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“If you don’t want more kids, I don’t care. If you decide you want them in the future, fine. But I am giving nothing up. Your health and happiness are the most important things, so I don’t want you to ever think you’re less because of that. Or any reason. I love you exactly as you are, high-maintenance, dry-clean directions, and all.” I followed the line of her bottom lip with the pad of my thumb. “It’s my privilege to take care of you. Like you take care of me.”
Her reddening eyes and tip of her nose alerted me to her coming emotions, and I smiled into a kiss. “Before you get weepy again, you ready to get out of here? We’ll have to pick Finn up from Jude’s, but you want to go out for dinner?”
“Yes, definitely. I haven’t been able to eat much the past few days.”
I stood and held her coat open so she could slip her arms inside. I swept her hair back over her shoulders so it didn’t get caught then zipped it up to her chin. “I missed you, angel. And even if you hadn’t walked in here tonight, I would have found you. I would’ve gone over to your sister’s house eventually and stood outside playing Broadway songs on a speaker until you talked to me.”
She snickered as she cleaned up her art supplies. “What was going to be your first choice of song?”
I thought on this while buttoning up my coat. “I could probably only name a few from your show, but I liked that one you were singing in the shower the other day. It was about coats and kisses.”
She turned to me, her purse on her shoulder, a purple beanie on her head with a ball on top. “‘I’ll Cover You.’ It’s fromRent.”
“I’ll Cover You.” I wrapped my arm around her shoulders. “I like that one.”
She leaned her head back, offering me her lips for a kiss. “I like that one too.”
THIRTY-TWO
KENNEDY
Ihad ravioli with homemade sauce simmering on the stove and a bottle of champagne chilling in the fridge. Or whiskey on the counter…in case of bad news.
But it wasn’t going to be bad news.
It was going to be good news. I was manifesting it.
“Good news, right, Finnie?”
Finn followed me as I paced, thinking it was a game. He’d tried to slow me down or trip me up by pretending to be a rock or dinosaur or crashing a Matchbox car into my feet like he was doing now. “Good news!”
“Yes, that’s right.” I patted out a nervous beat on my thighs as I avoided the plastic track Finn had laid out on the floor. “Good news. Daddy’s going to have good news.”
Liam had been insisting his board review would be fine, but I knew he was nervous. Even with all the amazing work he’d done. I told him he had to let his insecurities go, like my therapist had told me. Write them down on a piece of paper and get rid of it. Rip it up and throw them away. Don’t give them power.
But it seemed my good-luck blow job this morning did more for his confidence than any information I’d passed on from my few therapy sessions.
It had really been helping me, and I’d never been happier, being with Liam and Finn. I, of course, was no longer being paid to be his nanny, but my job hadn’t ended. For now, I was still with Finn full time, although I planned on finding a hair salon to work at a few hours a week. Liam said I didn’t need to work, but that only solidified my decision. Knowing I didn’t need to work meant I could really think about what I wanted to do, and it turned out I really wanted to get back into cosmetology. I loved talking to people and genuinely loved making people happy with their appearance. When I had asked Liam if that sounded silly, he’d said, “Everyone needs to get their hair cut at some point. Why shouldn’t it make you happy to do it for them?”
Then he’d smacked my ass and told me to get on all fours.
He had a real knack for driving the point home.
Below me, Finn dropped a heavy dinosaur on his face, which he’d been flying in the air above him. He cried out, and I bent to pick him up. “You okay, babes?”
“My chin,” he said clearly, and even though I didn’t want to smile because he was hurt, I couldn’t help it. He was doing so well with his speech, his beginning sounds improving every single day.
“Your chin hurts? Want a kiss?”
He nodded, and I rubbed my palm over it a few times then kissed it.
“All better?”
He nodded again and squirmed for me to put him down.
“Why don’t we pick up? It’s a mess in here. One of us is going to get hurt when we step on one of these toys.”
He sat on the floor, gazing up at me, confused. “Hurt toy?”
