Total pages in book: 85
Estimated words: 80188 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 401(@200wpm)___ 321(@250wpm)___ 267(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 80188 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 401(@200wpm)___ 321(@250wpm)___ 267(@300wpm)
"What are you doing?" I asked as he went into the closet. We hadn't even discussed it, but we had both moved a few basic items into each other's closets for situations such as these.
"Picking out something to wear," he said, sounding anxious about the prospect.
"What you're wearing is fine," I insisted to his clear insecurity on the matter. I imagined he'd never had a situation where he needed to meet a chick's family before. "All the guys will be in jeans and tees. Once in a while, Helen asks everyone to dress up, but not this week."
"You're in a dress," he pointed out, waving at my black and white checkered flirty 50's halter-top dress.
"I'm always in a dress," I said, shrugging it off. "Besides, this is a casual dress."
"Nothing casual about dresses, Peyt," he said, shaking his head.
"If you want to dress up a bit, go ahead. You have your funeral shirt here," I told him.
Yes, funeral shirt.
The only dressy item of clothing he owned was meant for the funerals of his buddies. That being said, it was a very nice matte black top. He'd worn it once when we had gone to Famiglia with Cy and Reese.
"But not the slacks," I added. "You'll feel too out of place if you go that dressy. Just the black jeans."
And with that, we put on our final touches, grabbed Hannibal so the kids could play with him, and headed out.
I realized in about one-point-two seconds of us walking into the house that while Ryan knew - and told all the others - that I was involved with Sugar, he did not know that I was bringing him to dinner.
One look at Helen said she was enjoying the hell out of the way that all the conversation in the living room stopped suddenly as the men one by one realized who was next to me, his hand at my lower back.
"Well, this is awkward," I said, nodding a little. "You're supposed to be on my side, woman," I declared to Helen.
"I'm on the side of what will be most interesting," she shot back, smirking at me.
"Traitor," I told her. "Alright, so... this is Sugar. Sugar, this is... well, everyone," I said, waving a hand out. "Sugar is expecting castration," I went on when all there was in there room was silence. "I would ask that you leave his..." I trailed off, seeing a few of the kids milling around, "funsicle alone. The rest is fair game."
"Gee, thanks, baby," Sugar snorted, giving my ass a slap.
"What? They feel the need to defend my nonexistent honor somehow. I just don't want them messing with the, ah, heat-seeking missile, that's all."
"Heat-seeking missile," Fee snorted.
"You're just mad you didn't come up with it," Lea shot back.
But I wasn't focused on them.
I was focused on Autumn who had broken away from Eli, and was making her way toward us, her eyes almost dreamy, thoughtful, as she looked at me, then Sugar, then the both of us as a whole.
"So you're the one," she said, smiling as she got in front of us.
"I'm the one," he agreed, hand giving my hip a squeeze that I somehow felt in my chest too.
I'd been feeling it a lot lately.
When I caught him watching me, when he pulled me onto his chest at night, when he ran his fingers through my hair, when he wrangled the remote away from me because he didn't like my choice in movies, when he disobeyed the car stereo rules, when he tossed me one of his offhand compliments, when he was sweet with Savea and sarcastic with Jamie, when I woke up to find he had already taken Hannibal out for me.
The heart squeeze.
I knew what it meant.
I should have been terrified.
I would have been just a few weeks before.
But, for some reason, that wasn't what I felt.
All I felt was a weird, warm, contentedness.
Because it wasn't scary.
It was new and foreign, but comfortable, something I actually looked forward to when it happened.
"She's a pain in the ass," Autumn declared.
"I know it," Sugar agreed.
"Hey!" I objected.
"But even so, I love her. And if you hurt her, I will pour honey on it and let rats eat it," she said with a beaming smile.
To his credit, Sugar just smiled back. "I have been warned."
"Well, then, welcome. Good luck with the boys," she added, grabbing my arm. "The ladies have to get the food plated," she explained as she pulled me away.
"Peyton," Lea scolded as I stuck my ear in the doorway to the living room, trying to overhear what was being said to Sugar. And I knew something was, because even above the sounds of the girls talking, I could hear the deep rumble of masculine voices from the other room. "Come and help. They aren't going to hurt him," she assured me.