17
Andy
Jordan’s kneehad been bouncing for the last ten miles, and given that we were only about twenty minutes from my mom’s place, I figured a distraction might help. Ideally, I would pull over and spank him until he calmed down, but we were stuck on the freeway, so that wasn’t an option.
He was nervous about meeting everyone—not that he’d admitted it, but I knew enough about my boy to recognize the signs and he’d been fiddling with his ear something fierce all week—so I thought that giving him a sneak peek at some of my sisters’ antics might make him feel a little more comfortable once he met them in person.
“Can you grab my phone?” I asked, glancing over at him. “I want you to take a look at something in the chat thread with Kate and Lizzie.”
He took my phone out of its holder in the center console, but just tapped it against his thigh instead of waking it up, throwing me a nervous look. “Can it wait until we get there?”
I grinned. “No. I guarantee that the minute we get there, you’re going to be mobbed. My family is excited to meet you.”
“Shit—” Jordan started.
“Language,” I said automatically.
“Fine,sugar,” he snapped. “But seriously, dude, I hope you haven’t oversold me. There’s no way they should be that excited to meet me.”
Yep, someone was nervous.
Even with my eyes on the road, I could still see him fidgeting in my peripheral vision. He adjusted the hat he was wearing—a backwards baseball cap—then drummed his fingers on the back of my phone for a second, then reached up to twist his earring. And... God, I wasn’t falling for him. I had fallen, chronic insecurities and all.
“There’s no such thing as overselling with you, Jordan,” I said, turning my head to wink at him real quick. “Besides, I’m sure the girls have made everyone watch your videos, so they already know you’re pretty incredible.”
He rolled his eyes, his cheeks pinking up. “Dude, whatever.”
I grinned. “Just wait until Lizzie and Kate start fangirling over you.”
“Fangirling? You know that’s going to be weird, right?”
“No, the weird part should be knowing that both my sisters think you’re hot.”
“Dude, Iamhot.”
“I know,” I said, which just made his knee bounce harder. Then, after a minute—
“So… what?” he asked. “You’re just going to keep letting me get away with that shit?”
I frowned, confused. “With what? Cursing?”
“That too, but I just called you ‘dude’ three times,” he said, sounding like he was probably pouting.
“You did,” I confirmed, glancing over to check my pouting theory. Yep. Adorable. No wonder I’d never been able to make a go of it with other guys. I clearly needed a needy boy.
“So we’re done with ‘it’s Daddy, not dude’ now?” he asked, dropping his voice low for the part that was supposed to sound like me. Then, under his breath, he mumbled, “So much for ‘permanent.’”
I reached over and squeezed his bouncing knee, helping it stay still for a minute. I hated the feeling of letting him down. I figured only time would eventually convince him he didn’t have to be insecure about things ending between us, but I still wished I could transfer all the certainty in my heart straight into his, so I could save him from panicking like this… although maybe that was just my vanilla roots showing? Was I supposed to give him hard and fast rules? Would those make him feel more secure? I was pretty sure I’d read about that, but I was still finding my way when it came to matching up this whole “Daddy” dynamic with what my boy actually needed.
“You know I’d rather hear ‘Daddy,’ petal,” I said, hoping I was getting it right. “But I want you to call me whatever you’re comfortable with while we’re around my family.”
The Daddy part of our relationship wasn’t their business, as far as I was concerned… but if Jordan slipped and called me that in front of them I had no problem with that, either.
Awkward? Probably.
Worth it, for him? Definitely.
“Dude,” he said, placing extra emphasis on the word as he made an exaggerated show of peering around the car. “I don’t see any family around here right now, do you? And you still don’t give a shit if I call you Daddy or not?”
