Page 17 of The Single Father Upstairs

“It smells like orange marmalade.” Indigo seized the invitation out of my hand and sniffed it again.

Was that human code for something?

“That cat’s called Marmalade.” My daughter bopped round the room to a tune in her head. “I love it ‘cause she’s orange.”

I hadn’t agreed to anything, but Indigo had apparently made the decision for me. Being in the same room with my mate anddaughter made me anxious, and I tugged at my collar. Indigo would pick up on me acting weird, though she was at the age where she labeled everything I did as odd.

“I’m going to make her a toy. Cats like strings and crinkly things.”

There was no excuse for why we couldn’t attend that would satisfy Indigo, so I’d have to grit my teeth and go. I fortified myself with coffee and yet more coffee while my daughter constructed a toy.

She rummaged in my scrap bin for a piece of wooden dowel and gathered ribbon and feathers from her dress-up box.

“What do you think?” Indigo twirled the toy in the air, and I imagined the spilled coffee and smashed vases that would result after Marmalade ran after it.

We have to go, my bear insisted.

I agree, but it might be awkward. Not to mention that my beast would want to mate Miles and I’d have to fight him off. My bear, not Miles.

Indigo looked at the clock every five minutes until just before three. She had the toy in one hand and the door open, and I’d been instructed to carry the cake tin containing the cookies we’d made. These were chocolate chip, thank gods, so I didn’t have to pretend to like oatmeal. My bear and I shuddered at the thought.

As we walked down the stairs, I rehearsed conversation topics in my head. Miles and I hadn’t seen each other since I spent the night in his armchair. We could talk about the weather, the cat, or my work, and I could ask him about his job, whatever it was.

Miles’s door was ajar when we arrived, and Indigo acted as though she’d known him all her life. She charged in, yelling, “We’re here.”

“Hi.” Miles didn’t appear upset that we’d barged in. He had color in his cheeks and his eyes weren’t bloodshot like the other night.

Though as he gazed at me, his face became more red as heat crept over his neck.

“Thank you for coming.”

Indigo was cuddling Marmalade who, if I had to guess, didn’t seem like the cuddly type, but she was putting up with it.

“I didn’t get a choice.” I managed a smile and cocked my head toward my daughter.

That got a laugh out of Miles which cut the tension. He thanked us for the cookies and offered Indigo a soda.

“Coffee?”

“Please.”

My daughter and Marmalade were playing as Miles and I wandered into the kitchen.

“I owe you an apology.” His back was to me as he prepared the coffee. “For the night you stayed here. I don’t remember much, which might be good if I said or did more embarrassing things than what I can recall.”

I’d skip the bit about him calling me handsome, though I did run that line through my head every so often.

“You were fine.”

Liar. My bear thought I should tell him what he said, word for word.

Miles rubbed the back of his neck as he had done the day we met. Did he not know what to do with his hands or was that a nervous habit?

“It’s been a difficult few weeks. Moving is always stressful, but I was excited to find this place. But why does it feel as though I’m an outsider?”

I could have said that everyone else had been here a long time and we were family. Accepting someone new always took some adjustment. Or I could’ve spilled that he’d moved into a building full of people who could turn into animals. I imagined his face when I explained that Indigo had a bear inside her. If her beast chose this moment to lash out at the furniture, it would save me the effort.

But first, I had to figure out what to do about us being mates.