Page 53 of The Snuggle is Real
“Ford. Your dad. Look at how worried he is about you. That’s because he loves you to pieces.”
“He’s not mad?”
“I’m not,” I rasped. “I’m sorry Sasha upset you.”
“Sasha?” Dottie said. “Please tell me you’re not taking up with her again.”
“I’m not.”
“Who’s Sasha?” Mason asked.
“No one,” I insisted before Dottie could fill him in on my dating history. I wasn’t sure why, but I didn’t want Mason to know. It was embarrassing, really, to have dated a woman like her, even if she had been a rebound after my divorce.
Charlie came around the table, stopping a few feet from me. “I lost our place in line.”
“Go ahead of us,” a woman called from the front of the line. “We’ve got a diaper emergency and you look like you could use a break.”
“You don’t have to?—”
“Please? You’d be doing me a favor.”
I turned a wry look Mason’s way. That wasn’t the first time that reverse psychology had been used on me.
This time, though, I wouldn’t fight it.
“Thank you,” I said. “Let me know if I can repay the favor sometime.”
She smiled. “Of course. Us parents have to stick together.”
“I’m not—” I stopped short and wrapped an arm around Charlie. “I’m not very practiced at this yet, so thank you.”
I walked Charlie up to Santa’s sleigh. I picked her up to set her in the sleigh but held her close for a minute.
“Charlie, I know this is new with me and you. That we’re still getting used to each other, but you are my family, and if you let me, I want to be yours too.”
She nodded and leaned in to kiss my cheek.
It was all the answer I needed. I lifted her into the sleigh and she posed with Santa. Her cheeks were still a little pink, but whether it was from the cold or her tears, I couldn’t say. The smile she beamed at Santa looked genuine.
The photographer stepped up and took a shot.
“So, I sort of promised Charlie she could visit Peppermint Bark when she finished here.”
I turned, startled. “You did?”
Mason toed at the snow. “She was crying, and I wanted to make her feel better.”
“But the toy drive…”
“Mrs. Lil is taking the next shift, and she’s an old hand at this. She won’t need me.”
“Are you sure?”
“Of course. As long as you don’t have other plans? That woman?—”
“No! No plans with her. Definitely not. She made Charlie feel awful.”
Mason cringed. “Okay, I wasn’t sure…”
