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"If you have to call someone to come and sit here while you're gone," he continued, "I don't mind waiting for them to get here."
Please. Like they'd leave me here alone and all by myself. That would never happen. I was never alone anymore, even when I woke up in the morning and thought I had the whole house to myself, I was wrong. If Dash needed to go somewhere, then someone else came over and waited for me to get up. I had no idea how I even got to drive myself to the shop alone, but then I guess the stupid cat came with me and I wasn't actually alone.
"Rain's here," I told him cheerfully. "He won't have a problem coming up front and watching over the store for me."
The smile slid right off my face when I watched his mouth tighten in anger and his eyes drop to the floor.
"Marcus," I started hesitantly, "what's wrong?"
"Your father and I don't get along very well," he told me quietly. "I get along with him when I need to and will be nice to him when I'm in his presence, but that doesn't mean I like him. I'm not going to lie to you and pretend otherwise. I have been doing as he asked me to do and giving you space, but I can't wait any longer. I miss you and I am not going to hide from you anymore because of him. I understand why he wanted to keep you to himself for a while, he's your father and you were taken away from him. I get it, if you were my blood and that had been done to us, then I would want to keep you locked up and to myself too. But, as much as I wish it were different, you aren't my blood and you aren't my real daughter. You’re his. He has that on me, but that doesn't mean you aren't important to me and I'm not going to treat you like you're my real daughter because I am. I realize that in doing what he's asked me to do, I might have hurt your feelings and made you feel like you don't matter to me when that's not the truth at all. Rain can hate it all he wants but I'm done doing as he says. Done. I'm going to fight for you and if Rain Kimber has a problem with that, then he can just suck it up because there's nothing he can do about it anymore."
I gaped at him.
Was he serious?
When had Rain said something to him, warned him away from me? And, more importantly, why had no one told me about it? I knew for a fact that Quinton and Tyson both knew about this because, oddly enough, Rain seemed to like them both a great deal and the three of them were always talking and acting like they were BFF's. Did this make me uncomfortable, my dad being BFF's with two of my boyfriends? Nope, not in the slightest. If anything, it made me happy to see that they had an older, male role model in their life. They needed to have good people in their lives and, even though Rain was all kinds of scary, he was still good people to me.
The fact that he told Marcus to stay away from me shouldn't really have surprised me, but it had more so caught me off guard than anything else. Marcus would never hurt me and I didn't understand or see the point in warning him off from me.
"I don't understand," I told Marcus seriously, and it was no lie. I couldn't understand why you wouldn't want your child to be surrounded with as many people who loved her and cared about her as possible.
What was Rain trying to do here by alienating Marcus?
"You don't need to worry about that, sweetheart," Marcus growled fiercely. "I’m going to take care of it and I'll make sure it's not your problem to deal with. I can handle Rain Kimber and, I promise you, he'll understand me."
That didn't sound good at all. Was he threatening my father? I hoped not, because Marcus was a really nice man and normally I wouldn't worry about him, but since he no longer practiced his craft and Rain very much did, I felt like I had to worry about him or maybe warn him away from Rain because, like I said earlier, Rain could be very scary.
"Marcus," I hedged, "I don't think—"
He casually waved off my words, as if swatting them right out of the air. Something warm leaked out of him with the wave of his hand and tingles shot down my spine. I looked down at my bare arms to see the tiny hairs on them standing up straight and at attention.
Slowly, I raised my eyes to look at the kind, gentle man standing across the counter from me and my eyes widened as I took him in, really looked him over, for the first time since he walked in here.
Even though it felt kind of gross for me to think it, I wasn't blind, so I couldn't help but notice that Marcus Cole was an incredibly attractive older man. He was in his mid to late fifties, I hadn't ever asked his age before because I felt it rude to do so, but I remember Vivian having said something about him being in his fifties. He didn't look his age though, and if I had to guess I would pinpoint him in his early forties at the oldest. He had light brown hair that when I'd first met him had only had a sprinkling of salt at the temples, but had since spread out through his hair. I hoped I wasn't at fault for his hair turning white, but I felt guilty because I was sure I had a hand in a good deal of it. On a high note for him though, he was going to look like what women called a silver fox, and it was just going to add to his attractiveness. His eyes were a soft brown that were usually filled to the brim with kindness when aimed in my direction but, unfortunately, were lacking their usual depth of kindness at the moment. I assumed this was due to Rain and had absolutely nothing to do with me.
"Go and get Rain, sweetheart," he ordered me.
I snapped my mouth shut as my eyes grew round. Going and getting Rain was the absolute last thing I think I should be doing at this moment in time.
"Uhh," I mumbled under my breath, "maybe that's not such a good idea."
If Rain had warned him against me, then there was no way he'd appreciate him showing up here unannounced, especially since this wasn't just where I worked, but where Rain actually lived too. And, with Marcus clearly being aggressive about the matter and deciding he's done with Rain's shit, this was just a recipe for disaster all around and I didn't want to get hit in the crosshairs.
The look on Marcus's face let me know that arguing with him would be utterly pointless on this subject, so I picked up my cell phone and quickly sent a text off to Rain, letting him know who was here and that I needed him to cover the store for me so I could go out to lunch with my guest.
I set the phone down on the countertop without waiting for a response. Rain rarely texted me back when I was here, instead he always chose to just come to where I was so he could respond face-to-face.
Marcus asked me questions about the store while we waited for Rain to show up. I didn't know if he was genuinely interested or simply asking to be polite, but I answered every question to the best of my ability.
He was smiling down at me with a soft look on his face when Rain walked in from the back entrance.
"What are you doing withmydaughter, Marcus?" Rain growled menacingly.
I sighed heavily as I looked at my biological dad. He was really going overboard with this whole dad routine. The corner of my mouth tipped up because I couldn't help but love how over-the-top protective he was when it came to me. I'd take all the love I could get, even if it did come from a crazy man.
Rain looked at me and smirked, almost like he knew that no matter what he said or did, it wouldn't mean shit to me because I would love him anyways.
My breath caught in my throat as I stared at him. Rain never smiled unless he was with me. Usually he had a dead, empty look in his eyes that were the same color as my own, and he looked like he could strangle you to death and walk away whistling, without a care in the world.
