Chapter 307 I love my bad daddy

Chapter 307 I love my bad daddy


Rose’s memories served her right, especially when she remembered how Sienna wanted to ship her off to boarding house.

"Tristan already asked me that," Rose said, looking at her father with the thoughtful, considering expression of someone who had already turned this question over before today. "He asked if I wanted to come live with them." She paused, watching as her father stared at her with a rare form of eagerness. "I said no."

A sigh of relief escaped him as she continued to study his face with those clear, serious purple eyes. "Daddy Frank is a good daddy. But I love my bad daddy." She said it simply, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "I'll stay with you."

Frederick felt the tear before he knew it was coming, a single, slow thing that made its way down his face while the rest of him sat completely still.

He had lost almost everything. He understood that now in a way he hadn't been able to let himself understand before. But this, this one small, stubborn, completely unearned piece of love, was still here. Still his.

It was enough. It had to be enough. "I promise you, Rose," he said, his voice thick but steady. "I am going to be a good daddy from now on. No other woman will ever come between us again. Not ever."

Rose's face broke open into a smile and she wrapped her arms around his neck, her small hands pressing into his back with everything she had. He held her and let himself feel the full weight of it, the gift he hadn't deserved and had been given anyway.

She pulled back after a moment, a new thought already moving across her face. "Can I visit Mom sometimes?" She searched his expression, saw something flicker there, and added quickly, "Just for two days."

Something moved through Frederick's mind, a thought arriving before he'd gone looking for it. He nodded slowly, already reaching for his phone. "I think I have an idea."

He pulled up Cassie's name and stopped. He wasn’t supposed to call her, knew she would not answer his call for any reason.

Being too proud to follow that rule, he decided to call her on an unknown number, and whatever goodwill he was trying to rebuild didn't have room for another misstep like that.

He hated the idea of going through Franklin, hated what it meant, what it confirmed, the way it underlined everything he'd lost in a single unavoidable gesture.

He was still sitting with it when a notification pushed itself to the top of his screen. Cassie's name. The announcement. Chairwoman of the Blackridge Maritime Group.

Frederick read it twice.

"It happened faster than I thought," he murmured, and then raised his voice toward the hallway. "Mom. Dad. Come down here and see this."

His parents appeared at the top of the stairs with the cautious energy of people who had not yet forgiven him and weren't in any particular hurry to make that easier for him, but the moment his mother's eyes landed on the screen, all of that gave way to something purely joyful.

"I knew it," she said, pressing a hand to her chest. "With Franklin there, nobody was going to try anything. She told me earlier that the woman behind her parents' murder had been sentenced too."

Frederick sat quietly while his parents absorbed the news around him.

The investment Cassie’s parents had made in the Novarian Group was still holding things together, still giving the company standing in the market, and that would have to be enough of a contribution from him.

It was the only thread he still had attached to her world, and he wasn't going to pull on it.

Rose didn't want them together. He had looked into her eyes and heard her say it plainly, and something in him had finally, fully accepted it.

Chasing Cassie now wouldn't be about love. It would be about his ego, and his daughter deserved better than to be caught in the middle of that.

He dialed her number with the unknown one, heard it connect, and said what needed to be said. "Cass, congratulations. It's me, Fred. Rose wants to see you. Can we meet?"

The pause that followed stretched longer than he wanted it to.

"Fred." Cassie's voice came through measured and clear. "You used a different number to get around our arrangement. That's disrespectful."

Frederick swallowed the bitterness that rose in his throat and said nothing for a moment. All he wanted was a meal together with his ex-wife and daughter to create memories for Rose, nothing hidden, nothing angled.

But how did you say that to someone who had every reason in the world not to believe you?