Page 6 of When We Were More (Aron Falls #1)

H enry

The alarm on my phone blares an obnoxious tune, reminding me it’s time to get up.

I groan and roll out of bed. Layla and Lena are still asleep, warm and cozy in their beds.

Mornings in the house are quiet. A yawn escapes me.

I guess that’s what I should expect when I get up at five a.m. to get paperwork done before the kids are up.

Being a single dad is hard. I seriously am in awe that so many people manage to do this alone, especially with a limited supply of money.

Luckily, my financial situation is very secure.

When I expanded Dad’s original carpentry business, Aron Builders, and brought my brothers on, it was a risk for all of us. What if it failed? Luckily, it didn’t.

In fact, it’s been a huge success. The offshoot of our family business took off in the western US about eighteen months ago, and the money it brings in is almost shocking. Who knew there was such a market for luxury log homes and conference centers?

Add in the tremendous income from one small invention I can hold in my hand: A simple yet specialized hinge that I envisioned, and Holden and Hayden helped design. Then Harrison handled all the legal aspects—patents, contracts—and we’re financially secure for the rest of our lives.

It’s all been very lucrative. So much so that my brothers and I could all retire today as multi-millionaires several times over. Not that we’d want to—we love it. What could be better than working with my best friends? If said friends happen also to be my brothers, that’s even more awesome.

I can easily afford a nanny to watch the kids here at the house when I’m at work, and I’m grateful as hell for that. Sally may be in her late sixties, but she raised five kids, and she’s still as spry as someone twenty years younger. On top of that, the girls love her.

She’s told me a million times she’s willing to be here to get them ready in the mornings, but I like to do that part. They’re both especially cuddly when they first wake up, and I wouldn’t want to miss that.

I get to the kitchen and make quick work brewing a pot of coffee.

One thing I miss now that I have kids is freshly ground coffee beans to make my morning coffee with.

But any parent who has tried to grind coffee beans at 5 a.m. knows that’s a mistake—a colossal mistake.

In minutes, your serene morning will become chaotic as every child in the house awakens and is likely crabby.

But hey, grinding your beans the night before is a small price to pay for the joy these two bring to my life.

My path to being a single father of two may be a bit unconventional—and certainly nothing I anticipated—but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I’d die for either one of my princesses.

I lean back against the counter in my small kitchen while I wait for the coffee to brew and glance around my cabin.

This place holds immense meaning for me, even though it’s smallish at twelve-hundred square feet.

I recognize its size is limiting, but the addition I’m planning for the back will make a huge difference.

Jeana, my ex-wife, used to say it’s “too rustic.” She hated living here. I promised her I’d make it something she loved, too, but she wanted out. Out of this house, and apparently, out of our lives.

My parents bought this cabin—a “rickety little shack ready to fall down,” according to Mom—and the acres of land it sits on shortly after they married.

Being a carpenter himself, Dad was able to make the cabin safe to dwell in during weekend ‘boys only’ fishing trips or family camping trips.

I can still smell the burning of a campfire when I think back to us five boys, our mom, and our dad sitting around the fire.

We’d listen with rapt attention as Dad described all the amazing things he was going to do to turn that little shack into Mom’s dream home.

One they would move into after they retired.

That never happened. Dad paid off the mortgage on the property after twenty-one years, and he was gone six months later. Mom never got her dream.

I jump when the coffeemaker beeps, but I’m grateful for it pulling me out of the trip down memory lane. The memories start out pleasant, but they take a nasty turn if I let them go too far.

I pour a cup of coffee and grab a high-protein, low-carb yogurt from the refrigerator for breakfast. Then, I walk to the back of the house, to the tiny, makeshift office I created from what used to be a mudroom.

A mudroom I could use right now, since Layla is into running around outside in the rain.

I grab the stack of contracts I’ve been promising Harrison that I’d review for a week. He’s the attorney. Why he thinks I would object to anything he’s signed off on is beyond me. Still, he insists I see anything that affects the operations and expansion of the company.

I grab a pen and a sticky note and jot a reminder to myself to start looking at getting Harrison some help.

All the legal and business aspects of our company are a lot and becoming more than he can handle on his own with the growth of our business.

He insists he’s fine, but his grumpy ass is full of it.

I handle all the operations and oversight of construction, codes, and inspections.

The twins, Holden and Hayden, are our resident brainiacs with their structural engineering and architectural skills.

Only our youngest brother, Heath, isn’t full time with Aron Family Builders she wasn’t even one when Jeana left and won’t remember her.

Layla, though, was four and a half, and sometimes, I wake up, hearing her crying for her mother in her sleep.

That’s fucking soul crushing. Especially because mothering didn’t seem to come naturally to Jeana, so what mothering she did do for Layla was minimal.

How do you explain to a child that age that their mom signed away all rights to them and left?

It’s been fourteen months. Fourteen long ass months and not a single word since the legal proceedings became final. Who does that? I’m glad I have full custody, and when I look at my princesses, I can’t conceive how anyone could ever choose to leave them.

I never will, not by choice. I glance down at the last drops of coffee in my cup and the empty yogurt container. Sometimes we don’t have a choice, though. That’s what scares me more than anything.