Chapter 61
Asher
Four and a Half Years Later
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Mirna fought sleep like the warrior she was. Even as I softened my voice reading to her, those hazel eyes snapped open the moment her eyelids drooped. I could see how she’d been my very first and fastest swimmer. That determination could have come from either of us.
Adam didn’t have a care in the world—he could fall asleep in a bowl of food and it wouldn’t faze him. He’d probably prefer it. He’d wake up to a snack. He was as gone for his mother as I was.
Mirna was almost four in two weeks’ time. She reminded us all several times a day.
Her eyes finally drooped and this time stayed closed. I carefully set the book back on the shelf and leaned down to kiss my angel.
Silently praying—as I did every night—that she wouldn’t take after her aunt. They got on far too well for my liking.
I tiptoed out before checking on Adam and Elissa.
He clutched his frog, drool dripping from his open mouth.
We’d had to build an iron barricade around the pond for safety—but as soon as he was old enough to climb he’d be in there just like his mother, chasing frogs.
At two and a half, everyone in the house knew to keep an eye on him and Elissa.
She’d crawl after him everywhere if she could.
Those two were in cahoots from the beginning.
I kissed his plump cheek and pulled out my handkerchief to wipe the drool.
Exactly like his mother.
I crossed the room to find Elissa knocked out. Hands in the air, rosy cheeked and completely unbothered by the world. Fourteen months old and I still had to fight her for my wife’s breasts.
But just like Sayla, I let her win every time.
I stroked the hair from her forehead and kissed her.
She was the bonus baby.
There may have been some fuckery involved in Sayla’s new contraception.
But my warriors needed their Valhalla.
I needed our forever cemented in so much love that Sayla never stood a chance.
Once everyone was tucked in I went to find my errant wife.
She’d broken a cardinal rule.
Thou shalt not give Daddy the middle finger.
Eventually she’d figure out where the cameras were.