Aisling was crushed, shared that with her mother and me, and both Rhiannon and I double-teamed him to relent.
He did.
Of a sort.
They could meet, being dropped off (since Kellan couldn’t drive yet) to have dinner at the diner. They had two hours. Then they were getting picked up separately.
However, this could not happen until during the Christmas break.
What Mickey didn’t know was that Kellan was walking Aisling to class, holding hands with her, and his posse was eating lunch with her posse.
Pippa shared this with me.
I did not share this with Mickey.
During this time, my kids had not quite made up with their father. He was trying and they were not rebuffing, but they stayed full-time with me.
Naturally, through all this, so much going on in such a short time at the same time preparing for Christmas, there had been an intermingling of families. The kids were getting used to each other. Auden was taking the lead as a big brother of sorts to all, including Cillian who wasn’t at his school.
So Mickey thought it was time.
Which meant it was our next step but a step that said everything.
Because if he wanted our children to get used to all of us under one roof, what happened next?
Only one thing.
Us being under one roof.
Permanently.
I loved this idea, obviously. And after a very shaky start, the kids were bonding beautifully.
It still scared the heck out of me.
“What if they fight over the remote or don’t agree on movies?” I asked.
“Listen to yourself, Amelia,” Alyssa replied. “All families fight over the remote and don’t agree on movies.”
She was right.
I was being an idiot.
“It’s weird,” I whispered. “My kids knowing I’m going to bed with Mickey.”
“Why?” Josie asked. “I’m under the impression you’ve been spending the night at Mickey’s. Have I missed something? Do his children mind?”
“No,” I answered.
“And, just pointin’ out,” Alyssa added. “Your two got some experience, their dad havin’ another wife.”
“This is true,” I mumbled.
“It’ll all go great,” Josie assured, patting me on the arm.
“Can’t go worse than Thanksgiving,” Alyssa muttered.
They of course knew all about our stellar holiday.
“Alyssa,” Josie hissed.
Alyssa raised her brows “Do I lie?”
“No, but still,” Josie returned. “I’m sure Amelia would prefer not to be reminded.”
“It’s okay,” I cut in. “You’re both right. Heck, if Mickey has his kids, they’re all together before school for Auden to take them and after school when they come back and we’re almost always having dinner together.”
“Families under one roof, your room a mile away from their wing of that place, means you’ll finally get laid,” Alyssa remarked.
This was a bonus.
Mickey and I had hit a dry patch because, me having my kids full-time, he couldn’t spend the night and I couldn’t either.
This meant no nights.
And no mornings.
He was gearing up to quit Ralph and keeping his regularly crazy schedule so there wasn’t time for us to meet somewhere to have quickies. And even though I was supposed to leave the kids behind and go to the locker room for fight night, every Saturday all the kids had come, Pippa, Ash, Auden and Cillian, even bringing their friends, and it wasn’t easy keeping a huge crew away from the cool dad who’d just won his fight. And, of course, my kids were with me so he couldn’t come over and fuck me on the dining room table.
This meant no sex but a lot of phone sex, which Mickey did really well.
But it wasn’t the real thing.
Thus, my guess, Mickey pushing the blending of families under one roof.
The last of the variety of reasons.
And another good one for me.
I was still nervous.
“Yeah, definite bonus,” I said to Alyssa.
“Amelia,” Josie called me.
I looked to her.
“I had no mother and a terrible father,” she told me. “All I had was my Gran. So I can say with some authority that if kids have two moms or two dads, all who care a great deal and want more than anything for those children to be happy, this is not a bad thing.”
She was very right.
And there it was. Just what I needed.
“Thanks, Josie,” I whispered.
“Don’t mention it,” she replied.
“Now that Amelia’s sorted, we gotta talk,” Alyssa announced, eyes to my nails, but I had a feeling she was talking to Josie. I would know this to be true when she went on, “Sofie told her dad and me last night that Conner invited her down to Boston for the weekend. You know I’m as liberal minded as the best of them, but no way in fuck her father or me are lettin’ her go spend the weekend with her college boyfriend.”
I listened to Josie whole-heartedly agreeing and I was there. I wasn’t far away. They’d helped work the things out that were taking control of my thoughts.
But I listened to them thinking La Jolla was one of the most amazing places on earth. It was beautiful and the weather was divine.
However, in all the time I’d spent there, outside of my children, I’d never gotten anything I needed.
No, I’d needed to move all the way across the country to a small town in Maine to find what I needed.
And I’d done that.
So finally, after forty-seven years, the Calway heiress didn’t want for anything.
On this thought, there was movement the like it would take your attention at the windows in front of Maude’s House of Beauty. Josie and Alyssa stopped talking as all eyes went there.
When they did, we saw a woman with long, thick auburn hair pulled back by one of those wide, wooly headbands that kept your ears warm. She also had on a puffy vest over an attractive turtleneck, a great pair of jeans that did wonderful things for her behind and a fabulous pair of high-heeled boots.
She’d whipped around and her rosy-cheeked face was screwed up in adorable anger as she jabbed her pointed finger at someone and shouted, “You no longer know me, Coert!”
At that moment, the handsome sheriff I’d seen at the town council meeting (a friend of Mickey’s I had not yet met) came walking into view. He stopped, planted his hands on jeans-clad hips, his profile was supremely annoyed, and he said something that only could be heard as a deep murmur.
“Kiss my ass!” she shouted, turned with her rich, beautiful auburn hair flying and flounced off.
Coert didn’t move, just stood there with hands on hips, muscle flexing in his jaw, watching where she went before he turned and prowled the other way.
Alyssa instantly snapped her head back to us.
“You know about that?” she asked Josie.
“No,” Josie answered.
Alyssa looked to me. “You know about that?”
“Nope,” I answered.
Her eyes drifted back to the windows. “We gotta find out about that.”
“Yep,” Josie and I both said at the same time.
We looked at each other, Alyssa looked to me, and we all burst out laughing.
Doing it, I knew I was right.
The Calway heiress finally had everything she needed.
*