Page 92 of Your Soul to Keep

I nodded. “I want this.” I swallowed and tried again. If there was a time to fight, it was now. “Her. You.”

Turning me into his chest, he cupped the back of my head and tucked me under his chin. “That’s the best thing I’ve heard all day.”

The rest of the evening unfolded with laughter, cuddles, and my legs caught between his through the night.

It wasn’t until the next morning that we hit a snag.

24

Dumb As a Post

IdressedasleepyDylan while Gabe packed her bag for the day and made us both breakfast.

It was the type of routine I had envisioned more times than I could count. I wanted it. I’d always wanted it. But to have it with Gabe? That bypassed dream and landed in miracle territory.

In Sage Ridge, the elementary school, high school, and daycare all occupied the same large plot of land, with the daycare housed within the same building as the high school. We dropped Dylan off and walked through the high school to the shared admin office together, Gabe’s hand holding tightly onto mine.

“Are you okay?”

He chuckled. “I don’t have a lot of good memories of this place.”

I gave him an extra squeeze as we passed the resource room where we met for homework club. “We got this.”

Homework club wasn’t exactly voluntary, but it wasn’t detention either. My first and only detention came when a bitch of a teacher filled in at homework club and centered Gabe out in front of the class, using his work as an example of how not to do something.

Gabe was already larger than life to me at that point. Seeing him shrink under the scrutiny ignited the anger brewing inside me.

I’d already lost my mother.

My father’s health was failing.

I had no patience for petty bullshit, and even less for unkindness.

And I combusted. By the time I finished questioning her worth as a teacher and a human, she was in tears.

My breath came faster just thinking about it.

It was worth it.

Today’s meeting was almost anticlimactic. Fifteen minutes later, we left, laughing at how taut our nerves had been going in.

“That wasn’t so bad despite having to deal with Brittany,” I commented.

There were mean girls and there were mean girls. Brittany was so nasty she needed her own category. I couldn’t imagine a worse person to deal with and was pleasantly surprised by her level of professionalism.

“Yeah.” He shuddered. “She’s a piece of work. I’m a big guy but I can tell you truthfully, you wouldn’t catch me alone in a room with that woman.”

My eyebrows flew up. “She asked you out?”

His eyes flickered toward me before dancing away. His lips tightened marginally before looking back. “Not quite.”

“Ah.” I nodded. Reaching the heavy doors leading out to the parking lot, I looked for my bag to tuck the papers in away from the misty rain. “Shoot! I forgot my bag.”

Spinning on his heel, he took my hand and walked back. “You’ll protect me?” he teased.

“Always,” I answered, wholly serious where he joked.

Brittany’s nasty laughter filtered through the open door into the hallway. “Dumb as a post, but you can’t say he’s not pretty.”

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