Like a boot camp sergeant, Gracie spent the next few days giving me a crash course on how to be a real parent.

Her attitude surprised me. The Gracie I had known used to be soft, pliant, accommodating. This version of Gracie was anything but soft. Yet, her sternness never came across as bitchy. She also maintained the patience of a saint as I stumbled like an idiot through my first week with Stevie. There definitely were more failures than successes. Screams, cries, and messes became my everyday norm.

Needless to say, fatherhood didn't come naturally to me.

By the end of the week, I was fucking beat and feeling somewhat overwhelmed. Taking care of a baby was no joke. Granted, on a physical level, the tasks were nowhere near as demanding as what had been required of me as a Marine, but hands-on parenting drained and stressed me out in a completely different way.

I didn't know how to describe it, exactly.

Stevie required me to give things I had never given before.

She also made me worry about things that I had never worried about before.

I was now required to pour all of my care and attention into another human being—

A human being who needed me to do everything for her—

Because she was helpless without me—

And keeping up with all of her needs felt as exhausting as it was rewarding.

I had no fucking clue how Gracie managed to take care of Stevie on her own for all those months while holding down a full-time job.

The woman was my hero.

She was definitely Stevie's hero. In a bittersweet sense, Gracie was the only mom Stevie had ever known. Their love for each other was so pure. A blind man could see it. My baby girl absolutely adored her, and Gracie loved her back tenfold.

Seeing how good Gracie was with Stevie motivated me to step up in a big way. I woke up at all hours of the night to feed Stevie so Gracie could get a little more rest. I took Stevie out for stroller walks to let Gracie catch up on some work emails in peace.

I wanted to be Stevie's hero, too.

I wanted to give Stevie a better childhood than the one I had been handed.

Since I was a kid, life often felt like a series of sick, sad jokes with no punchlines.

Why did I have to be my dad's son?

Why did Matty have to die?

Why did I fuck Lydia?

Why couldn't I have ended up with Gracie?

I didn't know.

I didn't fucking know.

All I knew was that—I'd protect Stevie with my life. Gracie, too, simply because she was Gracie. Other than that, though, I had no fucking clue what I was doing with myself.

The first half of my existence had been hell. Living in my father's house had made it so. The second half belonged to the military. The Corps had taught me discipline. It gave me the structure and purpose I so desperately needed as an eighteen-year-old dipshit kid. My time in Afghanistan had forced me to grow from a boy into a man. But it had also turned me into a shell of a man.

I was finally out of the Corps. I didn't want to go back because I had Stevie and Gracie now. I didn't want to be away from them, and I sure as hell didn't want to die on them. I'll never forget the helplessness and grief I saw in Aisha's eyes after Matty's funeral. I didn't ever want to put Gracie or Stevie through that kind of torment.

Yet, my civilian status made me feel purposeless, aimless. I managed to put on a good front for Gracie and Stevie, but I knew the truth. I was a disaster inside. The nights were always the worst. I could distract myself during the day, but, at night, my thoughts tended to wander down some dark and twisted paths.

Dead bodies and explosions haunted me.

Violence and destruction felt ingrained in my bones.

My men and I had been sent to Afghanistan to fight the war on terror, to fight for America, to fight for the Afghan people, for stability and peace—or so we had been told—but, after countless lives lost, the country was still in a state of chaos.

The horrors of it all made me question everything.

I struggled each night to make sense of the bloodshed and tragedy, to somehow put these memories in a less disillusioned perspective. I so desperately wanted to convince myself that our efforts and sacrifices hadn't been in vain, but doubt constantly threatened to drag me under.

Gracie and Stevie were the reasons I fought to keep myself afloat.

Staying with Gracie, even for such a short period of time, was a dream come true. Just like when we were younger, it soothed my sanity to be around her, but our proximity to each other also made my nights unbearable in a completely different way.

Because I wanted to be the one sleeping beside her at night.

Because I wanted to be the one who woke up next to her each morning.

Because I wanted this to be our real life.

This week had given me a taste, a taste of life with Gracie, and I was hungry for more. I didn't want our time together to end in a week. Over the past few days, I sensed that Gracie's walls were still up, but she no longer held me at a distance because of Stevie. Stevie forced us to become a team again, and I ate up every morsel of Gracie's attention and friendship like a starving beast. I liked being around her all the time. I liked being close to her.

But I also knew that I was setting myself up for disappointment.

The house rules were clear: I wasn't allowed to touch Gracie. I wasn't allowed to have her. I wasn't allowed to love her.

I knew I wasn't worthy.

Yet, my resolve was tested each night. I did everything in my power to not think about Gracie while she was in the shower—

Wet.

Naked.

Warm water spraying... everywhere.

Those sweet little breasts.

That perky rounded ass.

Her lean, shapely legs.

I remembered how she felt in my arms. I remembered how it felt to be inside her, how her sweet, slick warmth hugged my cock as I made love to her.

God, I wanted her.

I wanted her so bad.

I was ashamed to admit this—

But I started taking longer showers.

I jerked off in the bathroom while fucking Gracie in my mind all over her tiny apartment. Standing against the wall. Doggy style on the floor. Eating her out in bed. Cowgirl on the couch. Bareback and bent over the kitchen counter.

I knew my fantasies were all sorts of perverted, deranged even, and poor Gracie would probably have a heart attack if she found out about what I was doing, but, damn, it felt so fucking good to grip my cock and think about her as though she was still mine.