Ares flips him off. “Your wife doesn’t scare me. Pay attention and drive. Or else pull over and I’ll drive.”
“Youshouldbe afraid of her,” he says as he rolls his eyes. Sawyer is giggling beside me.
As we get closer to Lake Renegade, Sawyer sits up and looks around.
“We planned on taking a quick drive through town. Unless you want to save that for tomorrow?” Ares asks.
“I’d love to see the town if that’s okay. I’ve been here once, years and years ago. But we never stopped, just got gas and kept going. Could we can do more exploring tomorrow?” Sawyer asks.
“Of course. Our mamas own Precious Rising’s Bakery and Cafe. And there’s a coffee shop coming soon. I think it’s supposed to open in a few months.”
“Anyone we know opening it?” I ask.
“No, just that it is a woman, I think Mam said her name is Riley? Or something like that. She’s from Kentucky and told Mam she just needed a new start and was driving through Lake Renegade,” Lorenzo explains to us.
“Well, we’ve been saying that we needed a coffee shop.”
“We’re excited to see what she does with the place. She went back home to get her things together.”
“Maybe it’ll be ready when we come back to visit next time,” I say as I kiss Sawyer’s head.
“I do like a good cup of coffee. Holy shit. You all live here?” she says as the property comes into view.
“There are four main families here. The Mancinis, Bastianinis, Athanasious and Nikolaidises. And in the middle of all our properties are the campgrounds,” Ares explains to her.
“So the whole town is really yours?”
“Well, the Mancinis are the original owners. Then came the Bastianinis and then Athanasious and Nikolaidises. It’s been quite the expansion of families.” I chuckle.
“And you’re related to the Mancinis?” she asks me.
“Yes. Enea Mancini is married to my antín Graínne, she’s my da’s sister.”
“I love how much history is here and how you know exactly who did what to bring your families together.”
“We can trace our families back at least three generations,” Lorenzo says.
“That’s incredible.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
Sawyer
Emerson’s family makes me wish I had grown up like he did. You can feel the love between all of them. Even though they’re not all blood related, they’re all family. Emerson keeps telling me that they’re mine and River’s family now. But that’s so hard to believe. How can they be mine when they don’t know if things will work out with Emerson and me?
River’s having such a good time with all the kids. But I could see that he was starting to get tired so Emerson and I took him back to the house so we could get him ready for bed.
“But I wanna play,” he grumbles as I get him into his bath.
“You’ll get to play with them tomorrow.”
“You pwomise?” He scrunches up his face.
“Yes, I promise.”
My phone buzzes as I let him play in the water for a few minutes.
Former mother: I hear you’re back in Illinois. You need to come see me
