Page 43 of An Adventure For Aster

“I am tomorrow too,” he said.

“Could you spend the night and go to work from here?” she asked.

“I can,” he said. Though the two of them were pretty tight in the double bed she had. He only had a queen at Zane’s and was considering upgrading to a king. If he did he knew he wouldn’t have much room for anything else in the small space.

This was only a temporary house for now. He could buy something at any point and considered it, but there was no rush.

What he wanted was something like what he had on the water and that came at a price. He didn’t need anything fancy or huge. He could fix it up himself if he had to.

But there might be some talk if he spent more than some would think he could afford on his salary at his job.

And since when did he care all that much about talk?

Since he became an overnight hero and hated the attention.

“Did you talk to your family today?” she asked. “Or don’t you?”

“I talked to Daphne,” he said. He felt bad his sister was still at home, but it was nothing different than when he was in the service. Nothing in her life changed all that much. “She’s got to work today.”

“In the restaurant?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said. “She took the shift. My parents don’t cook. I think they will go out to eat. She said she didn’t care to eat out and would rather earn the money.”

“She sounds like me,” she said. “Do they know about me?”

He sighed. “No,” he said.

He could tell by the hurt look on her face that wasn’t what she wanted to hear.

“I haven’t had a lot of time to talk to Daphne. I want to do it when I’ve got more than two minutes when she’s running out the door and not in a text message. She’s going to call me later tonight,” he said.

“When you’re with me?” she asked.

“Yes. I thought maybe I could tell her and she might want to talk to you.”

The smile on Raine’s face told him he handled that well. It’s not like he was trying to keep it from his sister but rather it was the truth. It wasn’t the right time before.

“I’d like that,” she said. “Guess we are meeting everyone today. Well, you know Ivy.”

“I do,” he said. Ivy made it a point to seek him out whenever she was in the building, even if it was only to say hi. He expected she’d be a bit of a pain, but she wasn’t at all.

She was always chipper and sweet and wanted to come say hi because it was family.

He felt how genuine Ivy was and didn’t even feel smothered when those words were said.

“Then you grab that box with two pies in it and I’ll get this one.”

“What kind did you make besides apple?” he asked. “And I don’t see ice cream.”

“Crap, the ice cream. Hang on,” she said, put her box down and ran to get it out of the freezer. “Good thing you reminded me about that. And I made pumpkin because my father and brothers like it and then chocolate. A little bit of everything. What are you going to eat?”

“Not the pumpkin,” he said. “I never developed a taste for it. I don’t even like the smell when people come around me with pumpkin-flavored coffee and stuff.”

“It’s an acquired taste,” she said. “I know. I’m not a huge fan of it myself, but as I said, my father and brothers like it.”

“Does Emma normally cook Thanksgiving?”

“No,” she said. “My mother does, but her house is small and we are squished in there. The more we add to the group, the harder it is. Plus with the baby, it’s more difficult. Ivy and Brooks could have hosted, but Ivy’s never made a turkey before and was nervous. Emma said she had no problem doing it. It’s easier having everything they need there for the baby too.”

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