Page 39 of Summer with the Single Dad

“Oh my gosh! It’s like we have our own Brooke, now.” Aya turned around to Talia, who still wore a hot pink cast on her left arm after she was struck by an SUV in their pub parking lot a few weeks ago. “We have our own Brooke now!”

Talia wrinkled her nose in confusion. “Huh?”

Bennett cleared his throat, feeling the need to correct his youngest child. “Justine is temporary. She will move out at the end of the week.”

“We thought Brooke was temporary too. Now she lives with Uncle Clint and Talia. It could happen with Justine too,” Aya practically yelled. “Justine could become forever.”

Inappropriate sparks of desire for that to be true flickered in Bennett’s gut and he did his best to ignore them. “I just wanted to give you guys a head’s up because she might be at the house when we get there and I didn’t want to surprise you.”

“But I love surprises,” Aya said. “And Justine moving into our house is a great surprise.”

They hadn’t even gotten home yet, and already his daughter was dangerously attached to Justine living there.

This had bad idea written all over it.

And yet, the idea of her staying anywhere else sat so uncomfortably in his craw he couldn’t bear to think of her living at Dom’s or Wyatt’s. Or even worse, at Jagger’s. Even though he had the most amount of space, he was also the biggest playboy and flirt. And just thinking of Jagger flirting with Justine made Bennett want to punch his little brother in the face.

They reached the gate that separated the commercial part of the property from the private. The kids liked taking turns punching in the code on the keypad that unlocked the man door on the side.

This time, it was Silas’s turn.

“Remember to say the wrong numbers out loud as you punch in the right numbers so anybody listening in the woods gets it wrong when they try it,” Jake, Wyatt’s oldest son, said.

Silas nodded, bunched his brows and concentrated. “Three.” He hit “five”. “Seven.” He hit “two”. “Nine.” He hit “eight”. “One.” He hit “two” again. “Six.” He hit “zero”. Then beamed when the door clicked open.

Emme patted him on the back. “Good job. First time you got it right on the first try. Well done, Si.”

Silas puffed up his little, six-year-old chest and put a bit of a cocky saunter into his stride as he walked through the now open door.

“Brooke said we can all come to my house after school. She baked cookies,” Talia announced, hustling forward to lead the pack.

“I want to go see Justine first,” Aya said, glancing up with hope at Bennett. “Can we, Daddy?”

He nodded. “Okay.”

Talia and the boys went to her house while Bennett and his girls went to his. At first, he thought maybe he should knock, since he didn’t want to startle her, but he didn’t even get to make that decision since Aya nearly broke down the door with her eagerness.

“Justine! You here?” she called out.

“In the kitchen.”

Aya kicked off her shoes and didn’t bother to put them on the shoe rack before she beelined it for the kitchen.

Bennett cleared his throat. “Excuse me, Miss McEvoy, is that how we enter this house?”

She stopped mid-stride, one foot in the air, hovering above the floor. Her eyes held confusion and irritation.

“Your shoes?” Bennett said gently.

Aya was about to roll her eyes, but then thought better of it and quickly pivoted, ran back, and hastily stowed her shoes where they belonged. Then she resumed her impatient haste and raced to the kitchen. “Justine!”

Emme was calmer by nature and put her shoes away, hung up her backpack, and removed her lunch kit and homework, carrying them to the kitchen. He could always rely on her to follow protocol, stick to the rules, and keep the rest of the kids in line. His brothers and he didn’t know what they would do without her there to help wrangle her sister and cousins.

Bennett sucked in a big breath as he followed his older daughter into the kitchen, only to find Brooke sitting at the table with Justine, both of them holding mugs of steaming tea.

Aya had one arm draped around Justine’s shoulder and she was twirling Justine’s ponytail. Thankfully, the woman didn’t seem to mind.

“Just wanted to come over and welcome the new neighbor,” Brooke said with her Hollywood starlet smile.

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