He looks at me, excitement in his eyes. “Is that you, Mr. Townsend? Do you really have horses?”
I push out the breath I’d been holding on a laugh.
“I sure do,” I reply. “Tomorrow night you’ll get to meet some of them,” I tell him. “Maybe if your mom says you’ve been a good boy, you can ride them during our neighborhood Christmas celebration.”
“Can I, Mom?” He jumps up and down on his tiptoes.
“We’ll see,” Shanice says, rising to her feet, her face appearing relieved.
“How about we start with dinner?” I ask.
“I’ll grab the bread pudding,” Meghan declares from behind her sister before scurrying off to the kitchen.
I turn to Ellyn, taking her hand into mine and kissing the outside of her palm. “Looks like we do get to spend Christmas Eve together.”
She squeezes my waist in a brief hug and tilts her head back so that I can press a brief kiss to her lips before she releases me.
Within the next ten minutes, Parker comes running up to us, greeting Ellyn before taking her by the hand.
“I knew you would come. I told you, Mommy,” she tells Savannah.
Savannah swats Parker away and moves in to embrace Ellyn, her two daughters, and Randy and baby Charlotte.
Needless to say, they’re all greeted warmly, and Jodi and Meghan take a special liking to one another. We all eat dinner and talk while laughing at Amelia and Charlotte who look on at one another like anomalies.
After about a half an hour, it’s as if they’ve processed that the other is a baby, just like them, and they begin laughing and playing with one another. Especially when someone turns on Ms. Rachel.
“Ms. Ellyn, can you tell us how you knew you were in love with Dad?” Savannah asks, looking between Ellyn and me with a gleam in her eyes.
“Yeah, Mom. You never told us about the moment you knew,” Meghan says before popping an olive into her mouth. “Because for the past few years you kept telling me there was no chance of you falling in love again,” she adds.
“Meghan, hush up,” Ellyn chides, making all of us laugh.
“She is kind of right, Mom,” Shanice, who mostly remained silent throughout dinner, adds.
“Yeah, you never shared with me what it was either,” I goad.
Gasping, Ellyn tightens her hand on my thigh. “You’re teaming up with them, too? Against me?”
I shrug and chuckle, but then lean in and kiss her. “I’ll tell you when I knew if you tell me when you knew.”
The entire table cheers and urges us on.
Ellyn rolls her eyes playfully.
“He knew my favorite cake,” she says, looking at everyone before turning back to face me. “The moment you placed that slice of coconut cake in front of me on our first date.”
“Wow, your first date?” Jodi asks. “That’s early. How about you, Joel?”
“The moment I picked you off of that bathroom floor,” I confess.
Ellyn’s eyes widen. “You’re lying.”
I shake my head. “I was halfway there the moment you argued with me from your front lawn about not putting decorations up for Christmas.”
She groans. “Yeah, well, we all see how well that turned out.”
I chuckle along with the rest of the table.
