Page 27 of Bearing North
“What?”
“Orson. My name. My brothers never let me forget it.”
“Siblings are like that,” Alex said with a smirk.
“Have you thought about that?” Orson asked impulsively.
“Siblings?”
“How many kids you might want?”
For a moment, he was afraid she was going to stand up and knock him on his ass again. He was ready for her this time, so she’d have more trouble getting through his defenses.
But she didn’t look mad, she looked thoughtful. “A little,” she said reluctantly.
“Two, at least,” Orson said eagerly. “So they entertain each other. More than three might require a minivan. Which I wouldn’t mind driving, don’t get me wrong. Just a thing to think about.”
“Youhavethought about this,” Alex observed.
“I’d stay home with them. You’re way better at business stuff than me, and I’ve got cousins. I know how to change a diaper and won’t give them sharp things. I don’t mind being a soccer dad if they’re athletic. Or a Mathletes dad if they’re all smart like their mom. I’m not asking you to give up your job. Though you’d have to have the babies. I couldn’t do that part. Biology, you know.”
“Biology,” Alex said faintly.
“And it doesn’t have to be right away, of course. When we’re ready.”
“And if I didn’t want any?” Alex sounded a little dangerous. “Ever?”
No cubs?His grizzly pouted.
Orson smothered him. “That’s okay. I can be a stay-at-home husband without kids. I’ll take up an expensive hobby, and you can be my sugar mama.”
“Your sugar mama?!” Alex’s outrage was everything he’d hoped it would be.
“I have no shame. I’m completely happy to be a kept man.”
The waitress arrived with their meals and had heard enough of the conversation to give Orson a long, skeptical look as she put his sandwich in front of him. Alex took a vicious bite of her grilled cheese. “Three,” she said briefly.
“You want three kept men? I read about that once. It sounded pretty hot, but I might be the jealous type…”
She laughed crumbs into her napkin. “Kids!” she clarified when she had gotten herself under control. “Three kids! I…think that would be about right.”
“You will be the best mom,” Orson said without the slightest hesitation. “I can picture it now. You’ll teach the girls self-defense and ten speeds and I’ll teach their brother how to shoot and scratch himself.” He demonstrated the scratching and Alex kicked him under the table as she got her sandwich under control again.
This was everything he wanted in the world. It didn’t matter that their hotel room had two tiny beds, or that they were in a tiny, cheap shipping container passing itself off as a building halfway to nowhere. If Alex was there with him, it was a palace, and he wanted to start making those babies right now in their room with paper-thin walls.
She must have guessed that from his look, because she kicked him under the table again. “Keep your pants on, hot shot,” she warned. “I’m not thinking right this minute. I want a little time to figure this all out.”
“We could practice, though,” Orson suggested seriously. “We wouldn’t want to do it wrong when we go to actually do it.”
They laughed, but Orson was sure that anything he did with Alex couldn’t ever be the slightest bit wrong.
24
ALEX
Alex didn’t understand how all of this could feel so right.
Even lying squashed awkwardly in a tiny twin bed with Orson after another round of wall-pounding sex didn’t seem wrong. She slept deeply tucked tight in his arms and dreamed of bear cubs and meadows full of fireweed and bees. She woke to him stroking her with his fingers and they made quiet, slow love that didn’t wake the neighbors as the midnight sun streamed around curtains that were supposed to be light-blocking.
