Page 29 of Doran

“Not gross,” Doran declared. “Wondrous.” And then, he kissed me gently,

I smiled goofily. I loved him, and he loved me back!

I thanked my lucky stars I’d taken Grammie’s advice. I couldn’t imagine not being here now. This already felt so much like home and Doran’s being here was a huge part of that.

I went to move off of his lap so the boys would stop making gagging noises. Doran shifted, and I smirked, feeling his chubby beneath me as I slid off. I was still too sore for that, but I had other ideas for some fun things we could do with that later. Much, much later.

I settled against him once more just as Fred did his wiggly tip toe thing while preparing to bowl.

“Surely that is not possible?” Doran asked and I laughed.

“Not really, but then none of this has any bearing on the reality of prehistoric life on Earth.”

“This makes a lot more sense now.”

I pecked his jaw, his beard rough against my lips, and his tail moved to twine around my waist from where it stretched along the couch behind me. He was so sexy and hunky, but also endearingly cute. And he was all mine.

18

DORAN

That escaped hop-a-long was having the time of its life, and damned if anyone could find where it had decided to hole up. I knew where it had been eating, however. It had breakfast on our front porch the morning after its escape, chewing through the cloth bag Kelran’s delivery boy had placed our potatoes and carrots in and helping itself. It had left us a small trail of pellet shaped shits on the floorboards and steps as thanks. Others reported similar. It had helped itself to part of a morning delivery to the tavern as well, and gotten into some of the bags Kelran had sitting outside on the general’s store stoop ready to be loaded into the trailer for delivery. That one made Juckul, his delivery driver, the brunt of gentle jokes for a few days, as it had managed to do its mischief right under his nose as he carried out crates of milk and other goods to load into the trailer first.

Sweetie whined at the door, and I let her out. She went to go nose around under the porch, and I followed her, bending down to peer there myself. There were a few more bits of hop-a-long poop, no doubt left there after it had taken shelter there at some point. It wasn’t there now.

“Stop that!” I told the dog, who’d decided that the poop was a nice dog treat.

“What’s she doing?” Sarah called from the door.

“That hop-a-long’s been here again and left more dung, and she’s eating it like it’s canine candy.”

She made a face. “Eww, but to be fair, she’s a dog, and it probably is. I’ll add some of the breath freshener and tooth and gum stuff to her water I replicated yesterday. That was mighty nice of Jesse to send us a copy of that replicator pattern for it.”

I scooped up the stubborn dog and carried her back inside. “That it was. I already brought in the milk.”

“Thanks.”

“I left it on the table, as Sweetie wanted to go out.”

“That’s fine.” She pressed a kiss to my jaw, her hand trailing along my arm affectionately as she moved off. Ever since we’d completed our bond and confessed our feelings for each other, the kisses and looks and touches from her had become more frequent. Not that I was any less attentive. Quite the opposite, actually, but the initial sexual frenzy we’d shared had tapered off over the past four days.

She picked up the two gallons of milk off of the dining room table and carried them into the kitchen, and I followed her.

“I thought it would be nice if we had waffles today.”

I nodded, though I had no idea what a waffle was. I knew she wouldn’t serve me something inedible, and if I didn’t like it, I’d eat it anyway just this once.

“Did I hear someone say waffles?” Darren asked, his two sons sleepily following behind.

“You did,” Sarah confirmed, already opening a cabinet to pull a mixing bowl out.

“Can we have chocolate chips and a smiley face?” Matt asked.

“You make the face out of whipped cream,” Evan explained.

Sarah looked at their father in query, and he smiled. “Yeah, go on. I’ll take blueberry waffles if it’s not too much trouble.”

“None at all. I’m replicating the fruit and chocolate chips, and the can of whipped cream, so it’s easy peasy.”