Tempting Perfection

“Okay. Meet me in the lobby. I’m pulling up.”

“Sounds good.”

I gave a whistle, and George was at my side in an instant. Seriously, this dog was part human. It was like he understood me without any training. Although…I had a feeling Kurt had trained him on the side—but I wouldn’t tell him. It was sweet. At a booming seventy pounds, he was huge. I snorted as I thought back to buying him in the park.

“You are so much better than any lap poodle I could imagine. But I do wish you fit into a cute little bag.”

George cocked his head to the side as he listened.

“You’re such a good boy.”

He thumped his tail, our amazing dog. In many ways, I knew he’d helped bridge the divide when Kurt and I were lost on our paths to each other.

I put on his leather dog vest with his name written in rhinestones on it. Nina had made it and dropped it off last week. Secretly, I’d thought it was so Edge could come say hi to George. “Now you match your daddy. He’ll be so impressed.”

Or not. Probably not. But it was funny.

It was rare we ever had George on a leash because he stayed right beside us. Kurt got out of the car in jeans and a T-shirt and greeted me with a kiss. “Hey, baby. I’ll get George in the back. Come on, George.”

George hopped in the back, and I waited for Kurt’s reaction.

“Sawyer, what is this vest?”

Bingo!

“Huh?”

Kurt lifted his shades up on his head.

“This vest…I figured on tour next year, he could wear his to match his daddy. Maybe George can go on stage with you. I’ll get Dylan one, too.”

“Fuck.”

I grinned from ear to ear as we drove out to the beach house. The two-story home felt like a mansion. It was larger than I’d initially thought, but it kept growing as we added more rooms: recording studio, indoor pool, workout room, movie area. It would be amazing, and hopefully we could manage to keep the homey feeling.

I loved the angular feeling of the contemporary home. Something Kurt and I agreed on fairly easily was style. However, I would be adding more color than his boring gray and black.

As I stepped out of the car, the heat pushed down on me. Ugh. I grabbed my water bottle as I walked up the stone steps. It was still surreal—Kurt and I were building a house together. This would be our life. The house had been framed and Sheetrocked, but there was still a lot of work left. “Can you believe that we’re going to be in this place by the first of August?”

“We better be. Costing us a fucking fortune to expedite it.” Kurt looked around the room.

At first, the contractor had said early fall, which I’d been fine with. Kurt had not. He was insistent on bringing Dylan home to our new house from the hospital as opposed to the apartment. Kurt became more excited and less scared as the days passed. And I think having cast his father aside freed him in more ways than he knew.

Good ol’ Doug had vanished with his tail between his legs. We knew at some point, he might pop up and try something. But he seemed like the kind of guy who, when the going got tough, the cowardly ran away. The only reason he’d come back year after year was because Kurt gave him the money without much protest.

In a sense, Kurt had been petrified of the demons of his past coming to light. Though he didn’t want his personal history splashed across the media, Kurt now felt empowered to handle it. Or that was how it seemed.

We walked through the kitchen at the back of the house. One of the walls facing out of the kitchen was rounded and had a white marble countertop, which would be great for entertaining. They had yet to install the appliances. The windows were open, creating a breeze. It didn’t help, though. The sweat literally dripped off me as we walked around.

“The next time I’m pregnant, remind me to be seven months pregnant in the winter.”

Kurt froze.

I waited for him to say something, wondering what had put the perplexed expression on his face.

His eyes were wide and freaked out. “Next time?”

Stay calm. Don’t make a big deal about it. Once we got through one, we could discuss if we wanted a second. It wasn’t something that needed to be decided at the moment.