The Last Letter(118)

“Hiya, Maisie-girl,” I said and hugged her with my free arm. “How was school?”

“Good! I aced another spelling pretest.”

“Aren’t you just the smarty-pants?” I placed a kiss on the top of her head as we walked up to the porch. “What about you, Colt?”

“I did not,” Colt answered as he pushed his way in to hug me.

“Just a pretest, my man. We’ll study, okay?”

He nodded and got the door open for us.

“I come bearing food!” I bellowed.

“Ah, the hunter-gatherer returns,” Ella said with a smile as she came out of her office. “Good day?”

“It is now.” My eyes swept down her white sundress, noting her tanned skin, curled hair, and mile-long legs. Damn, I missed her body. Missed the way she gasped in my ear, the way her back arched when I was inside her, the way we lost ourselves to each other. But we weren’t there yet, so I told my dick to settle down and took the pizzas to the kitchen. “That’s a beautiful dress. Anything going on?”

She’d been dressing up a little more lately. With Maisie going in for scans every week, then every other week, Ella had more time for herself, and it showed. Her skin glowed, her eyes were bright, and those were definitely not Yeti legs.

“Oh, well, David Robins did ask me out for tonight.” She ran her hand down my arm and gave me a wide-eyed, way-too-innocent-to-be-serious bat of her lashes. Holy shit, was she actually flirting with me?

Now I was equal parts amused, aroused, and jealous as hell.

I didn’t miss her little grin as the boxes slid from my hands onto the counter, but I caught them before dinner ended up on the hardwood floor. Oh yeah, my girl was teasing me.

Robins had asked her out every month since we’d broken up. Pretty soon I was going to show up at his house and ask him out with my fist. Stupid pretty boy.

“Oh?” I tried to ask all nonchalant after I stopped fumbling with the boxes.

“Well, I know Jennifer Bennington asked you out when you had lunch with the kids today. She’s been after you since…what, the dawn of time?” She switched sides, running her hand along the small of my back before she looked up at me with a knowing little smirk. She never touched me this much. I didn’t know what had gotten into her, but I’d take it.

“Don’t poke the bear. You know I told her no today. Just like I tell her no every other time and will continue to tell her no.”

She tugged on her bottom lip with her teeth and gave me a look I hadn’t seen in seven months. That look was going to get her on this counter in about ten seconds if she didn’t watch it.

“Ella?”

“What?” She danced around the other side of the island.

“Did you just twirl?” Something was up.

“Maybe. I’m in a good mood.”

“Apparently.” I grabbed four plates out of the cabinet. “So I’m guessing you’re not eating with us,” I teased, wanting to see how far she’d go with it.

“Why did you tell her no?” Ella asked, sliding up next to me. Her hair was loose down her back, and my fingers itched to weave through it and feel the strands against my skin.

“You know why.” Yeah, we were good, but she was killing me. Slowly. Torturously. She looked up at me, so damn beautiful that my breath caught. I checked to make sure the kids were still outside before giving her a look of my own. “Because I’m still in love with you.”

I told her at least once a week, let her know that I wasn’t just in this for the kids. Warned her that I wasn’t going anywhere, that our friendship was great, but I was coming after her heart. I was trying out that whole blatant honesty thing.

Her lips parted, and if this had been eight months ago, I would have kissed her. Would have done a hell of a lot more than kiss her once the kids went to bed. But it wasn’t eight months ago, it was now.

“Well, I told David no, too.” She smiled and spun away.

“And what was your reasoning?” Shit, now I was smiling, too. The woman drove me insane, but yeah, I still loved her with every bone in my body. How could I not?

“You, of course. We have dinner plans, right?” she said from the edge of the kitchen headed for the front door.

It wasn’t a declaration of love. I hadn’t had one of those from her since the night we’d agreed to co-parent. But I was nothing if not patient.

“Dinner!” she called out after opening the door, and there was a rumpus of feet, both two-legged and four-legged.

“I’ve got Havoc!” Colt grabbed her food and filled her dish.

Maisie took plates full of pizza to our respective places at the table. As I watched everyone take their seats and Ella put a glass of sweet tea at the top of my plate, I realized nothing had really changed in our relationship except the physical aspect.

She was still my first phone call when something went right.

I was still the one she leaned on when things went wrong.

She was at my side when I’d found out another member of my unit had died last month.

We still sat in the same places at the table.

I carried in Ella’s plate and put it in front of her.

“Can I say grace?” Maisie asked as I sat.

“It’s all yours.” We joined hands—mine with Ella and Maisie, and Colt directly across from me—and bowed our heads.