Page 80 of Owen

Christ, it’s a big dream, but maybe something I could retrain to do during the evenings and transition into once Poppy goes to school full-time.

You’re getting ahead of yourself. Slow down.

However, it’s the first idea that has excited me, so maybe I need to think about it some more.

My focus right now is looking after Poppy and Jade, and I couldn’t be happier about it, so I’m doing that and letting fate decide what happens next.

Daydreaming and wrapped in my bubble of jumbled thoughts while Jade visits the restrooms inside the taverna, I glance down at Poppy, who is sound asleep in her stroller. Her mouth is open, her thumb hanging out of it.

I place her soft gray rabbit plush toy that she loves on her chest, and she instantly wraps her little arm around it, snuggling in as she goes back to sucking her thumb rapidly.

It’s the cutest sight that has my heart expanding in my chest at the love I feel for this little cherub who isn’t mine by blood but feels like it.

I make a vow to myself to always be there for her, to protect her from whatever life throws her way, and always having her back no matter what life choices she makes.

Jade was right the night we swam around Aphrodite’s Rock. Love is unconditional, this is why I freely give my love to them both, because I know they feel the same about me, regardless of what I have to offer them.

As I rest back in my chair, Jade appears in the doorway and quickly scuttles across to her seat. “We have to go.” Eyes wide in shock, she sounds panicked.

“What? Why? Is everything okay?” On red alert, I sit up straighter in my seat.

“No. Get up, let’s go.” Looking back over her shoulder, she lifts her purse off the table.

“What is—” I don’t have time to finish my question because it’s then I see my mother and father standing in the taverna’s doorway.

Shoving my seat back calmly, I rise to my full height. “What did they say?” I sound calmer than I feel when I push my sunglasses on top of my head, but I’ll be damned if I let them see that their presence has rattled me.

“Oh, you know, they just offered me more money than Iwould know what to do with if I disappear out of your life.” Her eyes dart from me to Poppy to the pathetic excuse of procreators who call themselves my mother and father, standing there poker-faced. “They know everything about me,” she whispers, sounding scared, and she darts her eyes around the outdoor space.

Fuck them. They don’t get to do that to her.

“Take Poppy,” I tell her, never taking my eyes off the doorway. I dig the keys to the jeep out of the pocket of my shorts and hand them to her. “I will meet you at the car.”

“Owen.” Her voice is pleading.

Cupping her face in my hands, I kiss her soft mouth. “I love you and I am not giving in to them. I just need a few minutes to tell them to go to hell and then I will meet you, okay?”

“Promise?”

I draw a cross over my heart. “On Poppy’s life.”

She nods, satisfied with my answer, agreeing to do as I ask.

“How much did they offer you?” The bottled-up nerves in my stomach swirl about like a tornado, but I smile easily as I try to distract Jade from worrying about me.

“Five hundred thousand.”

I roll my eyes and kiss her again. “Assholes, I’m worth at least two million.”

She snorts and snuggles into my shoulder. “Your heart is priceless to me, Owen. I wouldn’t accept anything but your heart.”

“You have it, Hotshot,” I whisper in her ear and side eye my mom and dad, who are watching every move we make.

Yup, get an eyeful, you heartless fuckers, because this is what love looks like.

“And you have mine.”

Jade pushes up onto her tiptoes and closes the small gap ofour height difference and kisses my lips. “Don’t be long.” She narrows her eyes as she shifts her disapproving gaze over at our two voyeurs.

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