Page 47 of A Dye Hard Holiday

“There’s only right now,” he said, but I could hear his gears grinding. “Hey, I brought up your dinner. Do you feel like eating?”

“Not really, but Mom went to the trouble, so I’m going to give it my all.”

“Do you want to eat here or in the sitting area? I can start a fire for you.”

“Oh, a fire sounds nice.” I waggled my eyebrows suggestively.

“Not tonight, you’re in no shape.”

“I could totally still rock your world, Gabe,” I said, sliding from between the sheets.

“I have no doubt, Sunshine,” he said, following me with the tray of food. “Can and should aren’t the same things.”

“You sound so parental.”

“I’m practicing for future conversations with the kids. Is it working?”

“No, I still want you to do me, but I’ll be lucky to stay awake long enough to eat my soup.”

“I’ve never seen you sick before,” Gabe said worriedly.

“I’ll be right as rain in the morning,” I promised him.

Gabe set the tray over my lap, and I smiled when I saw that my mom sent up all the things she fed me when I was sick as a kid. Campbell’s chicken noodle soup, peanut butter and jelly cut diagonally, lime Jell-O, and a bottle of Sprite. “My mommy loves me.”

“She sure does, now dig in while I go check on the babies.”

“Bring them to me,” I hollered after him, which made me cough.

“I planned on it,” Gabe assured me. “I thought we could do story time in here tonight.”

I must’ve been hungrier than I thought because I ate everything on the plate. Maybe that adage about feeding a cold was right, because I felt a little better. I sure as hell breathed better with the “goo” on my chest.

“Daddy! Daddy!” my angels said when Gabe carried them into our room.

He set them down and they tottered their sleepy heads over to where I sat on the sofa.

“I missed you so much today,” I said, holding them to me. I kissed the tops of their heads and breathed in their baby shampoo. “I missed bath time.”

“You missed a doozy too,” Gabe said. An ornery smile crossed his lips and I knew exactly what had happened.

“He said it again, didn’t he?”

“Oh yeah.” Gabe’s lips trembled as he struggled to hold it together. “He got mad when his bath toy was out of reach.”

“Dylan James, did you say that naughty word again?”

Our son shook his head.

“I don’t think I believe you,” I told him. I looked over my shoulder and saw that Gabe was gone. I waited a few seconds then heard the distinct sound of my husband laughing his ass off coming through the baby monitor.

He returned with a stoic look on his face when he rejoined us with a book in his hands.

“That might’ve worked better had you not lost your sh… cool in the nursery with the baby monitor on.”

“Oops,” Gabe said sheepishly.

“Read us our story, Big Daddy.”