Bad Intentions ↠ h.s.

Chapter three

"Did you eat already?" Ashley asks, glancing at me.

"Yeah, but it was more like an appetizer meal," I say in return. "Are you still hungry Bel?"

Bella looks up to me and shrugs a little bit. "Sort of."

"Well, I must be getting downstairs; got to fix supper," Ashley comments, jumping to Arabella's response, acting as if making supper was some huge thing for someone to be doing.

For Ashley, it was. We rarely ate dinner together; we normally either cooked our own food or went out to get food on our own.

Ashley gives Arabella a quick, one-arm hug before rushing out. I let out a sigh of relief, happy that she was out of the room, leaving me alone with Arabella.

"We can spruce up the room later on if you'd like and leave it to your own will," I say. "Ashley's obsessed with pink and purple so I'd understand if you'd prefer it your own style."

"It's fine, It's kind of cute actually, thank you" She replies shyly, taking ahold of her duffel bag and placing it on the bed. "I'm just grateful to finally have my own room."

She really is so sweet and kind-hearted.

"Would you like help?" I quickly ask, referring to her bag that she's holding.

"S-sure... I'd like help," Arabella nods quickly. She unzips the bag, digging out a few t-shirts. I speedily go over to the wardrobe in the corner of the room and open it, pulling out a couple hangers for her. "Thanks."

"No problem, sweetheart," I try out the nickname. It sounds on coming off my tongue. Arabella's cheeks heat up and she looks down at her feet. "So,uh, do you always go by Arabella or do you have a nickname you prefer?" I ask, trying to recover from the awkward comment.

"There's a few," She softly says, suppressing her narrow smile. "At the home they called me Bella and Lee. But that was only while kidding around. Besides that, they called me Arabella."

I bite my lip; the tender skin peeling at the various attempts of nervousness. "Why Lee?"

She looks down at her feet, grabbing a plain black t-shirt from her bag and hanging it in the large closet. "It was what my mother called me before she passed away. It was her way of coping with my fathers presence after he left. So I pretty much grew familiar to the name."

"That's sweet," I murmur, staring down at Arabella as she spilled out something so personal. I honestly expected it to take a little longer for her to become comfortable with me like this; to trust me enough to tell me things like this about herself. "So, what do you prefer I call you?"

Arabella stops for a moment, her eyes flitting upwards so that she's looking directly at me. "Call me whatever you want," she replies sweetly, flashing me that pretty smile of hers. "What do you prefer I call you?"

"Whatever you want, darling," I mock her, crossing my arms over my chest and biting the corner of my lip as I admire her beautiful facial features."But no naughty words."

"Like what?" she asks, those sweet eyes filling with confusion. I feel something inside of me twinge and I innerly smirk; she's so pure it's adorable.

"You cant call me the A-word or the B-word or a D-head-slash-bag," I say playfully, earning a giggle from the younger girl. Arabella nods at me, promising that she won't. "Other than that, just call me whatever you're comfortable with."

She pauses to think, "Hmm, what about I call you Dad?"

I smile, happy that she's comfortable enough with thinking of me as her father to call me by that name so soon. "Whatever floats your boat."