Chapter 17
Theo
Icouldn’t move.
Couldn’t think.
Could barely process what I was seeing.
Jeremiah was kneeling in my foyer, promising my daughter double orders of her favorite food, and I was pretty sure my brain had just short-circuited. He’d been texting from my front porch, which meant he’d already been here when he’d asked what we were up to.
A knight in shining armor, indeed.
“You didn’t have to do this,” I managed, though my voice sounded strange to my own ears.
“I wanted to,” he said, meeting my eyes over Debbie’s head. “Besides, I was in the neighborhood.”
“The neighborhood” was a twenty-minute drive from where he lived, but I didn’t point that out.
“Can we eat now?” Debbie asked, tugging on both our hands. “I’m so hungry I could eat a whole dragon!”
“A whole dragon?” Jeremiah raised an eyebrow. “That’s a lot of dragon. Good thing I brought enough food for a small army.”
Within minutes, he was spreading containers across my coffee table while Debbie bounced on the couch beside him, asking a million questions about whether he’d ever eaten with chopsticks and if Chinese restaurants really had dragons in the kitchen.
I stood in the doorway watching them, a glass of iced tea in each hand, still struggling to believe this impossibly kind man had shown up at my door with dinner, the same man who’d understood when I’d had to cancel our date, who’d texted me anyway, just to check in.
“You coming?” Jeremiah called, looking up at me with eyes so blue they made my knees wobble.
“Yeah,” I said, settling onto the couch. “Just . . . still processing.”
“What’s to process? Man brings food. Family eats food. Sounds simple to me.”
Family.
That was a punch to my chest.
Debbie claimed the spot between us, which was probably for the best. I wasn’t sure I could handle sitting directly next to Jeremiah right now, not when he kept doing things that made my heart race and my carefully constructed walls crumble a little more with each word he spoke.
“Willie Wee, do you like princess movies?” Debbie asked, already reaching for the remote.
“What kind of question is that? I love princess movies,” he said solemnly before leaning in and whispering. “Especially ones with dragons.”
“Aladdin has a tiger!” she announced. “That’s almost like a dragon. And the genie is blue and magical and funny.”
“Sounds perfect.”
The food was incredible—better than anything I’d had in years. The lo mein was perfectly seasoned, the fried rice wasn’t greasy, and the crab Rangoon made Debbie close her eyes and let out tiny joyful sounds that had both Jeremiah and me grinning.
“Where did you get this?” I asked around a mouthful of orange chicken.
“Little place called Golden Dragon. Been going there since college. They make everything from scratch.”
Debbie silenced our chatting with an annoyed glance as the movie—the one whose words she could probably recite from memory—began in earnest. As Aladdin began his adventure through Agrabah, I found myself watching Jeremiah more than the screen: the way he answered Debbie’s endless questions about whether genies were real and if magic carpets needed insurance, how he helped her when sauce dripped on her shirt, the patient way he listened to her running commentary about every character and plot point.
Our eyes met during the “A Whole New World” sequence.
Jeremiah was quietly singing along . . .
with Debbie . . . neither missing a single word.
He caught me looking and smiled as he continued mouthing lyrics.
As the song drew to a close, Debbie reached over, patted his hand, then gripped it and didn’t let go.
Something I couldn’t quite identify passed between us that made my chest tighten.
He came back, my heart whispered. He brought dinner and made your daughter laugh.
He’s still here.
He didn’t run away. He ran forward.
Toward us.
I stared at Debbie, completely absorbed in the movie, sauce on her chin and happiness radiating from every inch of her small body. One look at her and my heart was mush. She’d always done that to me. She probably always would.
Then I glanced at Jeremiah, who was watching her with such fondness it made my throat tighten.
He did that tonight. He made her happy.
By the time the credits rolled, we’d demolished most of the Chinese food and Debbie’s head was starting to loll with the heaviness of a child up past her bedtime.
“All right, Button,” I said softly, reaching out to lift her limp body off the couch. “Time for bed.”
“But I want to see the end,” she mumbled, her eyes already closing. “When Aladdin and Jasmine get married and live happily ever after.”
“You’ve seen them live happily ever after about a gazillion times.”
“But this time Willie Wee is here,” she said drowsily. “It’s special.”
I didn’t look, but I felt Jeremiah’s eyes on me, warm and understanding.
That’s when Debbie did something that stopped my heart entirely.
Still mostly asleep, she shifted toward Jeremiah, snuggling against his side like it was the most natural thing in the world.
She shifted, trying to get comfortable. When that didn’t seem to work, she climbed directly into his lap, wrapping her small arms around his neck and resting her head against his chest.
Within seconds, her breathing slowed with the peaceful rhythm of sleep.
Jeremiah didn’t dare move. He sat perfectly still, his arms coming up instinctively to hold her tight against him. His expression was soft with wonder and something that looked like awe.
Debbie muttered something, half asleep. All I caught was, “. . . good daddy smell,” as her little nose nuzzled into Jeremiah’s neck.
When he looked away and a tear slid down his cheek, I had to swallow hard against the army of emotions lodging in my throat.