use away from home.

I spared a look at my parents’ house as I
walked towards the front door of my little private space on their property and
wondered whether Mom had her own suspicions about what I was up to; certainly
she hadn’t had anything to say about me going out for the afternoon and
evening. She knew that I’d been more than a little interested in Cade from the
very beginning, but while she’d kept my secret from Dad, I didn’t like to force
her to continue to lie to him if I didn’t have to. Bad enough that I was doing
that.

I got my keys out of my purse and sent a text
message to Mom to let her know that I was heading out. Almost as soon as I had
seen that it’d been sent, just as I was putting the phone in my pocket, I felt
it vibrate. For just a second, I thought that it might be Mom, texting back
either to tell me to have fun or to ask me to pick something up for her.

But instead, to my surprise, I saw that the
message had come from Titan. It had been weeks since I’d seriously thought
about my ex, but I had enjoyed being with Cade so much, and had so many other
things on my mind. Besides, Titan had made it clear to me that he had no
interest in me or our daughter. I thought I could be forgiven for writing him
off and putting him out of my mind.

So when I saw that he had messaged me, I was
shocked.

I opened up the message and the words I read
only made me more surprised.
Hey, Autumn!
I just wanted to let you know that I’m probably going to be in town in a week
or two to visit the fam.

I pressed my lips together, trying to resist
my initial feeling of irritation towards him. I had gotten over the hurt he’d
dealt me, and I had moved on from the additional betrayal that I felt at the
fact that he wasn’t even interested in getting to know his own daughter in her
first year of life. But the fact that he felt entitled to message me to let me
know that he would be in town…something about the gall of the cheery message
annoyed me.

I took a deep breath and fought back that initial
reaction; he was, at the end of the day, the father of my child. I had a bond
with him whether I wanted to or not.

I’m sure they’ll be glad to see you,
I wrote back.
I take it from you messaging me that you might want to meet your
daughter?

I wasn’t sure anymore if I even wanted him to
meet her; after all, he would be there and gone, and either Addie would never
remember him, or she would and feel confused later on when she tried to
understand why she didn’t have a father, or why her father didn’t want to be
involved in her life.

Absolutely!
The response from Titan surprised me yet again. I shook it off. If he
was interested in getting to know Adelyn, then I should encourage him.
Why don’t I get in touch closer to the time
and we can talk about arranging a meeting?

I pressed my lips together and tried to make
up my mind to do the right thing. If Titan was interested in developing a
relationship with his daughter, I knew my parents would want me to encourage
it. I should at least give him a chance to step up and be a father. I took a
quick, deep breath and typed up a response, checking the time again.

Let me know when you’re free, and I’ll plan to bring Addie to you, or
you can come here. We’ll work something out.
I hit send and closed out the app, shaking my
head at how strange it was. I had a sneaking suspicion that perhaps things were
not going quite as well as he’d claimed in his previous messages, but there was
no way for me to know.

I pushed the issue out of my mind, determined
to focus on my date with Cade instead. The meeting between Titan and Addie
wasn’t going to be happening that day. I had plenty of time to decide how I
felt about it and to make up my mind to do the right thing.

As I got into my car and started off to the
next town to meet with Cade for our date, I decided that I wasn’t going to
mention the most recent texts from Titan to the farmhand. I hadn’t mentioned
the ones I’d gotten before
—
just that Titan seemed to have no interest
whatsoever in getting to know Addie and that things were well and truly done
between us, which was, as far as I’d known then, the case.

I couldn’t help but feel a little guilty about
the fact that I was keeping Cade in the dark about Titan’s messages to me, but
I didn’t think that it was, strictly speaking, his business.

After all, any real love I’d had for Titan had
died when he’d abandoned me for someone he’d met online, and any potential
respect I’d had for him as a person had gone away when he had made it clear he had
no interest in his own daughter. I didn’t think I was in any danger of doing
anything that would violate my relationship with Cade, and Titan was
 
Addie’s biological father.

It was an issue between my daughter, myself,
and her father, not something that Cade could or should get involved in unless
we became serious.

I’m just batting a thousand on the honesty front these days,
I thought wryly as I turned onto the highway
that led out of town. I wasn’t telling my parents about Cade, I wasn’t telling
Cade about Titan. I pushed my guilty thoughts as far from my mind as possible,
but I couldn’t help thinking that if anything else came up that I had to lie
about or cover for, I was going to be in a sad state indeed.

Chapter Thirty Two

Cade

“Autumn. Autumn?” I reached out to give her
shoulder as gentle a shake as I could.

“What?” Autumn blinked up at me and for a
moment, I could forget the distraction I’d seen on her face again and again for
the past two hours since we’d met at the festival gates.

“I said, Donny’s band should be going on
next.” I smiled slightly and shifted my hand along her back, pulling her a bit
closer to me. “You know, the whole reason we’re here, instead of doing
something else?”

Autumn chuckled, looking up at me. “I thought
we were here instead of doing something else because it was out of town and
there’s less risk of someone seeing us, and then commenting about seeing us
together to my parents,” she pointed out.

“That was part of it,” I admitted, giving her
waist a little squeeze. “But I also figured it would be nice to support Donny
—
and of course, spend some time together.”

Autumn pushed herself up onto the balls of her
feet and gave me a quick kiss on the lips; it felt good to be somewhere that we
could be affectionate, without having to think about who might be watching us.
Every date that we went on in town, we had to be careful. While no one had, to
the best of our knowledge, gone to Bob Nelson yet about the fact that we were
spending time together, Autumn and I had both agreed that it would be best not
to be too obvious while we were in public together.

Of course, we didn’t have a whole hell of a
lot of private time together. Autumn couldn’t be away from Addie for very long,
and even when she brought Addie on our dates together and we went back to my
place, she couldn’t stay away from home for very long without risking her
parents worrying about her.

I reminded myself again and again that it
would all be worth it once the harvest was over and done with in a month or
two, but if I took the work that Bob had offered for the off-season, getting
the land ready to overwinter, then I might have to wait even longer to be open
about my relationship with her.

When Autumn had met me at the gate, I’d
noticed that it looked like something was troubling her, but all she’d said was
that she’d run into a weird traffic snarl on her way into town and that she’d
been worried she’d be late to meet me. We’d kissed, and gone into the festival
with the tickets I’d gotten from Donny, and I’d put it behind us. But as the
date went on, I couldn’t help but notice that she was more and more distracted,
not less distracted, which was what I’d expect if her worry had been about
getting there on time.

There was nothing wrong at all with the way
that Autumn looked
—
that much I had to admit. She always looked
cute, and she looked cuter to me every single time I saw her, but I could tell
she’d gone to a little extra effort to look nice. I could only assume it was
for me. I pulled her into my arms while we waited for my friend’s band to start
setting up and swayed with her to the beat of the radio playing over the sound
system.

“Have I mentioned you look even more gorgeous
than usual today?” I could feel Autumn smiling, even with her head tucked on my
shoulder, and started feeling better about us, about the date. She was warm
under my hands, her body as alluring as it had ever been, and I hoped
—
again
—
that we could find a way to take a little time
back at my place before she had to get home.

We broke away from each other when Donny’s
band, Rock Island Ragers, finished setting up and started making noises of
going into their first song. I cheered my friend on and took Autumn’s hand in
mine, moving a little closer to the stage to really enjoy the act. There were a
few dozen people at the festival
—
probably no more than a few hundred on the
outside
—
but the guys were playing hard, and I wanted them to feel their
success.