Page 32 of Smitten with the Single Dad

Griffon cheered up. “Thanks, Dad.”

“I sure hope you develop a more adventurous palate when you’re older. But I’m not wasting expensive-ass prawns on you if you don’t like them.”

“They look like creepy ocean bugs,” Griffon argued. “I don’t want to eat creepy ocean bugs.”

“Can I help with dinner at all?” she asked. “I like to cook.”

Frowning, he shook his head. “I’ve got it. You and the boys can just hang out and keep passing barely legible notes until I call you.”

That made her smirk. “My writing is not that bad.”

“It’s terrible. Truly terrible.”

She was full-on smiling now, and he could tell it hurt her lip to do it, but shealso didn’t seem to care and grinned through the pain.

He left the three of them and went down to the kitchen to start making dinner. Even if he couldn’t stay away from the kitchen on Sundays, he made a point of always being home for dinner on Sundays, and he cooked a nice meal for him and the boys. Usually, he let the kids choose what he made, but tonight he wanted to venture past mac ‘n’ cheese, hotdogs, tacos, and spaghetti. It was also barbecuing season. So he was going to make the most of his ridiculously expensive grill.

And no, he was not compensating for something with the size of his grill. He was a chef, so it felt wrong not having a top-of-the-line grill. He was completely confident and secure with what he carried around in his pants.

Dinner took just under an hour to prepare and cook. So by five-thirty, he was calling the boys and Vica down to eat. It warmed his heart to such a pleasant temperature to hear the boys laughing the way they were upstairs, whispering and conspiring, and bringing Vica out of her dark headspace.

“Wash your hands, you filthy animals,” he called up the stairs. “And I mean all three of you.” He snickered to himself as he cracked open a bottle of beer from the brewery. It was one of Clint’s newest concoctions: an unfiltered, Belgian-style Witbier brewed with orange peel and coriander. Wyatt was obsessed with it. It was smooth and spicy, and so perfect for a warm summer evening as the smoke from the grill wrapped around him like a comforting blanket.

His thunder-hooved colts came barreling down the stairs like they were being chased by pumas, blasting into the kitchen with just as much vigor. Vica practically floated behind them with all the grace and beauty of an angel. And she really did look like an angel as she stood there by the kitchen table with the late afternoon sun pouring in, creating an almost-halo around her head. She’d put her hair back in a small ponytail at the nape of her neck, but a lot of shorter strands had escaped to frame her face. She was stunning, and for half a second, Wyatt was tongue tied and unable to blink.

“Dad, you okay?” Griffon asked. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

That was enough to shake some sense into Wyatt. He blinked and grinned down at his kid, caressing Griffon’s head a little. “Sorry, just thinking.”

“Can we sit down?” Griffon asked.

“Did you wash your hands?”

Griffon ran his hands over Wyatt’s arms. They were still damp. “That’s pee, not water.” He started cracking up. Even though he was six, he still had that full toddler-like belly laugh, and it got Wyatt every time.

Wyatt set down his beer and grabbed his youngest kid before he could escape, and quickly flipped the kid upside down, which only spurred him to laugh more. “Is that so? You think you’re a funny guy, huh? How about I give you a swirly? Do you know what a swirly is?” He jogged to the two-piece bathroom off the living room and hallway to the den, flicked on the bathroom light, and lifted the lid. “It’s where I dunk your head in the bowl and flush.”

“Ahhhhhh,” Griffon cried, though he was still laughing.

“I’ll teach you to wipe pee-hands on your dad!” Wyatt flushed the toilet and pretended to lower his son.

“It’s water, it’s water. I washed them.” Griffon could barely get the words out. He was laughing so much now. “Dad, I’m going to pee my pants. I’m laughing so hard. Put me down.”

Wyatt set his kid down on his feet in the hallway, pretending to be stern with his eyes.

Griffon was all big, toothy grins and dimples. “Now I have to pee.”

“Wash your hands after,” Wyatt said, leaving his kid to do his business, and rejoining Vica and Jake in the kitchen. Everything was already on the table. All he had to do was get Vica whatever refreshment she preferred. “I’m having a beer. Would you like one too, or something else?”

Jake had already gone into the fridge and grabbed both him and Griffon cans of flavored sparkling water.

“I’ll have what the boys are having,” Vica said. “Please.”

“I’ll get it,” Jake said. “What flavor, Vica? I like the blackberry. Griffon’sfavorite is peach.”

“I also like strawberry,” Griff yelled from the bathroom.

“And there is lime, grapefruit, and black cherry,” Jake finished.

---