Page 85 of Marry Me, Maybe?
He wouldn’t just… leave.
Not after last night.
Not after the way he’d kissed me and held me after.
Would he?
I frowned, listening to the stillness. No sound from Ivy.
Shealwayscame into my bed if she was awake before me, climbing under the covers, burrowing into my side, whispering “Daddee” in that soft little voice like she thought I might disappear if she spoke too loud.
Was she still asleep?
I reached blindly for my phone on the nightstand. I blinked at the time.
11:47 a.m.
“Shit.”
My heart dropped. I bolted upright so fast I whacked my shin against the corner of the bed frame.
“Fuuuck,” I hissed through my teeth, hopping on one foot as pain radiated up my leg. “Goddammit.”
I’d missed half the day of work, and I couldn’t afford to have my pay docked. Gray probably wouldn’t, but what would I say as an excuse?Your son wore me out last night,so I slept like a log.I couldn’t take advantage of Gray that way. He’d already done so much for our little family.
There was no way Ivy was still asleep. Why hadn’t she woken me up? The last time she’d tried pouring water on her own and had gotten the floor wet. What if she tried to…
Oh God.
I rushed out of the bedroom barefoot, skidding a little on the hardwood as I rounded the corner into the hall, then the living room.
And stopped short in the kitchen doorway.
Matty stood at the counter in one ofhisold T-shirts thatI’dstolen from him four years ago. I wore it all the time, and now it was faded and soft, shrunk to fit his frame like it hadbeen made for this exact moment. He could’ve been modeling a flour-splattered romance cover, barefoot, sleeves rolled up, grin tugging at the corner of his mouth.
Ivy stood beside him on the stepstool, piping bag clutched in her frosting-coated hand, her little tongue poking out the side of her mouth in concentration.
They were decorating a cake.
A crooked, sunken, lopsided thing with too much frosting globbed on one side, and gummy bears stuck into the top like a toddler’s version of modern art.
The kitchen was a wreck.
Flour dusted every surface—the counters, the floor, Ivy’s curls. A streak of icing ran across Matty’s cheek like war paint. An empty egg carton lay on its side beside a bowl of half-melted butter, and there were suspicious smears of something blue on the cabinet handles.
It looked like a tornado had hit a bakery.
And it was the most beautiful damn thing I’d ever seen.
My heart stuttered.
“Matt?”
He hadn’t left. He was keeping my three-year-old occupied so I could get some extra hours of sleep.
Matty turned, eyes crinkling at the sides from his smile. “There you are,” he said, like it was the most natural thing in the world. “I was starting to think you might sleep through lunch.”
I groaned, entering the kitchen. “What have you two been doing?”
