This. This is what I’ve always dreamed about having.
My family.
My Wolf.
My Little Tulip.
Chapter thirty-four
Emma
Hockey players and kiddie slides.
Most of the party guests have left by now, and all that remains are our close friends and family. We still have the place fully reserved for another hour, so we’re letting Dante and Gracie run freely as we pick up and take down the decorations.
Gracie is still too small to go up in the bigger structures, so she’s been having a blast in the toddler zone and ball pit with my dad and Amanda. Dante, on the other hand, appears to be some super monkey that climbs everywhere he can. He’s been making Silas run around all over the place.
Actually, that’s not entirely true. Once the place cleared out, the boys decided it was their turn to have fun and are now going through every module they can like they aren’t full-grown men.Using the excuse that theyallneed to follow Dante to make sure he doesn’t hurt himself.
“So when are we expecting our next grandchild, doll?” Andrew, Greyson’s dad, asks when I start cleaning around the table he and his wife are stationed at.
Nancy slaps him in the chest. “Leave the poor girl alone. She already has a little girl and a grown man who thinks he’s a baby to take care of. She doesn’t need another one right away.” She nods her head toward Greyson, who’s coming down a tubed slide that looks to be a really tight squeeze.
“Oh please, Nance. Those two go at it like rabbits, a broken condom is bound to happen. Why do you think he calls her Bunny?” Andrew retorts.
“Oh God, that isnotwhy he calls me that!” I gasp as a blush takes over my cheeks.
“Sure, sure. And you call our son what again? Wolf, right? You know, I wasn’t born yesterday? I know a thing or two about role-play. In fact, Nancy and I often venture into that kink.”
“That’s enough, Andrew!” She slaps him in the back of the head this time while he laughs.
“And that’s my cue to go!” I say at the same time with wide eyes, shaking my head with a giggle as I turn around.
Andrew is something else. Whatever he thinks, he says. Don’t get me wrong, I love jumping into his jokes, but even for me they can get a little too uncomfortable at times. I wonder what it was like for Grey and Aubrey growing up. Must have been something worth seeing.
I find Ronnie sitting by herself looking out at the guys. She’s been quiet ever since the whole Noah and Gabe thing, which isn’t like her at all. “You okay, babe?”
She looks up at me and forces a smile. “Yup, all good. I just hate when men think they can take whatever they want without asking.” She grinds her teeth like there’s more meaning hidingbehind her words. Sometimes I question what Ronnie’s story is. She never talks about her past and changes the subject every time we ask.
“I know Gabe and Noah are a lot to handle and can be pretty inappropriate at times. But they really are good guys deep down. I’m sure if you put your foot down and told them to back off for real, they would.” I place my hand on her bicep, giving a light squeeze.
She sighs and looks down at the phone in her hands. “Yeah, I know.”
“Minnie…”We both look up to the playground in search of Silas’s strange voice.
Ronnie and I walk over to the rest of the girls as Cecilia looks around for her husband with a worried expression. “Honey?”
“Minnie!” he shouts louder, sounding distraught.
Cecilia gets up from her seat and walks closer to the modules, panic flaring to life in her eyes as she looks frantically around for her son and husband. “Silas? Where are you? Where’s Dante?”
Suddenly a little dark-haired boy comes out from the bottom of a circular tubed slide. Cecilia rushes over, kneeling before him and pressing his head into her chest as she kisses his crown. “Oh, my baby. You had me worried there for a second. Where’s your daddy? Silas, honey?”
“I think… I think I’m stuck,” he finally says in defeat after a few seconds.
Cecilia bends at the bottom of the slide, trying to look up. It’s one of those big ones that loops around multiple times, so depending on where he’s stuck, we won’t be able to see him. A normal adult-sized human would fit no problem, but Silas is anything but normal-sized.
At six foot four and widely built, he definitely never should have gone down that slide. Actually, come to think of it, that’sthe same one Grey came down from earlier. The one I wasn’t sure he’d make it out of.
