No Strings Attached

Chapter Two

A/N I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm interrupting! I just realised I forgot to say thank you this morning to @upwiththerain for a new cover! She deserves a huge thank you for taking time to make such a fab cover for a story that - at that point - was just a prologue, so I just wanted her to know it was so appreciated, thank you xx

Now

Shannon pulled up outside the cottage later the next evening.

The meeting went well with the representative from Nabokov’s, a relatively new agency that had agreed to take her on board with the company as a commissioned designer.

Everyone she’d discussed her new projects with had seemed to be dying to get her back over into the city so that she could work full time at their offices, but she didn’t feel ready to be back in that lifestyle right now – if she ever would entirely – and it suited her to be able to work from home, even on commissioned and irregular pieces. Matthew, the rep she’d been dealing with, had assured her that there would be plenty of call for her designs – not only did she have a strong following as a model, but she was also a very capable designer, and her pieces suited the current market.

So, with the contracts signed, she was off home with a smile on her face and a spring in her step. Finally, it was all coming together properly, after months of meeting dead ends everywhere.

And the meeting with Dr. Greenwood had gone okay, as well. They had mostly talked through the situation with Nate, although her father had kept creeping in there as well.

The therapist had suggested that she evaluate her feelings about Nate’s role in her parents’ deaths as a starting point. She was under the impression that most of Shannon’s issue with sex had stemmed primarily from childhood, but was reinforced by the borderline aggressively sexual nature of her relationship with Nate, and that needed to be addressed as an entirety.

Pulling out her keys, she popped her head around the heavy oak door before strolling in. She’d carried on living with Tori and Jayden, even after he’d brought the house, and she was rarely at home at the moment anyway, but it didn’t seem right anymore.

They were in a really good place since Jayden had opened up a bit, and he was an amazing father, Shannon had to admit. He was completely and utterly devoted to both of his girls, in a way that sort of made Shannon wistful, and envious.

She felt like an interloper, though, with it now being a family home. Tori would just die if Shannon told her that, but it was the truth. For her, it was time to move on – she just had to figure out where to exactly.

Dropping her holdall back into her room, she was keen to see Tor after not being around for a few days – and even more so to see baby Ava, who was growing so quickly, it was hard to keep up! The baby, much to Jayden’s delight, was the absolute spitting image of her mother, even down to the cupid’s bow of her lips. Mixing in Jayden’s genes there as well, and Shannon was quite convinced that the little girl would not only be supermodel gorgeous, but also the most fiercely protected little lady on the planet.

There were already jokes about shotguns and rifles at the ready when boys knocked on the door ...

Smiling wistfully, she heard a gurgling, laughing baby from outside her bedroom window in the back, and she ran out to see.

“She laughed – did you see that? She laughed!” Jayden’s voice had a boyish excitement to it as she rushed over.

“I heard!” she smiled, “Was that the first time?”

“Yeah,” he beamed, and then tickled the baby’s tummy with his finger, looking at the tiny little lady as though she was the most astonishing thing he’d ever seen in his life, “I can’t believe Tor wasn’t here to see it, she’ll be gutted!”