Page 8 of Sunsets at the Beach House

Trina could still smell the powdery soft scent of Nico’s little head and feel the way his tiny fingers had wrapped around her pinky. “Aren’t babies the best?”

“Sure,” Willie said, settled in her chair once again. “Especially when they’re not yours. Different story when they’re screaming their lungs out, or you’re the one in charge of poopy diapers and three a.m. feedings.”

Roxie laughed. “You know, that’s true. I remember those days.” She winked at Trina, who was putting the pizza back in the oven to warm up a second time. “You weren’t that bad, though. You were always such a happy baby.”

Trina shut the oven door, then shrugged one shoulder. “I wouldn’t care about any of that. I can’t wait to have some babies of my own. I want at least two.”

Her mom looked at her from the kitchen. “Does Miles know this?”

“No.” Trina shot a look right back at her. “We only just started going out, Ma. It’s a little early for that kind of conversation.”

“It’s never too early.” Willie pointed at her granddaughter. “Better you find out now if he wants kids or not before you fall in love with him and then get your heart broke because he doesn’t.”

The thought that Miles might not want kids had never even occurred to her. Now Trina was wondering if she should work it into her next conversation with him and if she could do it without scaring him off.

“How are you going to have kids when you’re about to open a salon?” Roxie asked. She got the leftover salad out and started dishing it into three small bowls. “I’m putting Italian dressing on all of these, by the way, unless someone tells me different.”

“Sounds good to me,” Willie said.

“Me, too. I won’t have kids right away,” Trina answered. “I’m not even married yet. I can wait a few years. Lots of women have kids in their thirties these days. Even later, too. Although I’d rather have mine sooner.”

“Baby or no baby, I don’t like her,” Willie announced.

“She’s not that bad,” Roxie said. “I think her heart is in the right place, anyway.”

Trina frowned. “Are you talking about Paulina?”

“Yes,” Willie said. “A third wife.” She shook her head. “Your father certainly made the most of his years on Earth, didn’t he?” She snorted air through her nostrils. “What a loser he turned out to be.”

Trina couldn’t argue, but she didn’t like her dad being called names, either. Although he had earned them. She glanced at her mom. “Are you mad at him again, Ma?”

Roxie stuck forks in the salad bowls and brought them over. She put one on Willie’s side table, then the other two on the coffee table. “I guess I am a little. But I’ll tell you something else. I’m more bothered for Claire. I know how she feels now. Or rather, how she felt when she found out about me. I sort of understood it before, but for Claire, I was the other woman. Now, I have an ‘other woman’ of my own.”

She sighed. “It’s not a great feeling.”

“I’m sorry he did that to you, Ma.” Trina didn’t know how to make her mother feel better and she wished she did.

Roxie sat on the couch beside her and picked up her salad. “I’m sorry he did it to both of us.” She let out a short laugh. “Actually, I’m sorry he did it to all four of us. You, me, Kat, and Claire. You know, I’m really starting to like Claire. I mean, I can see things from her point of view pretty well and it’s not a fun place to be. I didn’t get a chance to talk to her about Paulina privately too much, but I know she’s upset.”

Willie sipped her drink, a cherry soda left over from Ethan’s last visit. “How could she not be? Who wouldn’t be upset to find out that kind of news? Not to mention Paulina and that baby are the reason you and Claire didn’t get as much insurance money as you thought you would. Might not bother you, but I know from Miguel that Claire was counting on it to help her invest in the bakery.”

Trina speared a slice of cucumber. “Maybe you should text her, Ma. See how she is. You might be exactly who she needs to talk to right now. No one else understands the situation like you do, that’s for sure.”

“I will tomorrow,” Roxie said. “She and I both need some time not thinking about this for a while.”

“Does that mean you want to stop talking about Paulina?”

“It does,” Roxie answered, but she said it with a smile.

Trina smiled back before focusing on the NCIS rerun playing on the television. “Okay. Let’s just eat and wait for Gibbs to smack someone on the head. By the time we finish our salads, the pizza will be warmed up again.”

Willie snorted. “I know who I’d like to smack on the head, but what’s left of him is currently in an urn on Claire’s nightstand.”

Trina laughed to herself. Her grandmother had no problem expressing herself, no matter what the subject. Trina wasn’t always so good at that. She’d have to get better, though. She was about to be in charge of her own salon. If she couldn’t say what she needed to when she needed to, her employees would walk all over her.

She didn’t feel like dealing with employees would be as hard as talking to Miles about what he wanted for his future, but her mother and grandmother were right. What was the point of getting involved with a guy if their plans for the future didn’t align?

She liked Miles a lot. She could very easily see herself in love with him. He was such a good guy. Kind and sweet, handsome, too. The kind of guy you could look up to and admire. And not just because he was a paramedic. He was just that kind of person. The reliable sort. If he said he’d do something, you could take stock in him doing it.

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