Daddy Devastating by Delores Fossen Read Free Book Online Page A

so he could scrub it over his face. He groaned softly. “Okay. I can deal with this. I can make it work.”
    “Make what work?” Julia asked.
    He tipped his head to Emily. “I was due to move to a supervisor’s job in the next year anyway, but this will just speed things up. I’ll get out of undercover work when I’m done with this case.”
    “What do you mean?” Julia said that a little louder than expected.
    He shrugged, as if the answer was obvious. “A desk job in the San Antonio office will give me regular work hours. And it’ll be safer. I can have a more normal life. And I can finally get a haircut,” he added, shoving the strands of hair away from his face.
    Julia put all those things together. Oh, no! He couldn’t mean that. “Are you saying you want to raise Emily?”
    He gave another shrug. “Of course. She’s RJ’s daughter. My niece. I’m her next of kin. Who else would be raising her?”
    “Me,” Julia blurted out.
    That erased any trace of Russ’s goofy smile. “You’re her cousin. I’m her uncle, and her father was my identical twin brother. That’s a closer bloodline than you have with her. Besides, if Lissa had wanted you to raise her, she would have said so.”
    It felt as if someone were squeezing a fist around Julia’s heart.
    “Lissa said that because she thought Emily’s father was alive. And because she probably thought I didn’t want children. She was wrong. Besides, need I remind you that you’re in the middle of a dangerous investigation?”
    “An investigation that’ll end soon.” He stared at her. “You want to raise her yourself?”
    Julia managed an indignant nod. “Well, I am the natural choice.”
    That was far from the truth, but Julia wasn’t speaking with her head. This was a heart thing.
    “Why? Because you’re a woman? Because you’re rich?” he asked, challenging her. “I can feed her a bottle and buy her clothes just as well as you can.”
    Since this was obviously about to turn into a nasty argument, Julia gave Emily’s blanket another adjustment and caught onto Russ’s arm so she could lead him out of the room.
    Zoey was there, apparently waiting for an update, but it would have to wait. “Could you excuse us?” Julia asked her, then waited until Zoey was in her room before she continued.
    “What makes you think you’d be a good father?” Julia demanded.
    “Maybe the same thing that makes you think you’d be a good mother,” he countered. “I love Emily. It doesn’t matter that I just saw her for the first time, I love her.”
    “And I don’t suppose it matters that the dangerous elements of your job could follow you from undercover work to a desk?”
    “The FBI makes it a priority to protect the families of their agents.”
    She was about to launch into the next wave of the argument, but he lifted his hand in a stop-right-there gesture. “Look, this isn’t a good time to go at each other about custody. We can work that out later.”
    “Can we?” she snapped.
    “We can,” he calmly assured her. Russ glanced around the room, and his attention landed on the minibar. Next to it was the small microwave she’d had brought in so she could heat up Emily’s formula.
    “Do you have any hard liquor?” Russ asked.
    Julia was still in a fit of temper, and that trivial-sounding question didn’t help. “Help yourself.”
    “It’s not for me. It’s for you.” He went to the bar, selected a bottle of bourbon and poured some into a glass. He brought it back to her and motioned for her to sit on the sofa.
    Because Julia’s legs were still wobbly, she did. She also took the drink and had a sip, despite the fact that she hated bourbon. As expected, it watered her eyes.
    Russ eased down on the sofa next to her. Not on the other side. But practically hip-to-hip with her. So close that she could see the trouble brewing in his eyes.
    “This drink is to help pave the way for what you need to tell me,” she said.
    He nodded and combed