Page 47 of If Only In Our Dreams

“Yeah?” Robin laughed. His eyes were still wet. I wanted to bundle him up and never let him go. What a sweet,sweetcreature he was. “I mean…as long as you’re cool with putting in the work. And know I might not be all that great.”

Both girls nodded exuberantly.

Robin’s eyes met mine again.

They asked,is this okay?

They asked, am I really welcome?

They said,I’m poison, I’m poison, I’m poison.

To which there was only one honest answer.

“We meet on Sundays around two,” I told him. “You’ll need warmer clothes than that.”

“Okay,” Robin nodded seriously.

“We’ll go get cocoa and have dinner after.”

“I like food.”

“I’ll bring water for you and the girls, so don’t worry about that.”

“Yes, Daddy,” Robin joked—though even I could tell it was strained.

“He’s notyourdaddy,” Rosie countered, annoyed. “He’s mine.”

Robin, because he was adorable, turnedbrightred. His eyebrows shot up, and a startled laugh escaped him as he nodded. “Right. My bad. Sorry. Won’t happen again.” His voice cracked.

Glancing over him, I couldn’t help but scan his chest for those lovely perky nipples he kept flashing. They were hard, as per usual, the cold making them poke against the fabric even worse than the piercings did.

I licked my lips, bit back a groan, and forced myself to focus.

“On second thought,” I dragged my gaze back to his face. “I’ll take you shopping. I don’t think you know how to properly dress in this kind of weather. You’ll need a guide.”

“My very own Vermont-ian expert. Vermonter? Vermontian-er.” Robin frowned, obviously confused by his own bullshit. “Okay.” His cheeks were still bright red.

“What are you doing now?” I asked, plans already forming in my mind.

“I was just walking to the hardware store,” Robin answered immediately. “You know…for paint. For thething?” His eyes bulged like he was trying to communicate to me telepathically.

“The…thing?”

Oh. The haunted house.

Huh.

I was more than a little surprised he was still working on that. Days had passed and I’d assumed with his radio silence that the haunted house had just been an excuse to come see me that first day. Which…maybe it had been. Maybe now it had turned into something more.

“Oh, thething,” I agreed, nodding along.

“What thing?” Rosie asked, but Robin sidestepped the question adeptly.

“I don’t wanna get in the way of your day,” he said, biting his lip. His piercing flickered. “I just wanted to say hi.” More like, he’d heard the kids crying and came to rescue me. My adorable goth knight-in-shining-armor. Not that I needed to be rescued from my own children, but still.

What he’d done had been incredibly helpful, and exactly the kind of thing that would make child-rearing so much easier if I had a partner to share it with.

“Let me ask the girls what they want to do,” I hummed, sinking down low so that we could speak, the way we always did. “What do we think?” I asked them, making sure to make eye contact with them both. “Are we done training for now?”

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