“Now?”
“Just like this.”
“I’ll put my shirt back on.”
“No. Unless you’re breaking some Navy rule.” Shiloh was already up. Her camera was in the living room. She checked that there was film, then stood by her chair. “Go back to eating.”
“No.”
“Just hold your fork. Look natural.”
He picked up his fork. He lowered his eyebrows.
“You look really handsome,” she said. “You look vivid.”
He smiled a little, and she took a photo.
“Take one of us together,” he said.
“How?”
“Sit in my lap.”
“I’m too tall to sit in your lap.”
“No you’re not.”
She walked over to him, and he pulled her down with his arms around her waist.
Shiloh sat on his lap and tilted her head against his, holding out the camera facing them. She took photos with the kids like this sometimes; she thought of it as a single-parent skill. “I’m going to take a lot because these probably won’t turn out.”
She did.
When Shiloh stood up, Cary’s hands trailed after her. She sat back down in her chair, but she scooted closer to him.
“I think my mom thinks you’re still married,” he said. “Otherwise she’d have her eye on you.”
“Oh, I’m sure she’d rather you marry someone who didn’t already have kids.”
“That would be hypocritical of her.”
“Mothers are inherently hypocritical. ‘Do as I say,’ every one of us.” Shiloh took a bite of her chicken-fried chicken and smiled at him. “I still can’t believe how lucky I am to have caught you in costume. Can I try on your hat?”
Cary looked amused. “Why do girls always want to try on the cap?”
“What girls?”
“Girls in bars. They think it’s sexy.”
“Isit?” she asked.
His cheek dimpled. “Sometimes.”
“Girls inbars...” Shiloh said, looking down at her salad and picking up a fork. “Never mind. I am never trying on your hat.”
“It’s called a cap. Or a cover.”
“Hmm,” she said, still thinking about Cary in a bar, looking like Tom Cruise inTop Gun.
