Page 24 of Daddy's Mail Order Mate

“I remember you now. And you might remember me? I’m Liam Gates.”

My memory pairs the man in front of me to the boy who’d often been on Paige’s heels.

“Yeah. Guess you grew out of your ‘pull her pigtails’ stage with her eventually, huh?”

Liam chuckles sheepishly and rubs the back of his neck.

“Yeah. Eventually.”

Paige pops through the doorway with a sway of hair and a smile.

“Thorn, come help me heat this up, would you? I’m not done with you yet.”

For some reason, Thorn and I seem to seek each other’s eyes at the same time. It almost feels like the old intuitive tempo we shared with each other back then slid right back into place.

I give him a silent look, wry and a bit petty. He makes a grumbling sound and approaches the kitchen, but stops short near me.

“Take him?”

I blink in surprise, but extend my arms all the same. It’s the first time he’s let me hold him; honestly, the intensely protective energy he had with his son had made me think he might never let me. Rowan wiggles a little bit in the transfer, big green eyes blinking placidly up at me.

“Well hello,” I greet him softly.

And somehow, that gets him to smile. My lips twitch a bit to mirror.

“He’s a cute kid, isn’t he.”

I hum in agreement and gently cradle the baby into my shoulder.

“Yeah.”

The mother must have been beautiful.

My stomach twinges and twists, and a fresh pulse of agony moves through me.

She must have been plenty of wonderful things, if she’d been together with Thorn long enough to have his kid. He hadn’t said much about the situation over the app, and I don’t know if I was desperate to know or if I wanted to bury my head in the sand about his romantic history.

The atmosphere is pleasant enough as everything gets put together for dinner, but a constant ring of anxiety through my body keeps me on edge. A surprise dinner with an Alpha and Luna was the last thing I wanted or needed. And with the complicated history and unresolved issues, it feels like a meal ina minefield. Apparently Thorn feels much the same; I can tell from the set of his shoulders and the deepening of his tone that he’s far from relaxed as well.

I keep myself quiet with strategically paced bites of Paige’s chicken alfredo and do my best to let the three of them fill the silence. After all, despite the fact I know them all from our youth, they were all practically strangers to me at this point.

“You know, it might be Seluna at work here,” Paige suddenly remarks, smiling with such enthusiasm.

Her husband smiles fondly over at her with a curious lift of a brow.

“Where’s that coming from?”

“This whole thing. You know, Gwen and Thorn being anonymously matched! I always wondered why you two didn’t maybe get back in touch after Thorn left Portsmill. You two were such a sweet couple. And while Portsmill wasn’t the kindest place to any of us, I figured once Thorn got out into the world, you know…”

I feel sick. It takes all my willpower to not just put my fork down, and the bite of food in my mouth suddenly tastes nauseously rich. My chewing slows and I force myself to try to focus on getting it down as calmly as possible.

Everyone is quiet, and I don’t have to look to know Paige is looking around expectantly for someone to pipe up.

“... Thorn, I know you don’t have much to say most of the time,” she goes on, “But don’t you think it’s really lucky too?”

He grunts wordlessly.

Despite my efforts to do so quietly, my fork sounds deafeningly loud when I set it on my plate.

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