Page 155 of Good For Me

“Exactly the way you saw it.” I kiss the top of her head. “This is what you said, right? That you could see the three of us at the beach, just like this. Tell me you don’t believe in fate now.”

She snorts. “It’s not exactly the way I saw it,” she argues. “I pictured a little boy, remember?”

I slid a hand over Poppy’s dark curls. “She’s too amazing even for our dreams.”

I expect her to berate me, the way she usually does when I get so sappy, but instead she just sighs, nestling closer. “She really is, isn’t she?”

We’re quiet for a moment, just sitting there in the sand while the water laps around us, watching our girl splash and laugh and fill her parents’ hearts to near bursting.

“A boy would be nice,” Jas says after a while. “A little brother for her, just like you and Rose.”

My body goes still. This isn’t something we’ve ever talked about before. We’ve had enough on our plate in the last year and a half. It turns out starting a new business—even one you love like crazy—is a hell of a lot of work. Starting a business and then having a newborn is a whole new level of insane. We made it work though. The three of us are a pretty good little team.

But our present has been so busy we haven’t spent a lot of time looking into the future. That’s been fine with me—with a life this freaking incredible, I haven’t felt the need to wish for much.

“A brother, huh?” I ask, my voice sounding a little husky. “That something you want to start thinking about?”

She shrugs against me. “I wouldn’t mind having another baby with you, River Ransome.” She brushes some water off the side of Poppy’s face. “We did pretty good on the first one, didn’t we?”

I tilt her face to me so I can press my lips against hers. “I fucking love you, you know that?”

She laughs. “You’re going to have to curb that swearing you know. She’ll be repeating you soon.”

I scoff. “Pretty sure you have a way dirtier mouth than me, babe.”

She grins back, knowing I’m right, and I have to kiss her again. How could I not? The girl of my dreams is here in my arms, our baby safe and happy mere inches away. And now there’s the thought of another miracle just starting to grow in my mind. If that doesn’t call for some celebratory kissing, what does?

Eventually Poppy splashes too hard and ends up with a mouthful of salt water. We can’t help but laugh at the horrified grimace on her face. When the grimace starts to shift towards tears, I snatch her up and practically sprint across the sand back to our shade tent. I pull a sippy cup of juice from the cooler before Jas even gets to us. “You’re ridiculous, you know that? You didn’t have to run off like she was in grave danger over some saltwater.”

I kiss the side of Poppy’s face. “My girl doesn’t like that yucky taste, does she?” I coo, and Jas rolls her eyes as she settles onto our beach mat. “She probably could use some shade anyhow. We don’t want her pretty little arms to get burned, do we baby girl?”

“I’m so sorry, Poppy,” Jas says, readjusting the baby’s sun hat. “Your father is insane.” Poppy just gives her gummy grin and shouts “Da!” once again.

I pull out some sand toys and Poppy goes to town. Jas leans back on the mat and closes her eyes, so I figure it’s a good time to check in with work. Our weekend manager, Vinny, is awesome, and I have no doubt he has everything under control. But I still like to keep an eye on things.

Have I mentioned how much I love my job?

I pull out my phone and start scrolling through my messages. The first text from Vinny has me chuckling the second I see the attached picture.

“What’s up?” Jas asks, opening one eye. I hold out the phone so she can see the screen and she snorts. “God, they’re a terrible influence on each other.”

She’s referring to Lou, Mark, Carl, and my grandpa. They met at the opening of the skatepark and ended up becoming friends. The Geriatric Gossip Club, as Brie likes to call them, started inviting Grandpa to their Sunday afternoons at the diner. They’ve also taken to hanging around the skatepark during the week. Not to skate—as far as I can tell, they mostly heckle the other skaters.

In the picture from Vinny, the guys are clearly passing a bottle in a brown paper bag between them. He wants to know if he should confiscate it, since alcohol is prohibited at a place where people regularly do tricks that involve throwing themselves off ramps and pool ledges on an eight-inch wide board.

Sometimes I worry about what we’ve unleashed on the unsuspecting population of Los Angeles in introducing them to each other.

I write back that he should feel free to kick them out then click on the next picture he sent. This one makes me smirk as I hold it over to Jas so she can see the shot of CeCe soaring a full foot above the mini-ramp. At least three teenage boys are in the shot, all of them gaping at her with open mouth wonder. “Showing up all the boys,” I say, chuckling.

Jas smirks at me. “I wouldn’t say those boys are complaining.”

Something about the teasing tone of her voice doesn’t sit right. “What does that mean?”

She rolls her eyes. “Those boys aren’t just impressed. They’re madly in love. Or lust.”

My mouth drops open and I look from the screen to Jas and then back again. “Bullshit.” Jas just arches a brow. “She’s a little kid!”

“She’s fifteen. Did you start getting interested in girls when you were fifteen?”