Total pages in book: 143
Estimated words: 138844 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 694(@200wpm)___ 555(@250wpm)___ 463(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 138844 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 694(@200wpm)___ 555(@250wpm)___ 463(@300wpm)
I didn’t foresee Noa waking up anytime soon. He had to be exhausted.
Thank fuck he was making progress. It brought a lot of comfort. If he wasn’t buzzing around making plans for the lizard’s enclosure, he was spending time with friends or helping Cam pack for our trip. But every now and then, his mood could drop.
He was cuddled up in Cam’s arms when my head hit Lucian’s shoulder, and I pulled the duvet higher up.
He winced and turned toward me. “Your hair’s all damp and cold,” he muttered drowsily.
“Sorry—”
“Hey, I didn’t say you could move.” He swiftly hauled me close to him again, and I sighed contentedly and slipped a leg between him. “Where are the boys?”
“Right behind you, still asleep.”
He hummed and pressed his lips to my forehead.
“Mmmm, I’m awake…” Cam yawned and stretched out. “Did you work out already, Daddy?”
“I did. Get some more sleep, sweetheart,” I murmured.
Then Noa let out a sleepy groan. “I’m also awake, Daddy. And I’m soooo hungry for flutternuffers.”
Right. He’d invented a new word yesterday. To prevent mix-ups and jokes, the lizard was Fluffernutter, and the food was flutternuffer.
“Come with me downstairs.” Cam yawned again. “Bring your tablet—you can watch cartoons while I fix breakfast.”
“Awesomesauce.” Noa sat up with his bed head and rubbed the sleep from his eyes.
“What do you have against sleeping in this morning?” Lucian asked.
“We leave tomorrow, Owner,” Cam reasoned. “I have lots to do if I want departure day to be stress-free. And guess what. I do!”
Lucian and I rumbled a tired chuckle, and moments later, the boys padded out of the room together, both with their squishy stuffies in their grasps.
I smiled and stretched alongside Lucian, and I kissed his neck.
“We should give the boys a surprise tomorrow,” I said quietly.
“Mm…? Got any ideas?”
Actually, yes. I’d thought about two things during my workout, and one was much less troubling than the other. “I’m thinking…we order a car service, we have a nice breakfast in the lounge at the airport, I can pick up a couple of those stuffies from their wish lists, and when we get to Fort Lauderdale, we take Cam shopping for new cookware for our kitchen upgrade. We can have all the shit shipped home. His wish list at that French Le Creu…whatever the fuck, is getting longer than his defunct SLRN number.”
He grinned sleepily. “He has a new slave registry number at another site. But the rest—excellent idea. I’d like to go with you today. I have nothing else to do.”
Our poor man wasn’t handling unemployment very well, but I couldn’t blame him. I wouldn’t do any better.
It would be like this for a few months before he started figuring out a more permanent solution. Personally, I was hoping for private consulting because, one, he was good at it, and two, he could set healthier boundaries.
“It’s a date.” I gave him a smooch before I settled down on the pillow again, and I yawned.
Another hour of sleep couldn’t hurt.
After breakfast, Lucian and I caught a glimpse of Cam’s to-do list, so we decided to at least handle the errands for him. We were going out anyway; plus, we had a rule. If the boy insisted on keeping a job, which we respected, everything in the household couldn’t fall on him. It would be way too much, and then he’d be the one with burnout symptoms.
Lucian and I went to Tysons first, where we could get nearly everything on Cam’s list, as well as two new stuffies. We picked the biggest ones we could find, and they were pretty damn huge.
With that out of the way, we headed across the river. I called Lucas on the way to make sure they were home, and he asked if we wanted coffee.
I always did.
It sounded like Colt had something he wanted to discuss too.
“What were we picking up at their house?” Lucian asked and checked the rearview.
“Noa forgot a charger and one of his coloring books after he hung out with Kit,” I answered.
“Ah—I knew about the charger, so I didn’t get the urgency. We have hundreds.”
Each one necessary when you had a Noa. I smiled to myself and slipped on my shades. But no, the coloring book was the urgency. Noa wanted to bring it on the cruise. It contained curse words that could make his day.
I’d never forget the day he called Lucian at work and was like, “Hello, Sir Cock womble! Just wanted to say I love you dearly! Okay, bye.”
Halfway to Georgetown, we got stuck in traffic, and a month ago, Lucian would’ve been a grumbling, irritated mess, cursing at every car around us.
Not now. Now he was humming quietly to the music on the radio, holding my hand, just glancing around absently.
Cam was going to say yes when Lucian proposed, of that I was certain.