Total pages in book: 78
Estimated words: 77415 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 387(@200wpm)___ 310(@250wpm)___ 258(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77415 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 387(@200wpm)___ 310(@250wpm)___ 258(@300wpm)
“Hey, you okay?”
Jessie’s worried words had me looking up in surprise to realize that I’d drifted while thinking about the things I’d promised myself that I wouldn’t think about.
“Just thinking,” I said. “Would you like chicken cordon bleu or fried chicken tenders?”
Jessie’s lips pursed. “Do you know how to make gravy, too?”
I grinned. “Yes, I do.”
“Chicken tenders, then,” he answered almost instantly. “With mashed potatoes?”
I started to laugh. “Yeah, I can do those.”
An hour later, I was sitting at Jessie’s tiny table for two, with Linc on my lap, handing him pieces off of my plate.
Jessie was watching me, his eyes hot.
“What?” I asked him.
“You make it easy,” he answered.
“Make it easy to what?” I questioned.
“To love you.”
***
“Fried chicken tenders and mashed potatoes?” Jessie asked hopefully.
“You still haven’t learned how to cook that after all these years?” I teased.
His eyes became serious, for a few seconds, as he stared at me.
“No,” he answered. “What would be the point when I could never make them as good as you can?”
A blush stole over my face.
“That’s very sweet,” I whispered. “Gravy, still, too?”
His eyes started to shine with laughter.
“What kind of a question is that?” he continued to tease me.
“Can you make rolls, too?” came Linc’s hollered demand from the living room. “I like rolls.”
I grinned.
“I can,” I answered him, raising my voice slightly. “But it would require an extra hour.”
Linc kicked his feet out in front of him and reached for the remote. “That’s fine with me.”
I snickered and turned my gaze back to man-child’s father.
“He’s exactly like you. Just like I always thought he’d be,” I informed Jessie.
Jessie’s face showed his pride. “He’s a good kid.”
“That’s because he has a good father,” I informed him. “Now, put that dog outside, let him go potty, and then come in here and help me peel potatoes while I get this bread started.”
Jessie sloppily saluted me, mostly because the dog on the leash in his hand had a hold of his long-sleeved tee that, I might add, fit him like a glove. “Bossy.”
But he did as I asked, taking the little booger outside.
Ten minutes and some nearly completed dough later, Jessie walked back in with my puppy on his heels.
“He’s smart.”
I looked up from where my hands were buried to my wrists in the dough I was kneading, and nodded. “He really is. I’ve had him less than a day, and through all that time, he’s never once peed or pooped inside the house or my office. And when I tell him to be nice, he instantly stops playing so hard.”
Jessie looked down at the dog.
“That doesn’t mean that the dog isn’t a wolf, though, woman,” Jessie said. “You need to be careful.”
I looked at the playful little puppy. “We’ll see.”
There might be a slight possibility that the dog was, indeed, a wolf. I had found him on the side of the road by the woods, after all. That didn’t mean that I was giving the little thing up, though. He’d been shaking and shivering when I found him, and who knew how long he’d been lying there waiting for someone to help him before I came along.
No, I wouldn’t be letting him go.
“If you’re going to keep him, you need to give him a name.”
I contemplated the little ball of fur and pursed my lips.
“How about Spartan or Paladin?” Linc offered his two cents.
How he could hear us over the loud TV, I didn’t know, but whatever.
“The first one’s not bad. Paladin is kind of a mouthful.”
“Achilles?”
My eyes lit up at Linc’s other suggestion.
“I really like that one,” I cooed, dropping the dough onto the flour dusted counter. “What about you?”
Jessie shrugged. “It’s good.”
My mouth quirked. ‘It’s good’ was the equivalent of ‘I like it a lot’ in Jessie speak.
“It’s settled then,” I grinned, rolling out the dough. “Achilles, it is.”
The rest of dinner went off without a hitch. We all sat down to eat, and I watched my two companions dig into my food, moaning in reaction to the taste and causing me to beam with pride.
I loved that they loved my food. Loved it.
Unfortunately, our night was cut short a few minutes after the last roll was snatched off the pan.
“Shit,” Jessie grumbled, standing up and walking over to his phone.
He picked it up, said a few short words, and then grunted an ‘I’ll be there’ a few moments later.
“Work?” Linc guessed.
Jessie continued to grunt.
“Yeah.”
I got up and cleared the plates, rinsing them off in the sink before doing the same to the other dishes.
With most of them ready to wash, I left them to gather up my things while Jessie got ready.
The moment he was back in the living room, dressed completely in head to toe black, I had my purse in my hand.
“You mind staying here with him? Just in case?” Jessie’s quiet words had me looking up from my nearly dead phone.