Page 56 of Single Mom for the Firemen

“So that means you’re going to be living here full-time?” Mason adds, and Vanessa nods.

“That’s the idea, yeah.”

“What about work?”

“Oh, yeah, I guess I should tell you about that part too,” she remarks, her lips twitching again. “I spoke to my friend, Lara—she’s the one who edits the Journal. And she told me that the article I submitted about you is too good to leave at just a single story.

“How do you mean?”

“I mean, she wants me to write a book,” she replies.

“Holy…sugar,” Killain exclaims, censoring himself at the last second when he remembers that Callie is there. “She thinks there’s enough for a whole book here?”

“So she says,” she replies. “And hey, if you guys are willing to talk with me a little more…”

“If it means you’ll stay,” Mason replies. “I’ll answer any questions you want. Just say the word.”

“Hey, I wouldn’t go that far,” she teases him. “Who knows what kind of thing I might ask…?”

Mason cooks as we chat, and soon the food is ready. The sun is beginning to set, casting those long golden rays over the ground before me, and as we cluster around a small table we brought out from the living room to eat on, I feel the warmth of it on my back.

But it’s more than the warmth of the sun. No, it’s the warmth of having all these people around me. After so long feeling as though I have nothing, after so long hating myself for everything that happened with my foster parents, I’m finally here, with people who care about me, with people I love. With people who feel like family.

I wish they could have been there to see it, our parents. But I hope that, somewhere, they can, and they can see how happy we are. How well we did, even after everything.

After we’re done, we clear up, and Callie is starting to falter on her feet.

“I guess we should get home,” Vannessa sighs, wrapping a strand of Callie’s hair around her finger. “This one is starting to droop…”

“No, can we stay?” Callie asks, her eyes hopeful.

Vanessa smiles, and glances up at us. “Well, I suppose it’s not up to me,” she remarks. “Guys? Is it okay if we stay?”

“As if you have to ask,” I murmur.

“I’ll go get her bed set up,” Killian replies, and he moves to the stairs, going to get Callie’s bedroom sorted for the evening.

In another half hour, Callie is in bed, and even though she insisted she wanted to stay up, she’s already out for the count by the time her mom goes to check on her. Vanessa tiptoesdownstairs to join us, and grabs another beer from the fridge as we all settle in around the fire.

“So, tonight was a lot of fun,” she remarks as she glides her lips over the head of the bottle. My eyes are drawn to the way her mouth looks brushing against the glass, and I am struck, all too clearly, with the memory of what she looked like riding my cock just a few days ago. I push it aside—now is not the time. Well, not quite, anyway.

“It was,” Killian replies, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees. “And that was some pretty big news you dropped on us.”

“It was,” she replies, pulling an apologetic face. “I’m sorry. I should have thought of a more chill way to drop that into conversation…”

“Why? Because you thought we might not react well to it?” I ask, and she frowns as she glances over at me.

“No, no, nothing like that,” she replies. “Or…I mean, I don’t know. You’ve got your life out here, and I didn’t know if maybe I would be intruding on that in some way. Getting in the middle of something that you wanted to keep to yourselves.”

“I might have felt that way at some point,” I agree. “But not now. Not now I’ve had a chance to get to know the two of you.”

She smiles a little wider. “I know it’s not the most…normal setup in the world,” she admits. “What with me…being involved with all three of you, I guess. But I’ve done normal. Or at least, I tried to. I tried to do normal with Callie’s father, but then he passed. I tried to be a normal single mom, but I wound up bringing the cartel down on our heads. Maybe it’s time for me to just admit that I’m not good at the whole normal thing.”

“Maybe,” I agree. “But I guess we can try being abnormal…together?”

“That’s one hell of a proposal,” she giggles, turning to me. “Not sure that’s exactly how I pictured it, but…” She pauses as she glances between us for a moment. “But I think it works.”

She lifts her beer, holding it out into the middle of the room where we can all reach it.

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