Page 38 of Doran

I kept looking up, squinting up into the teal coloured sky.

“They should be here soon,” Doran said. “Bob will put on the landing conversation on loudspeaker.”

“I know.” I'd said those words so many times over the past half hour that they had stopped meaning anything.

Soon. They'd be here soon. My children would be here soon. No, our children. I smiled, glancing up at my handsome mate. Emma had called him Daddy already, something she’d ceased referring to Harold as for three years now. If she talked about him at all, she simply referred to him as ‘father’ in the most generic of senses. He’d done that, wrecked his relationship with his children. Not me. And it didn’t matter anymore, as now they had Doran and he was Daddy.

I clasped my hands together, then unclasped them again. Doran glanced down at me.

“You're still nervous.”

I gave him a look.

“I'm terrified.”

He smiled faintly.

“So am I.”

I looked up at him.

“You're terrified?”

“I'm meeting our kits for the first time after only speaking to them via comm a grand total of three times.”

That made something warm flicker through the knot in my chest.

“You've already met them on the screen during our video calls.”

“That isn't the same. Screens aren't people. It hits different when they’re in the flesh in front of you”

“That’s true. You’re way hotter in person.”

He laughed. “As were you and you still are, but let’s not get ourselves riled up like that right now.” He took my hand. “I want them to like me for me, and not the idea of getting a father.”

I squeezed his fingers. “They'll like you.”

“You don't know that.”

“I do.”

“How?”

“Because you're you. So, how can they not? And look at Darren and Tarek’s kids. They adore you. And Sweetie. She adores you, and I’ll have you know that dogs are excellent judges of character.”

He smiled.

“And besides,” I added, “you have wings.”

“That helps?”

“With five-year-olds? Probably. With eight-year-old boys? Definitely. And Emma already loves you. She wouldn’t be calling you Daddy otherwise. Thirteen year olds are very selective. You made her feel safe from light years away when she commed us after my mother pulled her little stunt.”

He nodded gravely.

“And your mother?”

The knot returned. That was a million dollar question, one we’d only get the answer to once they’d arrived.