Gentlemen Prefer Curves: A Perfect Fit Novel by Sugar Jamison Read Free Book Online Page A

wanting to believe that, but this time it wasn’t true.

 
    CHAPTER 4
    I can’t go for that …
    “Daddy? My feet hurt,” Ruby said as they walked up to his new firm.
    “Did you step on something?” he asked her absently as he unlocked the door. They were there to pick up a file he had forgotten before he took her out to lunch. He had been distracted for the past few days. Absentminded. He was falling behind on his projects. He had misplaced his keys three times. He had even forgotten to give Ruby breakfast once.
    And it was all Belinda’s fault.
    He thought about her constantly. About their short marriage, their breakup, how his life had changed so much in the past five years. Seeing her again reminded him how angry he was with her.
    But anger wasn’t going to get him anywhere. He had to make a fresh start for Ruby. He couldn’t do that if he was still legally, emotionally, or mentally attached to Belinda.
    “I didn’t step on anything. My shoes squish my feet.”
    “Oh.” He stopped in his tracks and for the first time that day focused fully on his daughter. She wore cute little red shoes, but for the life of him he couldn’t remember the last time he’d bought her a new pair.
    Guilt eased into his chest.
    “Are all your shoes bothering you?” he asked, hoping she would say no.
    “Yeah,” she said quietly. “I think maybe you should buy me some new ones.”
    Ass. Can’t even remember to get your kid new shoes.
    “I’ll do that today,” he promised. “Right after we get this file. Okay?”
    She nodded.
    “I’m sorry, Ruby, but you need to tell Daddy these things sooner. Sometimes I forget that you’re growing.”
    She nodded again and looked up at him with understanding. She was so serious, his little girl. Such a little adult. For once he just wanted her to act like a kid. To whine and complain. To be a brat. But she never was. She never giggled or was silly. She wasn’t loud. She never bothered him, and it caused him to think he was screwing up this parenthood thing.
    “Let’s hurry up and grab the file so we can get you some shoes.”
    They entered the building. His new firm was tiny compared with where he had come from, just him and Steven. Before he moved here he hadn’t seen his old friend in years, since after his first wedding to Bethany where Steven served as his best man. They had been so close in college, at times he felt much more at home with his friend’s family than his own. But something changed between them when he moved back west. They lost touch, only exchanging a few brief emails a year. His old friend barely knew his daughter, or half the stuff that had gone in his life for the past few years. Carter felt guilty about losing touch with the man who had once felt like his brother.
    He was grateful Steven asked him to join his firm. It was the change he needed. They weren’t designing multimillion-dollar opera houses, but they did good solid work. Carter was currently making plans for a new restaurant while Steven was designing a motel that was going to be built on the outskirts of town. The work would always be steady here. People in Durant wanted to use local businesses, which initially surprised Carter. New York City was less than two hours away and world-class architects could be found by the dozens, but these people were loyal and a hell of a lot less fussy than his San Francisco clients. They also didn’t require three-hour dinners and weeks of wooing before they made a decision or mind that he had to conduct all his meetings before Ruby got out of school.
    He thought he would miss the huge jobs he was so used to working on for the past ten years, but he was surprisingly content with his new work. It allowed him to spend more time with Ruby. He refused to get a babysitter, determined to do it right this time. But it was hard to juggle things. She spent a lot of time in his office with him. Sometimes when he couldn’t help it he had to put her in the afternoon