Page 58 of The Soldier's Homecoming

Penny reached out an arm and put it around Gabby.

“And then tomorrow night, we thought we’d ask your grandma over again.”

“We did?” Daniel raised an eyebrow as he asked.

“Yeah,” Penny said, throwing him a smile as she kissed Gabby on the head.

“Of course.” Daniel shook his head as he realized that was her way of telling him she’d decided to agree to his date suggestion.

“Because tomorrow night I’m taking your mom out dancing.”

“Dancing?” Penny and Gabby said the word at exactly the same time, only Penny sounded terrified and Gabby looked beside herself with excitement.

“Yes, dancing,” he repeated, before turning his gaze to Penny and giving her a wink.

“And we’re going to have a great time.”

They hadn’t been out on the town since before they were married, but tomorrow night he was going to make sure they had a great time. Like they used to have.

“I didn’t even know you could dance, Daddy,” Gabby said.

Penny laughed and he tried to frown and failed miserably, cheeks burning from trying so hard not to smile.

“It’s your mom who can dance,” he told Gabby. “She’s the best dancer I’ve ever seen. Me? I just shuffle along beside her.”

Penny hugged Gabby tighter as Daniel watched her, but she didn’t argue. The playful twinkle in her eyes was all he needed as encouragement.

For the first time in a long while, it was like a cloud of happiness was shining over him, rather than a gray cloud of gloom.

11

PENNY stretched her limbs and kept her eyes firmly shut. It seemed like forever since she’d been able to lie in bed without waking at the crack of dawn.

She raised her head and squinted at the bedside clock.

Who was she kidding. Ithadbeen forever since she’d been able to do this.

Only the last thing she wanted to be doing today, with so few days left here, was lounging about in bed. No matter how good it felt.

She didn’t need to look to her right to see if Daniel was still beside her. He was heavy enough to weigh his side of the bed down and she would have known if he was there. Even though they didn’t touch in the night, she always knew he was there. Knew that his body was beside hers.

Penny forced her legs from the bed and straightened her pajamas. Voices wafted down to her and she followed them.

She was tempted to pause in the hall and listen, but she didn’t want to sneak up on them. Gabby was yapping away to Daniel, and he was hardly getting a word in. Not that he’d care.

Penny peeked into the bathroom to find Daniel leaning over the hand basin shaving, with Gabby standing on a stool beside him.

She puther hand over her mouth to stop from laughing. So they didn’t know she was standing in the doorway.

Gabby’s face was reflected in the mirror, covered in Daniel’s white shaving cream. She was using a toothbrush to scrape the cream off, copying her father.

She’d never seen anything so beautiful in her life.

No matter what happened between her and Daniel, she couldn’t ask for a better father for their daughter. He’d royally stuffed up as a husband, but as a dad? He couldn’t be faulted.

And she was starting to realize that maybe, just maybe, Daniel couldn’t shoulder all the blame for their marriage falling apart.

“Hey, you.” Daniel had a towel tucked around his waist. torso bare from his shower. “I didn’t want to wake you so I used this bathroom.”

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