Page 70 of Bully's Second Chance
But, it was also times like this that I was thankful that we could save her, even if we couldn’t save her twin.
“Mommy! Mommy! Daddy gon-ge-me! Help!”
Jax leaned forward. “Better get into Mommy’s arms. Otherwise, the tickle monster’s gonna eat that tummy!”
Angel nose-dived out of her moving electric car and tumbled onto the floor. I quickly stopped the video and rushed to pick her up before she clung to me and buried her face into my shoulder. I dropped to my knees and rubbed her back, hoping and praying she hadn’t hurt herself.
And as Jax leaped off his bike, I heard it crash against the stairs.
“Is she okay? Did she hurt herself? Angel, you shouldn’t have dove out of your car like that. These marble floors are hard.”
Just like our mischievous little girl, though, she went from panicking to giggling in a heartbeat. “You didn’t get me, Daddy.”
I sighed with relief. “I think she’s just fine.”
He scooped her out of my arms. “Then, let the tickle monster have his revenge!”
“Nooooo!” she squealed.
She laughed as Jax cradled her in his arms, tickling her sides and the bottoms of her bare feet. He rolled her shirt up and blew raspberries against her tummy as her giggles filled the foyer, and I stumbled around to get my phone out. I fiddled with it before I got another video going, and I aimed it right at the two of them.
Both of them, laughing together as Jax twirled them around in circles.
“Around and around and around we go!” he exclaimed.
Angel picked up right where he left off. “And where we stop, no-nose!”
I threw my head back in laughter. “That’s right, sweet girl. Good job!”
Jax walked over to me and pressed a kiss to my lips, and I turned my phone off. I bent forward and kissed our daughter’s forehead, drawing in her scent through my nose before Jax hugged me. He passed our daughter off to me, and I cradled her close as he wrapped me up in his strong embrace. And after we stood there for a few minutes, his lips found their way to my ear.
“Wanna take her on a walk?” he asked.
I peeked up at him. “I’d love nothing more.”
Angel scrambled down to her feet before she dashed for the back door, and I wondered if the girl would ever learn to walk. But when we stepped outside and she went running into the backyard, I felt a sense of peace and calm come over me. She was one wild child who loved to be outside as much as possible. With her bare feet in the grass and her beautiful curls bouncing in every which direction, she reminded me of a flower child, ready to mate her life with the wild nature around her and become one with it.
I watched Jax jog in front of me before he plucked a wildflower from the bed of flowers he and Angel had planted together at the start of summer a couple of weeks ago. And when he placed it behind her ear, I whipped out my phone and took yet another picture of how they were smiling at one another. I wanted to frame it and put it up on the wall of her bedroom.
“Got it,” I whispered.
Angel took off down the cobblestone walkway with her bare feet, and Jax walked back to my side.
“So, have you given any more thought to Ma and Pa’s offer?” he asked.
I sighed as I walked beside him. “I don’t even know how I’m supposed to take an offer like that. I mean, me? Of all people?”
He shrugged. “You’re the one with the degree. You’re the one whose passion is to own a business of her own one of these days. You could have it all right here.”
I shook my head. “I simply can’t believe the two of them are wanting to retire, again! Guadalupe hated retirement the first time around. That’s why they opened the spa in the first place.”
“Well, things can change. And you know Pa’s got that thing with his heart now.”
My shoulders heaved with a sigh. “I know it’s just A-fib. But, that’s a pretty serious complication tojusthave, if that makes any sense.”
He wrapped his arm around my waist. “All the more reason why Ma wants to retire. She doesn’t know how much more time she’s got with him, and she wants to spend it with him. You could give them that if you wanted.”
As I walked along with Jax, keeping an eye on our daughter as she tumbled around in the grass, I thought about the offer they had made me a few days ago. Ma and Pa came over for dinner, and by the time they left, they were offering me the spa, free of charge. They just wanted to hand it over to me, like they hadn’t worked themselves to the bone to get the damned thing off the ground.
