His Lullaby Baby Read online

  His Lullaby Baby

  By Airicka Phoenix

  His Lullaby Baby ©2015 by Airicka Phoenix

  All rights reserved.

  www.AirickaPhoenix.com

  This book or parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical,

  photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without prior written permission of the copyright owner and/or the publisher of this book, except as provided by United States of America copyright law.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Cover Designer: Airicka’s Mystical Creations

  Interior Design: Airicka Phoenix

  Editor: Kathy Eccleston

  Beta Readers:

  Kimberly Schaaf

  Nanette Bradford

  Krystal Marie

  Sam Destiny

  Jaime Radalyac

  ISBN-13: 978-1518660580

  ISBN-10: 1518660584

  Published by Airicka Phoenix

  Also available in eBook and paperback publication

  Also by Airicka Phoenix

  TOUCH SAGA

  Touching Smoke

  Touching Fire

  Touching Eternity

  THE LOST GIRL SERIES

  Finding Kia

  Revealing Kia

  REGENERATION SERIES

  When Night Falls

  THE BABY SAGA

  Forever His Baby

  Bye-Bye Baby

  Be My Baby

  Always Yours, Baby

  SONS OF JUDGMENT SAGA

  Octavian’s Undoing

  Gideon’s Promise

  STANDALONE

  Games of Fire

  Betraying Innocence

  My Soul For You

  Kissing Trouble

  The Voyeur Next Door

  Transcending Darkness

  Dedication

  Krystal

  For putting Toby in my head.

  HIS LULLABY BABY

  Chapter 1 ~ Toby

  What Jedi mind powers did a mother possess that instantaneously turned a grown man into a five year old child just by the volume and tone of her voice? There had to be some kind of hypnosis involved. Subliminal messaging. Ouija boards. Who the hell knew? The only thing Toby was absolutely certain of, was that his mother was the queen of guilt trips and he had no one to blame but himself.

  “Mom, I’m fine!”

  The mantra of my life recently, Toby thought as he leveled his weight out on his cane. The rubber grip at the bottom stayed against the concrete and he heaved himself up onto the curb without putting pressure on his right leg. Nevertheless, the nerves gave a twinge of pitiful protest and he gritted his jaw. His fingers tightened around the phone. He was careful not to make a sound, to keep every breath regulated and even; his mother could sense pain like some homing beckon.

  “But you’re not sleeping at night,” she protested. “Have you seen the doctor about that? There could be something wrong—”

  “I swear I’m … wait, how did you know I’m not sleeping?”

  His mother hesitated, but he knew. The stench of betrayal was strong in the crisp afternoon air.

  His gaze swung over to the silent figure walking next to him, deliberately studying the heavens like all the world’s mysteries lay floating up there with the clouds.

  “Did you tell my mother I wasn’t sleeping?” he hissed, careful to mash the phone into his jean clad thigh as he half growled, half hissed the accusation.

  Mark flinched like he’d been physically assaulted. “Dude, your mom scares me, okay?”

  “You stinking Judas!” Toby shot back, still careful to keep his voice low.

  “I’m sorry!” Mark cried back. “I panicked.”

  “I am going to show you panic!” Toby muttered before stuffing the phone back to his ear.

  “So I was thinking I would like to go with you this week to see Dr. Nalway and maybe go over some ways to—”

  Yeah … no.

  “I think I’m hitting a dead zone. You’re cutting out…”

  “Toby!”

  “Bye Mom! Love you.”

  He hung up before she could suggest she put him in diapers and breast feed him all over again. The very idea of the latter made him recoil and shudder.

  He wedged his phone into his pocket and rounded on the traitor. He punched Mark in the arm.

  “You asshole!”

  “She ambushed me!” Mark protested, rubbing his injury. “I don’t know what it is, but the second she says hi Mark, my entire body seizes. I feel like I’m giving an oral examine … naked.”

  Toby could only shake his head at that visual. “You’re a twatwaffle.”

  Leaving his best friend gawking, Toby pushed onward.

  Mark caught up to him in two long strides. “You know, I don’t know what a twatwaffle is, but it kind of sounds like it would taste delicious. I mean, I like twat and I like waffles, so…”

  “Jesus!” Toby burst out laughing. “How the hell are we friends?”

  Mark grinned. “Just luck on your part.”

  Toby shook his head and kept walking. Sweat gathered between his palm and the foam grip around the cane handle. The iron rod creaked slightly beneath every limp. He hated the thing, but the clever doctors and pretty nurses had assured him that it wouldn’t be forever, just until the damage to his nerves could repair themselves. A year, maybe two at the very most. It could have been worse. The bullet could have hit him in the head. Kind of hard to walk that off. But as though the humiliation of being discharged from the only career he’d ever known wasn’t enough, he’d been confined to an old man’s wheelchair, an old man’s set of crutches and then, because he hadn’t suffered enough, he had another two months of hobbling around on an old man’s cane.

  Life hated him.

  “You know what would make you feel better?” Mark piped up, jolting Toby out of his self-deprecation. “We should stop by your sister’s shop. See how the McClain ladies are doing.”

  “You do know both my sister and cousin are married, right? With kids.”

  Mark squinted back at him. “So? A man can look. If I had sisters that looked like yours, I would…” He paused to consider his train of thought. He blanched as it sunk in. “Okay, so I wouldn’t, but they’re not my sisters. Besides, MILFs, man. Hot! You just know they’re freaky in bed.”

  Toby would have hit him if he thought it would do any good. Mark had a single goal in life and that was to work his way through every woman in Willow Creek. Toby wasn’t even sure there was a limit or some line drawn. His friend had problems with boundaries.

  “Well, just so you know, Damon and Jared will kill you if they hear you talking like that.”

  Mark snorted. “I wasn’t going to tell them. Anyway, where are we going?”

  “Bank. Then we need to make a stop at the grocery store.”

  “Why?”

  “Because the inside of your fridge looks like a third world country and I, for one, enjoy the little things like food.”

  The phone buzzed in his pocket. He dug it out and checked the screen. Willa’s number flashed up at him. He hit the talk button and mashed the phone to his ear.

  “Will?”

  “Hey!” she said at once in her upbeat enthusiasm.

  Toby frowned. “Did my mom make you phone?”

  Willa hesitated. “No, was I supposed to?”

  “No, sorry. What’s up?”

  Something shuffled in the background, followed by a beep and Willa’s fr
ustrated sigh.

  “I was hoping you could do me a favor.”

  For Willa? There was very little most people wouldn’t do.

  “Yeah, shoot.”

  “I’m in the middle of an interview and I promised the kids I’d take them horseback riding today. Would you mind?”

  “Taking them horseback riding?”

  “You just have to drive them there. I’ll be done by the time they finish.”

  Toby pulled his phone away from his ear and checked the time. “When?”

  “In an hour. Please, Toby?”

  “Yeah, sure. That’s not a problem. Where?”

  Papers rustled.

  “Uh…” Willa mumbled something absently. Then, “Macy’s Bed and Breakfast. Sorry.”

  Toby nodded. “You got it.”

  “Thank you again, Toby. I really appreciate this.”

  He was in the process of disconnecting the line and returning the phone to his pocket when a glass wall appeared out of nowhere. The full frontal assault sent him staggering backwards a full two feet before the sidewalk vanished entirely and he was falling. Concrete met him with the gentle and loving arms of a pissed off bull. It crashed into his back and shoulders. Pain shattered in a splinter of colors. A series of creative words that would have horrified his mother expelled in a long, five minute rant that was broken by his snarling grunts. Then he just lay there and stared at the sky. Fluffy white cloud that looked like a dildo and the other one that closely resembled a dog.

  At least they’re not together, he thought miserably as the pain in his body gradually subdued.

  “I am so sorry!” A dark, bobbing shape appeared in his line of vision, obscuring his view of the dog cloud. “Are you okay?”

  “I was assaulted,” he declared. “I didn’t see by what, but I’m pretty sure it’s wearing an imprint of my face.”

  There was a pause, followed by, “I don’t know what … what does that mean? Are you hurt?”

  Groaning, Toby pushed into a sitting position and found himself the center of a very large ring of concerned and nosy people.

  “Show’s over, folks,” he called out. “I will live to see another breakfast. Be gone.”

  A few left, shuffling away with a mild sort of grudge, no doubt infuriated that they would have nothing interesting to share at the dinner table that evening. Oh, if only he’d shattered his skull like a normal person.

  Finally, he focused on the figure crouched down next to him. Warm, brown eyes the delicious hue of milk chocolate peered back at him from a small, heart shaped face surrounded by a tangle of hair in the same brown. Fine lines of concern puckered the soft skin of her forehead, drawing delicately arched eyebrows together over eyes dominated by an endless sweep of lashes. A fine dusting of freckles speckled a slender nose and spread across elegant cheekbones. Lips the soft pink of his mother’s favorite china sat slightly parted, revealing just the hint of straight, white teeth. The smooth column of her throat bobbed where the single button on her blouse had been left parted at the hollow. Dressed in a long, loose skirt and a floral top, she reminded him of a prim school teacher, the kind in pornos just before they brought out the ruler and gave the naughty boys detention. It was hot as fuck.

  “Hello?” she whispered when he could only sit and gape.

  “Marry me,” he blurted, uncaring how insane that sounded. Part of him even meant it.

  “I’m sorry?”

  She wasn’t real, he decided. How could she be? No one that gorgeous lived in Willow Creek. He would know. He was born and raised there. He knew everyone. This person … this magnificent goddess was not from the town, which made him wonder…

  “Christ, am I dead?”

  His companion’s look of stunned dismay was almost amusing. “No?”

  The question at the end of her comment nearly made him laugh. “Well, that’s a relief. Not sure I could pull off the dress and harp ensemble.”

  Her gaze moved over him. Starting at his shoulders and working down the sprawled length of him to his boots. Maybe she was determining whether or not he could pull off a dress, but Toby knew enough about his own masculine appeal to recognize when a woman was checking him out. The fact that it was this woman was just the boost his deflating self-esteem needed.

  She licked her lips and … shit.

  His cock hardened against the rough grain of his jeans, making the stiff denim uncomfortably tight. His heart escalated in his chest. Each beat cracked just a little too hard against his ribcage.

  Her lashes lifted and he was caught in those eyes again. Light splintered off the starburst of gold and shimmered across the velvety surface. He could just make out his own reflection gawking back at him with the slack-jawed wonder of a pubescent teenager catching his first glimpse of a Playboy Bunny. He would have been mortified if he could pull his senses together.

  “Do you feel okay?” she asked quietly. “Did you hit your head?”

  That seemed to be the only explanation for the molasses taking over his brain.

  He shook his head to clear it. “No, I’m good. I think I’ll live to see another day.”

  The lines of concern smoothed away, softening her face into a wide smile that kicked him square in the gut.

  “Good.” She drew in a breath that strained her generous chest against the front of her thin blouse. “I’m glad to hear that…?”

  He stuck out his hand when she trailed off uncertainly. “Toby McClain.”

  She eased one soft palm into his rough one. “Addy … Nixon.”

  “Addy?”

  She gave a little shrug and rolled her eyes. “It’s short for Adelaide.”

  “No kidding, that’s crazy, because Toby is actually short for Toby so we already have something in common.”

  Her quiet laughter muted the background noise taking place around them. She sat back on her heels and hugged her knees. Her head cocked to one side with a teasing grin lifting the corner of her mouth.

  “It’s nice to meet you, Toby, but what do you say we get you off this sidewalk?”

  “We could ooooor you could join me and I could introduce you to a dog and a penis.” He paused to replay his own words over in his head. He grimaced. “Wow! That sounded so much better in my head.”

  Addy chuckled, but she looked as wary as he expected her to after such a proposition. Honestly, he’d half expected a slap. Instead, what he got was worse.

  Mark shoved his ugly face in over Addy’s shoulder.

  “Hey, you okay?”

  While that awkward moment was successfully broken, it also left no room for him to explain that he wasn’t a pervert … most of the time. Plus, when he glanced up, the penis and the dog were both gone, so he had successfully made himself come out looking like a weirdo.

  Fabulous.

  He heaved himself up without his cane. As snazzy as it was, the pimp cane rarely got the ladies wet and he really wanted this one dripping. But his pride had serrated fingers of agony splintering up the length of his thigh to his hip in sharp stabs of pain. The unexpected burst of heat had his knee jerking out of pure reflexes and he staggered forward. His hands flew up to catch his crashing weight only to be assaulted by the sweet fragrance of frosting and cupcakes. Slender arms caged around his ribs in a firm embrace. The slight figure tucked against his chest with the perfection of a lost puzzle piece. His own arms jerked up and locked around a tiny waist. His palms splayed across her narrow back, gripping her possessively to his chest. Fine strands of silk tickled the underside of his chin and caught along the stubbly lines of his cheeks. It whispered along his mouth and he had to resist the urge to turn his face into the wavy locks.

  “Okay?” Addy’s cool breath fanned across his cheek. Her lips grazed his chin and he felt the unconscious gesture all the way down to his toes in a hot rush of electricity. “Just hold on.”

  Just when he was getting uncomfortably comfortable with the weight of her firm breasts crushed into his and the taunt of her tight nipples burning hole
s through his t-shirt, she released him. She unclasped her arms and pulled away, leaving him biting back a whine as she swooped down and grabbed his cane. Then it was being shoved into his palm. His fingers were made to wrap around the gripper and the end was settled against the concrete. Toby reluctantly settled his weight on it.

  Cheeks flushed, Addy stepped back. She brushed her hands quickly over the front of her blouse and straightened her floral skirt. She brushed back a lock of hair and exhaled in satisfaction.

  “That is not normally how I impress the girls,” Toby told her.

  Addy laughed. “Don’t worry. I won’t tell.” She turned away to snatch up her purse off the sidewalk. She dusted it off before slinging it over one shoulder. “Is there anything I can do? Do you need a ride somewhere?”

  Toby shook his head. “No, but I would like your number.”

  The pink in her cheeks deepened and her gaze dropped to their feet. Her fingers fumbled with the strap on her shoulder.

  “I kind of don’t … I don’t date.”

  She peeked up at him through her lashes, trying to gauge his reaction with an apologetic little grimace.

  “All right, then we won’t date,” he offered. “We can undate.”

  “Undate?” Amusement curved her delicious lips.

  “Yeah, that’s where neither one of us ever mentions the word.”

  She chuckled. “Just because you don’t say the word doesn’t make it less of the thing it is…” She trailed off, eyes narrowing as she finished slowly. “Did that make sense?”

  “Okay, option two then, we will meet somewhere at a specific time, get separate tables and text each other from across the room.”

  Her laugh was a beautiful wave of sound that radiated from deep in her belly. It rocked her head back. Her shoulders trembled despite the hand she lifted to stifle the flow. Her eyes twinkled as they met his.

  “That is tempting…” She smiled brilliantly. “Very tempting, but I really can’t.” She started edging backwards. “I need to go. I’m sorry again for hitting you with the door. I’ll, maybe, see you around.”