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“Fair enough.”

And here was tea.

I loved my family. Wildly so.

“I love you. All of you.” I meant that. Every word. “And now there’s someone else too. Doesn’t mean anything is going to change. I live here. You can’t get rid of me that easily.”

“Reubs here has already called the builder. He’s having the downstairs changed into a games room. Pool table and all that.”

I laughed, because yeah. He was making it all up.

“It’s fine, Dad,” he said. My son. “It’s fine. And we love you too.”

“Good.”

“Also, we’ve had a change of plan. Kids and Reubs are staying put. I’m flying back on Sunday. On my own. Bloody traitors, but it makes sense. Kids can get back to school on day one of the new term, and Reuben has in-person tutoring every day next week. That way, he’ll ace the exam. It’ll be fine.”

“I assume you’ll need me to do the school runs,” I said. I would gladly do that. I needed it. Normality. Routine. The kids’ hands in mine.

“Would that be okay for you?”

“After-school stuff?”

“Gray is making a schedule. Also, Jay has karate on Mondays now, right after Jasmine’s ballet, so it’ll be a bit of a squeeze. We might have to rope Agnes in.”

“We can do that.” I nodded. “Want me to ring her?”

“She likes you.”

“Everyone likes me,” I huffed.

“Especially Dylan.”

“Dylan?” Jasmine questioned, coming up and climbing onto my lap.

“Yes?”

“So he’s not a stranger?”

“No. He’s my boyfriend,” I said, like it was normal, then almost choked myself on my tea.

“You have a boyfriend? That’s cool! I don’t have a boyfriend. I asked Akeem in my class to be my boyfriend, but he said he hates girls.”

“That’s not very nice,” said Gray, swallowing down laughter.

“I’d rather have another boyfriend. I like Harry Styles.”

“Don’t we all?” my son said. “I want to be Harry Styles’s boyfriend.”

This family. I shook my head. Then I hugged my granddaughter and watched Gray do a very bad impersonation of someone called Harry Styles.

Madness. But it was my madness, and I kind of…loved it.

22. Dylan

Aweek later, we were both exhausted, and I was stabbing myself in the cheek with the toothbrush in my hand. A new one. I’d even bought it myself.

Well, small lie. Jean had scheduled a grocery delivery order—a weekly one that was paid for by the contract fee that had been paid into the company account.