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I was so used to being on top of the structure game. I knew my family members’ plans for the day. I helped them make things easier. That was my responsibility. And now, I didn’t know crap. I was so out of the loop, despite that it had only been a day.
Over the next few hours, I did my best to pour all my concentration into what I was doing, but as the kids came home one by one—first, the eldest two being dropped off by friends’ parents, then Sloan himself arrived with the youngest—I couldn’t shake the feeling of being in the wrong place. This wasn’t my home, not my family, not my people. Not my sense of normal.
“Daddy, I can’t reach the soap!”
“Dad! Can I stay at Ted’s this weekend?”
“Archie, what’s for dinner?”
We made four batches of different kinds of chocolate chip cookies while the house was in chaos. Corey and Sloan helped out with homework, plans were made for Jason’s next game, and he also had plans with a friend named Ted, little Emma-Jo wanted a sleepover somewhere else, and Loki came up with a song about apples.
“I loooooove apples sometiiiimes!”
“Oh my gosh, shut up, Loki! I’m trying to concentrate!”
Archie thrived in this mess.
I didn’t.
Corey goofed off with the kids.
I didn’t.
Sloan made rounds to catch up with every family member—and he included me. He was concerned. He looked like a rough-around-the-edges car mechanic, but he had the typical Daddy Dom senses that evidently tingled around me, and he was incredibly kind. He asked if there was anything he could do, he advised me to get some rest—he said I could use his and Corey’s bedroom so I could have privacy.
My answers came out dull and reeked of autopilot.
I wanted to go home. The noise was too much for me, and seeing their everyday routine play out—seeing how happy they were together—made me wanna bawl my eyes out. What the fuck was I still doing here?
I could understand my initial panic. I could understand how badly I’d needed to escape, regardless of how much guilt it brought me too, but I couldn’t understand why I was still here. I should’ve gone home earlier; I should’ve asked to call KC so he could pick me up. Or, hell, somehow find a cab that would drive me all the way to Mclean, no matter the cost.
When Archie went from filling cookie jars to preparing dinner, I caught a break. Corey and Sloan suggested a walk with all the kids and the dogs, and the silence that followed once they’d left was deafening. Cacophony and chaos, gone. Just like that.
I exhaled and leaned against the counter.
“Boy, did you need that.” Archie smirked knowingly and gave my shoulder a squeeze on his way to the fridge. “Have a seat on the couch, Cam. We’re having burgers for dinner, so there’s nothing you can do anyway.”
“What? I can set the table, I can help you with the vegetables, I can?—”
“Go have a bloody seat, that’s what you can do.” He got stern with me, and he pointed toward the living room. “Besides, Master will be home any moment, and I’m sure he’ll want to talk to you.”
Oh great.
“Actually,” he said abruptly. “We’re going to take Sloan’s advice. Come here.”
The guy literally nudged me out of the kitchen, then steered me through the living room, out into the hallway, and straight to where their bedrooms were. Two of them, one for Greer and Archie, one for Sloan and Corey—though, I knew they all shared the largest room often.
“In here.” He ushered me into Sloan and Corey’s bedroom. “You’re going to rest. I’ll bring you a soda and some cookies.”
“I’m not tired!” I protested.
“Sleepy, perhaps,” he corrected, “but you’re most certainly tired.”
I huffed as he left with a quick, “I’ll be right back.”
He could be bossy.
I sat down on the edge of the bed and glanced around me as I ran a hand through my hair. Last time I’d peeked in here, Sloan and Corey had recently made the room their home, so it’d been messier. There’d been a desk and moving boxes, all of which were gone now. The bed remained, with two nightstands, a small flat-screen attached on a mount in the corner of the wall, a rocking chair below it, and new wallpaper. I remembered Corey telling me once that he was sick of white and sterile because of what he was used to, and I was sure that’d dictated the remodel of this room. Rich, rustic colors in shades of red, blue, green, orange, and teal. Same mismatched theme as the rest of the house. And a bunch of pictures on the walls.
