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“Yep!” she says proudly. She takes a few more bites of her dinner and then turns to me with curious eyes. “Which reminds me...”
Knowing exactly where this is going, I point my fork at Emily. “Talk to her,” I tell Willow. “I did my job.”
Emily sighs and wipes her mouth with a napkin. “Willow,” she begins.
“Mom,” she replies just as seriously.
I hide my smile behind my glass of water while Addison busies herself smothering a chip with queso. Her eyes meet mine as she brings the chip to her lips, and I quickly look away, embarrassed at being caught staring. The back of my neck heats as I turn my focus back on the topic at hand: Willow and her unshaved legs.
“You’re only ten,” Emily says. “What’s the rush? You’ll be shaving your entire life.”
“But everyone else is shaving, Mom. Even Madelyn Pritchard, and you know how strict her parents are. Plus...” She drops her gaze to the table, looking guilty for her feelings. “I just want you to be able to teach me. Maybe I don’t even have to do it again for a while, you know? Just this once. Pleeease.”
Emily’s eyes glaze over, and she nods her head. “I understand, baby. We’ll make it work soon, okay?”
Willow relents and goes back to her food. The rest of the dinner is somber. I don’t want the night before Willow starts fifth grade to be remembered as depressing, so when it looks like everyone’s finished, I lean to my left and whisper in Willow’s ear. With a wide grin, she runs into the living room and returns quickly with her iPod.
Emily’s grin now matches Willow’s. “It’s been a while since we’ve had an after-dinner dance party.”
I wait for the device to connect to the Bluetooth speakers on the kitchen counter and then hit shuffle. The starting beats of “SexyBack” by Justin Timberlake fill the room, and Willow hops up and starts bouncing around. Emily stays seated, bopping her head to the beat of the music.
I jump up beside Willow, and when the lyrics start, she sings along. I chime in with the occasional “Yeah!” at the appropriate time, making my way over to Addison’s seat while dancing entirely offbeat. She laughs when I scoot out her chair and grab her hand. I place a kiss to her knuckles and then pull her to standing, encouraging her to join in.
My heart jumps for fucking joy when she immediately starts dancing with Willow. I grab Emily’s hand next, and she rises slowly and moves behind her chair. She has a death grip on the chairback, but the smile that lights her face is perfect.
I start dancing around the kitchen with the three of them, my gaze continuously falling back to Addison and the way she shakes her hips to the beat. I find myself breathless as I watch her. It makes me dizzy with the need to sink my fingers into her hips and feel her ass pressed against me. The second my dick twitches in my pants, I look away and distract myself by trying to make Willow laugh.
As the second verse begins, the four of us scream out “Yeah!” alongside Timbaland. Even when it ends, we keep dancing, and when “Shake It Off” by Taylor Swift comes on, Addison cheers.
“I love this song!” she shouts over the music.
“Me too!” says Willow. She runs over to the kitchen counter and grabs a wooden spoon and a spatula from the utensil holder. As those two belt out the lyrics, I dance around Emily, bumping my hips into her and forcing her to do the snake wave with me.
I bust out the sprinkler and the robot, two of Willow’s favorite dances to make fun of me about, and when the song comes close to the end, I start backing up into her in a terrible attempt at a twerk. She nearly collapses to the ground in a fit of giggles, and I scoop her up into my arms. I look up and meet Emily’s gaze, and the grin drops off my face.
Tears trail down her cheeks, but her smile is wide as laughter bubbles out of her. She quickly wipes her face and then reaches out to pause the iPod.
Addison stands still beside me, hands on her hips, her chest rising and falling as she catches her breath.
Emily looks between the two of us, and I swear her grin grows wider. “All right, Willow,” she starts and takes a big, deep breath. “Let’s go upstairs and make sure everything’s ready for school tomorrow.”
I kiss the top of Willow’s head as I deposit her feet back onto the ground. She’s still giggling in between sharp breaths, and I ruffle her hair before she skips toward the stairs. Emily lifts her hand in a small wave as she plods behind her.
When it’s just the two of us, I start walking back toward the table. Addison follows and grabs a few plates, but I reach out to her arm with my left hand as I scroll on Willow’s iPod with my right. “I’m not done with you yet,” I tell her.
“What—what do you mean?”
She looks nervous, and I think I kind of like it. I like knowing I’m affecting her like she is me. Reluctantly, I tear my gaze away from her and look down at the iPod. I do a quick search for a slow song and pull up “Who Are You When I’m Not Looking” by Blake Shelton. A little old school, but it’ll do.
I pull her close, nearly wrapping myself around her entirely, and for three perfect minutes, I forget everything around us and reacquaint myself with the feel of Addison in my arms.
