Page 21 of Omega Dragon Manny
That night, when we finally went home and Louise headed out, the kids were already asleep. We moved all of my things into his room.
“What should we do with this room?” I looked around my now-empty space.
He came up behind me, wrapped his arms around my waist, and rested his chin on my shoulder. “I was thinking we could keep it as a potential nursery.”
I turned in his arms to face him. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”
“I know we have three wonderful children,” he said softly, “but I wouldn’t be opposed to more…with you. As long as we do it one at a time.”
I laughed, rubbing my cheek against his. “Three at onceisa lot.”
“Yeah.” He chuckled. “We’ll stick with one.”
Because that was how babies worked.
16
CLARK
The more we discussed it, the more I realized that the marriage thing was all about me doing what I thought was right and not about what either one of us wanted. In the end, we did go down to the town hall and file the paperwork, though. Not because it made us somehow more connected than we were. It didn’t. After some research, we realized it would make it easier with the triplets legally, giving him some rights a boyfriend wouldn’t have, and that was important to both of us.
But the mating was something we both really wanted.
We’d waited so long that we decided to make a special night of it. Not like a wedding that would take place in front of everybody, that was ridiculous. We did, however, want it to be when we weren’t worried one of the kids would wake up or I had to be to work soon. Those adulting kinds of things.
So when Louise offered to give us an overnight away, we took her up on it.
We didn’t go far, a B&B less than fifteen minutes down the road, but we deemed it our mating moon. The place was adorable,abutting a river, fire pits in the back, rocking chairs on the wrap-around porch. It was the epitome of everything you thought of when someone said B&B, and when we got there and checked in, I thought the night was going to be perfect.
That was until Beau’s stomach decided to mess with him, and instead of changing for dinner, he found himself hunched over the toilet and losing the remains of lunch.
I felt horrible for him. It was our first night away together ever, and he was sick.
When he was done and cleaned up, he said he felt good enough to go out. I had to admit, he looked fine. I agreed we could try to go somewhere, but not to the place the owner had arranged for us. It was a farm-to-table restaurant with many courses.
He might’ve been better, but that was a lot of food for someone who wasn’t 100%.
Beau swore he wasn’t sick and it was just something he ate. And he looked fine, so we went someplace close, just in case. The cafe we found online had outdoor seating that sounded like it might be just the ticket.
We walked downstairs to let the owner know he wasn’t feeling well and asked if she could cancel the reservations she made.
I was shocked when the first thing she did was congratulate us.
“What?” I responded to her, but her eyes were on Beau.
That wasn’t the normal response you got for losing your cookies.
He didn’t seem surprised by her at all. “Can you scent it?”
“Yeah, can’t you?” she replied.
“No, that’s why I thought I was wrong.”
“Oh, take a deep breath, you can scent it. There’s a hint of honey and a bit of smoke.”
They kept going back and forth as I stood there, clueless and completely left out of the conversation. Then Beau told her to keep the reservation and dragged me by the hand up to our room.
“Did you catch any of that?” he said in almost one word.
