Ethan lay sprawled on the stripped bed, bare foot hanging off the side with a warm body wedged snugly against him.
“Well, we did it,” Amanda murmured lowly, her raven hair spread across his old pillow as she gazed up at him.
Ethan nodded, looking down at Caleb stretched out between them. “I can’t believe we ran out of sheets. That’s never happened before.”
“Your fault,” she returned. “You wouldn’t stop making the damn bed.”
“I had to do something, and besides, I’m optimistic; I kept hoping it was over.”
Rolling her eyes with a slight smile, she said, “I tried telling you. You just never give up, do you?”
Smiling slightly, he said, “Not usually, no.”
Her eyes softened a little and she looked up at the ceiling. “Remember when Alison wanted that damned Elmo for Christmas and they were out of them everywhere? I mean, everywhere.”
“Except for South Bend,” he said with a nod, his smile growing.
“And you went—”
“Without telling you,” he added.
“Without telling me, and they ended up getting a truck at our store, so I bought it…”
“But I got that damn Elmo,” he stated, shaking his head.
She chuckled. “The look on your face.”
“I was sure I was going to come home a hero.”
“I always loved that about you. Always made me feel safe, like you’d always take care of things.”
Smile dying, Ethan merely nodded. It was a nice memory but he had ultimately failed to always take care of things—which he hoped she wouldn’t point out.
Instead of rubbing salt in the wound, she said, “Thanks for staying tonight.”
“Of course. Thanks for letting me.”
“I’m sure you had better offers,” she said lightly, not looking at him.
“What better offer is there than cleaning up explosion after explosion of vomit?”
Nodding solemnly, she said, “You make a good point, I don’t know what I was thinking.”
“Obviously you weren’t.”
Darting a glance at him, she hedged, “So, I was thinking.”
When she didn’t go on to explain what she was thinking, he drawled, “Okay?”
“Maybe we could, I don’t know, go to dinner one night.”
His heart nearly stopped. “You and me?”
“No,” she said, quickly. “I mean, I meant all of us, like us and the kids.”
“Oh. Right, yeah, that would be…good.”
“It’s just, I mean, only the two of us would probably be weird.”