Page 60 of Small-Town Secrets
Laurence's eyes shone with unspoken emotion. "Thank you."
"You don't need to thank me." I was only trying to fumble my way through this new situation and holding on to the few things I knew for facts. Fact one, Laurence and the twins were under my protection now. "I'm gonna go set up that playdate."
"You do that." Laurence kissed the corner of my mouth before he let me go. "I'll check up on the twins."
I watched him walk out of the kitchen with a smile on his face. He seemed so confident about my ability to build a relationship with our boys.
I hoped his optimism wasn't wasted.
27
Laurence
Ikepta close eye on my boys when Maddie came over to play that afternoon. It wasn't a given that Chris and Tyler would get along with the girl, cousin or not. The two of them had a tendency to start fights wherever they went, either by refusing to go along with the rules or by saying things that weren't kind.
They could be sweet, but only when they wanted to be. I'd kind of hoped that once they lived in a more stable environment, the number of times they lashed out would go down.
I hadn't heard any complaints from the school recently, so maybe...
I held on to hope as I watched the three children play outside.
Aaron had suggested they build a snowman, and so far, things were going moderately well. There'd been a short skirmish when both Tyler and Chris wanted to form the head, but, to my surprise, they'd listened fairly well when Aaron told them to cut it out and gave that job to Maddie instead.
They made unhappy faces, sure, but they didn't argue. And Aaron worried that he couldn't parent, what a joke. Parenting wasn't about letting your kids run all over you, and I was glad he was putting some sensible boundaries in place. He seemed to be a natural at it, but that didn't surprise me. He'd always been the leader of his own pack.
There was another tense moment when Tyler decided to throw a snowball at Maddie as she was rolling the snowman's head, but the girl only laughed and returned fire. Tyler stared at her flabbergasted when he was hit with a snowball in the face. He turned to look at me, but I only gave him a shrug. He shouldn't dish it out if he couldn't take it.
"That's what you get for starting a snowball fight," I told him.
"Snowball fight!" Maddie cried and took another shot at my son, this time hitting his backside. Then she got hit by Chris. I chuckled. So my boys could work together after all. It only took a few seconds for Aaron's backyard to erupt into a full-scale snowball war. Even my alpha and I got drawn into it, though we refused to take sides.
Most of the time, I wasn't even sure what sides there were, to be honest.
Once we were all thoroughly snowballed and frozen to the bones, we went back inside for hot cocoa. All in all, I felt it was a pretty successful evening.
I was fairly content with my life until I tugged the twins into bed later that night. I gave Tyler a kiss goodnight and then rounded the bed to give one to Chris too when he reminded me that he hadn't forgotten the events of the morning. "Are you sleeping in Aaron's room again?" he asked with a suspicious look on his young face.
I felt called out. "Would you not like it if I did that?" I asked back, trying to appear as casual about it as I could.
"I don't know," Chris said, but the pout on his lips told me that he did know how he felt about this.
"Do you not like Aaron?" I glanced over at Tyler too, who seemed to be listening to our conversation with some curiosity.
"I don't know," Chris said again. "He's not bad." But he wasn't sure that he wanted to be living with yet another alpha on a permanent basis. I got that, even if my son wasn't able to put his feelings into words. I'd struggled with the concept too. Chris looked up at me. "And I don't understand the pictures," he added.
"What pictures?" Tyler piped up.
I knew what Chris was talking about. The photographs in the family room. He really wasn't going to let any of it go, was he? "It's bedtime now," I said. "We'll talk about it another time."
Chris squinted at me. "Really?"
"Yes, but it's nothing you have to worry about, okay?"
"What pictures?" Tyler asked again.
"Chris was looking at the picture frames in the family room," I told him. "It's not important. You two sleep well." I dipped my head to kiss Chris on the cheek. "We'll talk soon, okay?"
"Promise?" Chris asked.
