Page 33 of Owned

When he leaves, Astera pops into my room. “Come on. Let’s go get our nails done. And I can shop for baby clothes.”

“Okay.” I pull myself out of bed, and Astera is already sifting through my clothes before placing my cozy black sweater, a pair of skinny jeans, and my black knee length boots in my hands.

“I’m going to go change.” I disappear into the bathroom to fix my hair into a ponytail, I pull some loose hair out and quickly curl the pieces.

“You look so cute,” Astera compliments me when I pull the door open.

“Thanks. I like that green sweater on you.”

“Thanks. I got it when Griffin and I were on our honeymoon. Now let’s go.”

“Killer isn’t coming?” I question when we get to the SUV.

“No. I think the guys had something to do so I figured you and me could have some girl time.”

“Well, I appreciate it.”

Astera gets behind the wheel to drive us, and we have normal conversation on the way to the nail salon. “Do you think you’ll have kids?”

“I hope so. Preferably with Hayden.”

Astera smiles. “You guys would make beautiful babies.”

Of course, I smile at the thought. We continue our conversation until she pulls into a parking space. “Okay, this is the place.”

We enter, and Astera rattles off our names to the clerk at the counter.

“What color are you getting?” she asks.

“I might do black or maybe a deep red.”

“They can probably do ombre nails with both of those colors.”

“That’s a good idea. What about you?”

After looking at the colors, she points out the one she wants, “I might pick out a dark purple ombre color.”

The technician calls both of us, and we explain what we want.

“How many kids do you think you and Griffin will have?”

“I don’t know. Maybe four.”

“Wow. I didn’t realize you wanted that many.”

“Well one, I like even numbers so two doesn’t seem like enough, and two, if we had three kids, it would seem like one would be left out if two became closer. So the next logical thing is four. But I do want to have them close together. Maybe have two in a three-year span, and then two more.”

I smile. “That makes sense.”

“How many do you want?”

“I don’t know, maybe two. Just have a little four-member family.”

“I could see you guys with two kids.”

The technician shapes my nails into a coffin shape, paints the red color on them, and then adds the black toward the tips. And for my ring finger on each hand, she mixes the colors to become more of a marble design.

Astera looks over at my nails. “Those look sick.” I know she means this in a good way.

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