Page 171 of With Us

“It’s worse?”

He nodded. “When he’d stopped at the convenience mart, he’d picked up around thirty boxes of mac and cheese. The cartoon shape kind. He’d cooked almost all of it, and that’s what he’d put the cheese in. Faust was angrier thathischeese had been mixed with fluorescent orange powder cheese.”

By the end of the story, everyone was laughing, Luc included.

“It was an innocent, and drunken, mistake,” he said. “But since then, I haven’t been allowed to eat his food.”

“You basically ate his baby,” Julie pointed out.

“Speaking of babies,” Mar said loudly, cutting everyone’s laughter. “Uncle Theo, are you and Dahlia having a baby?”

Expectant eyes turned toward us. Even with a quick glimpse, I could see the excited anticipation in Rachelle’s.

“No,” I rushed out, not wanting to give anyone a false sense of hope. “No babies here.”

“I fucking wish,” Theo muttered next to me, earning an elbow to the rib. If his mother’s squeal of delight was any indication, she’d heard his comment. I elbowed him again.

Gabe looked at his daughter. “Mariangela, what would make you ask that sort of thing?”

Mar sat a little taller, her focus on me. More specifically, my stomach.

She wasn’t the only one inspecting and analyzing the area. Since my sweater dress was form fitting, it was easy to see there was no Amato turkey in my oven.

“I asked you a question,” Gabe said, using his ‘dad voice’.

Mar slumped back. “Beth said that if a man and woman kiss, she’ll have a baby. And Uncle Theo and Dahlia kiss all the time. And he’s always touching her butt. I thought maybe that was to make sure the baby didn’t fall out.”

Ignoring the laughter and comments, Gabe looked at Tina. “Looks like you need to bumpthe talkup a couple years.”

“And while I’m at it,” she said, “I’m adding in a talk with Beth’s mother.”

As conversation moved off babies and onto other embarrassing kid antics, Theo wrapped his arm around my shoulder and pulled me close. He turned his head, his lips right near my ear as he whispered, “Maybe soon, my gattina.”

Yup, definitely feels like a real family holiday.

Chapter Twenty-Four

A Bull and a Dancer

Dahlia

Flesh hitting flesh.

Every time was harder than the last.

The smell of dust and sweat clung in the air, coating everything. Everyone.

Dim lighting made it hard to see unless you were right under the strategically placed lights.

The ground and walls seemed to rumble and vibrate from the noise.

The roar of the crowd.

The scream of the victor.

Or maybe it was my own scream.

With one hand on my hip and the other behind my head, Theo had me pressed against the wall. His cock slammed into me, over and over until my moans drowned out the noises of the fight on the other side of the wall. I came hard and fast, clawing at his back and biting his shoulder to keep from screaming.

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