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“It’s okay. I’ll schedule it. Maybe a Thursday. I’ll drop her off, and you can take her to dinner after?” I suggest.
“I’d love that.” He smiles, and then it falls as his eyes trail from my wet head down to my blouse. “Isn’t that what you wore last night?”
I hug my arms tighter around me to hide the shirt I’ve been wearing for two days in a row, and then I realize I don’t care what Tyler thinks. “It is.”
“Was it laundry day?”
“Nope. All caught up as of Friday.”
He nods with the understanding. His eyes flick to the open front door, and the smell of sauce comes out from inside. “You’re about to have dinner?”
“That’s what people do in the evening.”
“You have company?”
I scrunch my nose. “No.”
“Do you guys want some? I’d love to stay and finish what I started with Izzy. Show her I’m here for her. Show her I’m here for you.”
“Me?”
“Yeah, Lyss. We’re a family. I’d like to come in for a few minutes. See the kids’ rooms. Share in this new part of their life. Show the kids that we can be a family without being together.”
“Ty, I don’t think—”
“Come on in, Dad!” Izzy is standing by the doorway, my father behind her.
She’s beaming like an eleven-year-old who is inviting her father into her new home for the first time since she moved in, and he’s grimacing like a man who is about to let his ex-son-in-law inside for the first time in two years.
Tyler walks past me and over to Izzy, grabbing her by the shoulders and walking inside.
He gives my dad a respectful nod. “Mr. Jones.”
Dad merely lifts his chin and watches Tyler head in with Izzy and listens as Hunter squeals with delight that his daddy is staying for dinner.
I turn around and walk into the foyer, closing the door and looking at my dad’s displeased frown.
“I don’t want to hear it,” I warn him.
He harrumphs. “Next time, change your shirt. He would have been halfway home by now.”
My shoulders fall. I hate it when he’s right.
twenty-one
THE NEXT TWO WEEKScontinue on with little fanfare. I work, spend my free hours with the kids, and when they’re with Tyler on the weekends, I sneak in some time with Will. Even though I have two full kid-free days, I work weekends, and he has a rotating schedule. Still, it’s nice because we can go slow with this new relationship.
Today, I’m at the office, doing inventory with Jillian. Tara stopped by because she really needs some girl talk.
“I ended things with Kent.”
Tara’s announcement has Jillian and me pausing mid–inventory counting.
“Oh no. You really liked him,” Jillian states with her hand over her cashmere chest.
“Is it the intimacy thing?” I ask.
“Yeah. I mean, it’s weird that we haven’t gone to bed with each other, but that’s not the problem. The issue is, I only want to go to bed with him because it’s some natural next step that I think we’re supposed to take. I like Kent, but do I really like him? Am I settling?”
