It sounded good, but if she wasn’t going to stay, then I wanted her with me.
“Save it for our late-night snack after this outing with the kids. You rolling with me for the rest of the day. Now let’s get these kids.”
Chapter
Thirteen
Olive
“Cece, you gotta hit the ball to make it into the hole,” Jo-Jo said as he leaned on his putter, sounding more annoyed than ever. Neela laughed as Cece swung the putter, but the golf ball didn’t move. Once we picked up the kids from camp, Highland drove us across the bridge to The Keys. We ended up at Hole N One, a putt golf course. We had been working on the course for the past hour or so, and between all the kids, we were only halfway through the eighteen holes Highland had set up for us.
Cece grunted as she tossed down her putter, stalking over to me with a mean pout, lip poked out and arms crossed over her chest.
“Ugh, this game sucks, anyways. Whose idea was this again? Why couldn’t we just go to the house and go swimming or something.” That had me smirking as I looked over at Highland who was rubbing his forehead, seemingly stressed out. The only person besides him who looked to be enjoying themselves was Jo-Jo, surprisingly.
I rubbed her back to apply some type of comfort when Neela joined in, cosigning her sister.
“Yeah, because this sucks.”
I lost my ability to control my laughter as it erupted, causing me to cover my mouth.
“Damn baby, you too. All my girls are done with this, huh? Well, let’s figure something else out.” I looked at Jo-Jo whose face fell and I immediately shook my head, thinking quickly on my feet.
“Highland, this was a cute idea, but yeah, this isn’t my cup of tea either.” Highland grunted and I moved to grab his hand as I rubbed his chest. It slipped my mind that the kids didn’t know the recent development of our relationship and clearly Highland’s too as he wrapped an arm around my waist.
“How about you and Jo-Jo stay and I take the girls with me. We can entertain ourselves while y’all finish the game.” Jo-Jo perked up, with his head moving between Highland and me.
“Baby but we drove one car.”
“And, iDrive is available everywhere. I just need the address to the beach house. We’ll stay down here until the game is over with.”
“Hell no, what I look like having y’all in an iDrive. You take the car and me and Jo-Jo will make our way to you once we’re done. Hit the beach house in the GPS and it’ll take you straight there. And don’t get in there and try to cook either, Olive. Dinner is on me.” He leaned down and pecked my lips a few times before oohs came from the kids, causing me to blush and step back.
Highland, of course, pulled me back into his embrace, kissing my lips again as he spoke against them. “Don’t be stepping away from me, these kids gon’ get used to seeing us love on each other, aight.” He dug into his pocket, fishing the keys out for me.
“Okay.” This time when I broke away from him, I turned and bent down to talk to Jo-Jo. Outside of a few people, I had never left him with anyone, and here I was, trading off kids with Highland so easily.
“Be mindful and listen to what Mr. Lando says, okay?”
Highland kissed his teeth. “Baby, me and my boy gon’ be good. Go have y’all girl time or whatever. And I meant what I said, ya man got dinner.”
A cheesy grin had my cheeks hurting as I finally accepted the keys.
“I bet you couldn’t wait to call yourself that. I just gave you the title less than twelve hours ago.”
“The title been mine, I’m just finally getting the privilege to put it to use.” One final kiss had the two older kids calling out to us in unison.
“Haven’t y’all done enough kissing yet?” I chuckled while Highland groaned and mumbled something like cock blocks.
“Okay, let’s go girls.”
It seemed that as soon as me and the girls made it to the car, all the questions began to pour out, with Cece being the ring leader.
“So you kissed my daddy, do y’all go together now?” We hadn’t even left the parking lot yet and baby girl started with a bang, causing me to choke on the air I’d just sucked in.
After I got myself together, I let out a few light chuckles, not completely sure how to answer. So I went with the safest response I could come up with as I hit the GPS to pull the directions.
“Little girl, what do you know about people going together?”
