No, sad is not the right word. She’s worried. I can see it plain as day, but she has no reason to be. He loves her, and to Camden, she is his mother. The only one he remembers. She’s in that role in his life, and I truly hope she’s willing to keep it for the rest of it.
“I never—” She swallows hard. “I didn’t tell him to call me that, Baker. I promise you. I wouldn’t. I’m sorry,” she says, her voice cracking.
“Mommy, Swoan sad?” Camden asks, picking up on her tears.
Sloane’s panicked eyes find mine, and I quickly distract my boy. “Hey, buddy, I bet you can’t build a super tall tower with those blocks.” I point to the tub of blocks in the corner. “Can you make a tower as tall as you?” I ask, holding out my arm to show him how tall he needs to build it.
Camden looks at Sloane, and she smiles, wiping at her cheeks. “I know you can do it,” she encourages.
“Cam can do it.” He moves off her lap, like all he needed was for her to tell him that he could, and rushes to the tub of blocks and starts mumbling to himself and building his tower.
“I’m so sorry,” Sloane says again, and I’m on the move. Standing, I pull the coffee table closer to her and sit on it so that we’re eye to eye. Reaching out, I take her hand in mine, lacing our fingers together.
“Baby, you have nothing to be sorry for.” I pause, trying to collect my thoughts. “Before you, this house was quiet. Sure, we laughed, and we made noise, but what I mean is, the feeling of the house was bare. It was just four walls that protected us from the weather, a place for us to house our things and lay our heads to sleep at night.”
“I love this house,” she says, wiping at her silent tears that are still coating her cheeks.
“The day you offered to help me changed that. From the first day, things started to brighten. This place was more than just walls and floors. It was becoming a home. A home that I look forward to coming home to every damn day. A home that I crave like nothing I’ve ever craved before, every time that I’m away.
“You made this house a home. Your presence, your love, and your laughter. You breathed life into us, into me. You fill a void in my life. In our lives. One we didn’t know we were missing, not until you showed us. The world makes sense with you here with us. This is where you belong,” I tell her.
“Baker.” Her eyes soften.
“Baby, he loves you. I love you, Sloane. You are the best thing that’s ever happened to us. I know I’m a single dad, and my son just dropped a huge bomb on your life, but kids are honest, and to Cam, you’re his mommy.” I swallow hard. “I know it’s a lot of pressure, and please don’t feel obligated to let him call you that, but, baby, I see you as his mom, too.”
Her mouth falls open.
“We lost Natasha, and while she wasn’t giving him lots of her time, I feel like she loved him in her own way. She gave him life, and for that, I will forever be grateful. I’ll never speak ill of her, and he’ll never know the way she pushed him out of her life. There’s no need. She’s gone, far too soon, and he’s already going to be sad that he missed knowing her, remembering her. There are hardly any pictures of the two of them together, but I still want him to know about her. Know that the mommy who gave him life lives on in heaven.”
Lifting her hand to my lips, I kiss her knuckles. “One day, whether that’s now or years from now, I hope you’ll be ready to be his mom. The one who reads him five books when he’s fighting sleep, the one who kisses his boo-boos, the one who holds him for hours when he’s not feeling well and just wants to be close to you. He chose you, Sloane. And I choose you.” Her lip quivers through her teary smile.
Moving to the couch, I pull her into my lap and wrap my arms around her waist. “I love you, Sloane Peterson. I love your spirit. I love your heart. I love the way you love my son, and I love the way you love me.” I let my words hang in the air. I don’t know how much time has passed. It feels like a century, but eventually, she turns to look at me.
“I’ve wanted to tell you for so long, but I held back. I don’t even know why I did it, but now it feels silly. My life was good. I loved my job, and I had a great group of friends.” She smiles at me. “When my job was eliminated, I panicked. I offered to help you because I wanted to help you, but it was also to help me. The idea of spending my days with Cam was so much better than a dingy bar on Broadway downtown, with drunks grabbing my behind all night.”
“Fuck that,” I mutter under my breath.
“I thought I’d work for you, help you maybe through the season, and then go back to teaching, if I was lucky enough to find another position close to home. That’s what I got, but I got so much more. I got a man who loves with his entire being. Who’s kind and gentle and is the best daddy. I got a man who took his time getting to know me, then showed me, through his actions, what it means to be cherished. To be wanted.”
“I do cherish you, baby. I want you here with us.”
She nods. “I freaked out when Cam called me mommy because I didn’t know how you would react. It’s been a tough year, losing Natasha so tragically, and I’d never want to replace her, but, Baker, that little boy, he already owns half of my heart, and hearing him call me mommy is one of the greatest gifts of my life.”
“And the other half?” I ask her. I know the answer. I see it in her eyes every day. Feel it in every touch and hear it in every word, even when she’s not saying it. But I need to listen to her say it now.
“The other half is yours,” she whispers. She pulls in a deep breath, straightens her spine the best she can since she’s sitting on my lap, and says those three words that seal her fate. Three words that bind us together for the rest of eternity. “I love you, Baker. With all of my heart.”
“Daddy! Mommy! Wook!” Camden announces loudly.
We both turn to see his tower. “Wow, bud, that’s so tall,” I praise.
“Great job, Cam,” Sloane says, and while he seems satisfied at my approval of his tower, he preens under Sloane's.
“Should I tell him to stop?” I ask her. She turns back to me. “If we let him call me that, it’s gotta be forever, Baker. We can’t give him that love and then tear it away from him.”
“Baby, your fate is sealed. You're ours now. You’re his mom, and you’ll be the mother of his siblings. This is forever, Sloane. No way in hell am I letting you go now that I’ve found you. But if you’re not ready, I can slow this train down.”
“No. Don’t slow it down.” She smiles as her eyes shimmer with fresh tears.
