I pulled my phone out of my pocket and started taking pictures.
“What are you doing?” Braden mumbled sleepily.
I looked up from my phone to see him rubbing his eyes with one hand and stroking Ellie’s back with the other.
“Putting a photo of you and Ellie sleeping on Instagram. My readers will love it.”
Looking more awake now, he frowned. “What?”
“Didn’t you know, babe? You’re their favorite book boyfriend come to life.”
“You’ve been sharing photos of me with your readers?” he grumbled sleepily.
“I had to get some use out of you. You’ve increased my social media followers. Oh look. Twenty likes already.” I grinned over the top of my phone at him, and his eyes narrowed.
“You owe me for that.”
My body warmed just at the thought. “What did you have in mind?”
He smiled, slow, wicked, and sweet. “I’ll think of something.”
“Will I like it?”
“Are you flirting with me while our child is sleeping in the room?”
I strode over to them. “She can’t hear me,” I whispered, bending down to my haunches to stroke her soft hair. “She’s out.”
“I thought you were writing.”
I turned my attention from Ellie to Braden, falling like always into his pale blue gaze. “Beth misses me. Although she didn’t put it quite like that.”
“She wouldn’t.” He smiled affectionately. “She’s too much like her mum to admit outright when she’s missing someone. Always has to wrap up the feeling in sarcasm.”
I chuckled. “It makes life entertaining for you.”
“I wouldn’t want it any other way, babe.”
Leaning over, I pressed my lips to his, intending it to be a soft kiss, but like always, it turned deeper.
“Yuck!” Beth’s voice broke us apart. “It’s bad enough doing that in front of me, but in front of Ellie?”
At her loud entrance, Ellie stirred on Braden’s chest and began to whimper at being awoken.
“Beth, your sister was sleeping,” I admonished.
She immediately looked guilty and crept on her tiptoes into the room as if her now-silent entrance would undo waking up her sister. Coming right up to my side, she knelt down and put her hand on Ellie’s back. “It’s okay, baby girl,” she said softly. “We’re going to go out. You want to go out?”
Ellie reached sleepily for her sister, and Beth took her into her arms with ease and stood up. “I’ll go get her changed.”
I tugged on the hem of Beth’s skirt. “Thank you, baby.”
Once they were gone, Braden sat up, running his hands through his mussed hair. “We’re going out?”
I nodded and sat down on his lap, mussing his hair even more with my hands. “Beth was bored.”
He frowned as he wrapped his arm around my waist. “I could have taken the kids out, left you here to write.”
“No.” I kissed him again. “Beth was making a point. I need to spend more time with you and the kids. I want to spend more time with you.”
“And tonight with me?” He brushed his mouth teasingly over mine.
“Every night with you,” I whispered back, and he kissed me harder.
“Yuck!”
We broke apart this time to find Luke standing in the doorway with his arms crossed over his chest.
“Problem?” I arched my eyebrow at my eight-year-old.
“Yeah.” He said it like it should be obvious. “You’re not supposed to do that in front of your kids. That’s what Beth says. She says it’s, like, a rule.”
Braden chuckled. “Son, the only ones making rules in this house are Mum and Dad. Got that?”
He nodded obediently but still looked consternated. “Perhaps it should be a rule?”
I bit back laughter at the hope in the question.
“Believe me, bud,” Braden said, squeezing my hip for emphasis. “That’s the one thing that’s least likely to become a rule in this house.”
“But there’s a chance?”
I turned my face to Braden’s neck to hide my grin from Luke.
“No. There is zero chance.”
“When I turn eighteen, will I be able to make rules?”
Sensing where this was going, Braden chuckled. “Son, when you’re eighteen, a no-kissing-girls rule will be the last thing you want to put in place.”
“Maybe. But a no-kissing-Mum rule will definitely be put in place.” He disappeared from the doorway and we heard him yell for his sister, probably going in search of her to complain about us.
“They’re ganging up on us,” I murmured ominously, staring after our son.
“Oh, they can try.” Braden turned my face so he could kiss me again. When he pulled back, he grinned. “But they won’t succeed.”
I grinned at the humor in his eyes, the humor I shared, the connection we shared that got us through absolutely anything, and I knew always would. “We’ve got this.”
“We’ve got this,” Braden agreed, and then he kissed me once more as Luke walked back into the room, and our laughter bubbled against each other’s lips at the sound of our son’s outrage.
Grace
“You have to be nicer to Charlie,” I whispered in Logan’s ear as we walked hand in hand into the rugby stadium.
Maia walked ahead of us, clasping tightly to Charlie’s hand as Chloe and Ed chatted to them about something.
Logan grunted. “I was nice.”