Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 75414 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 377(@200wpm)___ 302(@250wpm)___ 251(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75414 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 377(@200wpm)___ 302(@250wpm)___ 251(@300wpm)
“Someday,” Gracie said, giving Lolly a wistful smile as she sat down on the small stage that was overflowing with flowers, “that is going to be me.”
“Absolutely will. But can you imagine how hard the girls will have to work to keep it a secret from your mastermind self?”
“I know, right?” she asked, beaming. “Okay. I’m going to go check on the food. Have fun, Dad.”
There it was again.
The flip.
The feeling of rightness.
As if sensing the thought, Lolly’s head lifted and her gaze found mine.
Her awe-filled smile had my heart feeling like it was gonna break free of my chest.
“Want a lunchmeat skewer?” Dezi asked, moving in at my side with a plate full of them.
“Did you leave some for anyone else?”
“Got these outta the kitchen. They’re extras. You should see the desserts: cake, cupcakes, macarons, cookies, turnovers, little individual pies. Oh, and donuts. There’s a whole cake made outta donuts.”
“Gracie went all out.”
“I’m gonna hire her.”
“For what? A birthday party?”
“Yeah, that. Or, you know, a random Tuesday night…”
“You’re gonna go broke.”
“Broke? I got me a sugar mama,” he said, proudly. You’d think a rough-and-tough guy like Dezi would be too alpha to be a kept man. But he fucking loved it. “Kinda crazy, huh?”
“Your food spending habits? Yeah.”
“Nah. This. Her. The two of you. Lot of little things had to go an exact way to bring us all here today.”
“Yeah,” I agreed, nodding.
“Guess it was good you were an ingrate who walked away from his old man’s banging cooking to go live on the road and eat shitty gas station food for years, huh?”
“How do you know my dad’s food is banging?”
“Laz? Me and Laz have a dinner date every month.”
“You’re fucking unbelievable,” I said with a laugh.
“My wife is a lucky woman,” he agreed.
“She goes too?”
“Well, I bring her leftovers.”
The laugh burst out of me.
“I don’t see your wife,” I said, looking at the crowd.
“She’s doing business lady shit. She’s coming, though.”
“You gonna save any food for her?”
“Depends on how long it takes her to get here,” he said, sauntering away.
It was a day full of gifts, food, and celebrating Lolly, who was so fucking deserving of the love.
The men eventually showed up to drive their tipsy women home, taking some time to load up their trunks with our gifts to drop at our house on their way.
“You should have opened some with me,” Lolly said, walking up to me when we finally had a moment alone.
“Nah. I had my fun watching you.”
“Also, you’re a big, fat liar.”
“I know,” I agreed, turning her back to my chest, then reaching down to lift up her belly, giving her a break from the weight for a moment.
She let out a low moan as she leaned her head back against me.
“But at least you lied for a good reason.”
“And under Gracie’s orders.”
“Oh my God. She had orders for everyone, I heard.”
“She did. Multi-step plans sometimes too. Right down to your dress.”
“She’s a mastermind.”
“She is. They’ve had this planned since that night I dropped you off at Gracie’s house all those months ago.”
“I love our people,” she decided.
“Me too.”
“But I love you a little bit more.”
Lolly - 9 months
“She’s going to be just fine,” Nave assured me, sensing the direction of my thoughts as we drove away from the house.
“I know.”
“Gracie has been babysitting since she was twelve. She is a babysitting guru. She knows tricks even seasoned moms haven’t figured out yet. And she takes an infant and child CPR class every year to ‘stay fresh’ just in case.”
I shot a smile in Nave’s direction. “It sounds like she’s more qualified to take care of our baby than we are.”
“She is,” he said with a laugh. “She’ll probably have her sleeping through the night and, I dunno, reciting her ABCs by the end of the night.”
“She’s like three months old.”
“That’s how good Gracie is.”
“You’re just trying to make me feel better about abandoning our baby.” Nave shot me a bemused look. “I know,” I said, exhaling hard. “I need to get okay with being away from her here and there.”
So far, I’d literally only left her when she was in her crib to sleep. Or when I was showering. I took her everywhere else: on walks with Edith and Blanche, to the store, visiting with our friends and family, everywhere.
He was right, though: we needed this.
We were loving being parents.
But we also needed to make time to be a couple. Especially because we had so little time together before the baby came.
We needed to foster us and our connection.
“If you want to go right home after dinner, we can.”
“Let’s see how it goes,” I said. I mean, I had shoved my feet into heels and bought a new dress that I felt confident in that gave my postpartum body a little grace.