Page 64 of A Love Most Fatal
“I think you’ll be a good mom,” Nate says. “With Claire and your sisters around, it’d be hard not to be.”
We both lean our heads back against the fabric headboard and I let my eyes flutter shut.
“I do have good sisters,” I agree.
“Well, one good sister,” Nate murmurs. “Mary might scare the baby.”
We huff matching laughs through our noses, and I sink a little farther into the bed, into the night, into the quiet warmth of this moment.
“What about you? I bet you want four.” I can already imagine his kids—frizzy hair and long limbs, and uncoordinated but curious, and smart; probably just perfect.
“Maybe,” he says. “I was an only child and I’ve always wanted a sibling. I’ll teach them things like fractions and card games, and my mom will spoil them rotten.”
I crack my eyes open to look at him. His face is close enough that I can count freckles across his cheeks and the high point of his nose. A very good nose.
He will be a good dad. His kids will have green eyes and they will be too-smart, tiny know-it-alls. He’s made for a quiet, safe life, with a quiet, safe partner.
“Lucky kids,” I blink my eyes closed again and sigh. Nate plucks my mug out of my hands and puts it on the side table and in my drifting state I know he’s about to leave.
“Stay,” I say, and then, because he looks struck dumb by the request, I add, “They might be sick again.”
He doesn’t disagree. There’s nothing left for them to throw up, surely, and even if there was, I could handle it on my own. I can handle any number of things on my own, but I didn’t realize how nice it is, sometimes, to have someone whose job is to handle things with you.
He settles back down beside me, our sides pressed together, and I follow the kids to sleep.
23
VANESSA
James and Ryan Sinclair.
When I said I didn’t care which marriage candidates he invited to dinner, Nate invited James Fucking Sinclair and his rat shit little brother Ryan, and of course because they’re a family of bottom feeders, Ronaldo had to join, and he had to bring his wife to snoop around and make passive aggressive comments regarding my childless status.
I’ve been lucky enough to not see Ronaldo for the last two months since I all but banished him from my front room for trying to pawn his nephew on us, and by some cursed luck, Nate chose James and Ryan to interview first and thought that they were the most reasonable candidates to have for a follow-up dinner.
They’re getting settled at the patio table outside for some appetizers and I must pretend to be pleased about this. Nate stands with his hands in his pockets none the wiser to what he’s just done. It doesn’t matter if we’ve been friendly of late, doesn’t matter that he cleaned my nephew’s vomit off his clothes this weekend—he’s a little goblin man parading as a consigliere in nice clothes with big shoulders and he’s been letting this beardgrow in a way that looks suspiciously handsome, andhe’s invited my least favorite people into my house.
I look at him until I catch his eye and then incline my head towards the kitchen. Once he meanders in behind me, hands still in those damn pockets, I push him not gently into the pantry, the automatic light clicking on over our heads.
“Get your hands out of your pockets, you look stupid,” I say. He does as I say, looking wounded, and I would consider telling him I didn’t mean it if I wasn’t so angry. “What the hell are they doing here?”
“You said to invite someone for dinner,” he says. “Two people. I invited two people.”
“What made you choose them?!”
“I didn’t have a lot of great options, Vanessa, it was them, the creepy mortician or the man old enough to be your father!” Nate whisper shouts. “How was I supposed to know you hated them more than the others?”
“Maybe by the way I’d drawn violent X’s next to their names?”
“The one with the beard seems harmless, just stupid. I thought you were fine with stupid!”
He’s right. Ryan Sinclair is stupid, but he’s also a Sinclair and I would rather put needles into my toes than have anyone think I’m considering him or his brother as a romantic possibility.
God, Ronaldo must feel so smug about this!
The pantry door swings open revealing my mother, who’s got fury in her eyes. It makes me stand up straighter; it doesn’t matter how old I am, that expression andVanessa Gloriana Morellion the tip of her tongue still terrifies me.
“Is there a reason you are hiding from our guests?” she asks.