He stares down into my eyes, his smile fading. “You really don’t want to work on a national campaign like that?”
“No.”
Clouds fill his sweet green eyes. “I…I mean, if you wanted to—”
Ikisshim. Not just a peck or a brush of lips. I usually try not tokisshim like this at work, because we both end up with pink in our cheeks from stubble rubbing, our lips red and swollen. Only when I feel his entire body trying to sink into mine do I finally end thekiss.
I cup his face in my hands. “Owen,” I gently say, wanting him to know how serious I am, “I loveyou. Do I enjoy the game of politics? Sure. But what I’m going to enjoy even more is sitting at the breakfast table with you and reading the morning paper, or kicking back on the couch with you and the boys and watching movies. Or taking a school day off and after we drop the boys off, taking you home, and we fuck each other over every piece of furniture we own.”
He sweetly smiles, but I’m not done.
“I followyou,” I say, trying not to get choked up. “If you told me you wanted to run for the Senate, or the House, or for POTUS, then yeah, we’d be doing it. We’re dads now. I’m with you that I can’t wait to be a full-time dad. You know as well as I do that we don’thaveto go back to work, if we don’t want to. We can sell your house and quit pretending.”
“What about Susa? The campaign?”
I shrug. “We wait to sell the house until after she’s re-elected. Doesn’t matter, because you have the townhouse, and we technically will be living in Tallahassee. If anyone asks, we say you didn’t like having to do the upkeep of a home, and you stay in one of our spare bedrooms when you need to be in Tampa. You’re the former governor at that point. No one will care.”
In my mind is a photo-shoot from a couple of weeks ago. I haven’t shown him the proofs yet, but they’re heartbreakingly adorable. Some formal shots, of course, but a few of me and Susa in the background, with Owen rolling around on the grass at the mansion with Tom and Pete, his sleeves rolled up and tie off, all three of them laughing.
They’ve also sent me the proof of the article that will accompany it, and the headline isHe’s Florida’s Most Eligible and Adorable Godfather.
I’m sure that will make Owen a little uncomfortable, the eligible part, but that’s on me. I asked the writer to drop subtle hints that Owen’s single, despite what we told the senator. I also told the writer why, that Owendoeshave a partner—and again I didn’t hint one way or the other regarding gender—and intimated that they could lose their sensitive job in a very specialized sector if public scrutiny is turned their way at this time.
Technically, none of that is a lie.
In return, I promised the writer an exclusive with Susa and I ahead of the election, a candid sit-down and photos, the whole nine yards, as well as another after the election, win or lose.
They were happy to agree to those terms.
It’s not like this is a Pulitzer kind of article, either. This isn’t deep background for Woodward and Bernstein. This is little more than a PR puff piece, and both the writer and I know it. It’s designed to sell issues on the newsstand, to catch the eyes of people standing in line with their Publix chicken dinners on their way home from work. Period.
But having an exclusive with Susa and I would help focus extra eyeballs on their cover, and they know it. They’re not stupid.
Hands wash hands.
It also means Owen will grumble in private about all the renewed love letters he’ll start receiving.
They’ll ease up. They always flood in after one of these kinds of articles, and ease up after several weeks.
Besides, in three months, he gets to change jobs and do what he really wants to do—
Be a full-time dad.
It’ll be so good having my boy back.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Election Night
We are, not-so-coincidentally, occupying the same set of suites we have on all of Owen’s election nights. We’re also surrounded by many of the same people who were here for us on most of Owen’s campaigns.
Owen is too focused on taking care of Tommy and Petey to feel nervous tonight, thankfully. It also helps that it’s not his head on the block. He can actually enjoy tonight, because either way, his job ends in January, and the next chapter of his life starts.
Being a full-time dad, even if no one knows that but the three of us.
Well, and Dray and Gregory and Ethan.
Susa stands in front of the TV in the suite’s living room and stares at WFLA’s early election results rolling in when most of the state’s polls close at seven. I watch her from the side, and she’s focused, intent, a stoked boiler close to exploding. Without thinking about it, she starts nervously chewing on her right thumbnail.
