Page 6 of Fierce-Dane

“Sweet,” Tiffani said. “I want mushrooms and black olives.”

“Ewww,” Tyler said. “I don’t like black olives.”

“There won’t be any on your side,” Dane said. He didn’t want to get into a battle here about this.

“But the juices move to my side,” Tyler whined.

“Nope,” he said. “Olives don’t have juice. When the pit comes out all the juice does too.”

“It does?” Tyler asked.

“Yes,” his mother said. “Juice free olives go on pizza.”

“Okay,” Tyler said. “I want sausage on my half. And you’re going to eat my side, right?”

His mother was laughing at him and he did what he always did. Played the peacemaker because Tiffani was frowning, as she’d want him to eat her side too.

“I’m going to have a slice from both of your sides because I’m starving.” He grabbed them both by the waist and pulled them close, had them giggling and added, “I might just eat the whole thing and leave nothing for either of you.”

“Nooooo,” Tyler said.

“I want pizza,” Tiffani said. “You can’t eat it all.”

He kissed them both on the cheek and congratulated himself on handling that the way he had. Now his daughter wanted it rather than giving him a hard time about wanting to order spaghetti.

“You’ve got a way about you,” his mother said.

“Glad someone thinks that,” he said and stood up, reaching for his kids’ hands. “Let’s get out of here and I’ll order the pizza in the car.”

“Elise,”Carolyn said the minute they left Dane’s side. They weren’t getting anywhere with Chloe’s brother so could pivot back to the target at hand. “How are you doing?”

“I’m great,” Elise said.

“You do look lovely today. So different than we are used to seeing you,” Carolyn said.

“It took a lot of work for this to happen,” Elise said. “Who has the time?”

She and her sister-in-law laughed. “We know that feeling well,” Diane said. “But we’ve had our fair share of weddings lately.”

“I’m sure you have,” Elise said.

“You looked nice dancing with Zander,” Carolyn said. “Almost like a couple...”

“He’s like another brother to me,” Elise said. “Eww.”

“I heard that,” Zander shouted from the end of the table where he was talking with Royce. Everyone knew what the two of them were up to...everyone but Elise it seemed.

“That is why I said it so loudly,” Elise said to Zander while she pointed at him.

“See,” Carolyn said. “You even get along well.”

“Sorry, ladies,” Elise said. She lowered her voice to a normal level now. “He’s not my type. A great guy but not for me. You’ll have to find someone else for him.”

“That’s too bad,” Diane said. “But we are up for the challenge. Between him and Gabe and Dane. All those eligible bachelors here.”

“We’ve got someone in mind for Gabe,” Carolyn said, thinking it was time to plant their seed. “Remember we talked about that.”

“Oh yeah,” Diane said. “Sorry. I just forgot.”

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