Chapter 54
Chapter fifty-four
Cam
The alarm goes off before sunrise, but I’m already awake.
The past couple of weeks have rushed by with back to school shopping, meetings with Kate’s lawyers, and the end of T-ball season.
Kate and I have a rhythm now. She makes coffee, I make breakfast. I wash clothes, she folds them.
Evenings are filled with animated movies and Evie’s newfound love of sharks.
This morning though, the house is quiet, gray morning light spilling across the kitchen floor. Rain taps the windowpanes as I move through the motions—drink my coffee, flip the pancakes, try to keep everything feeling normal when nothing about today is.
Kate comes down the hall barefoot, hair damp from the shower, wearing the navy dress she picked out days ago and changed her mind about twice this morning. Her hands tremble just enough for me to notice.
“Morning,” I say, sliding her a mug.
She wraps both hands around it. “It feels like the longest day of my life, and it’s only six-thirty.”
I reach out, rub a hand over her back. “We’ve got this, Katie.”
She lifts her eyes to mine, tired but steady. “You sound so sure.”
“I am sure.” I tip her chin up. “You’re the best mom I’ve ever known. That’s what the judge will see too.”
That earns me a faint smile. She sets her mug down and leans into me just enough that I feel her steadying herself.
Then tiny footsteps slap the hallway floor.
Evie appears in her pajamas, hair a tangle, holding Matilda by the tail. “Is Grandma coming soon?”
“Soon,” I say, crouching down. “Are you excited for pancakes?”
“Are they the whipped cream ones?”
“Of course.”
She grins, wide and gap-toothed. “Then I’m very excited.”
Kate smooths Evie’s hair. “Why don’t you go get dressed, sweetheart?”
“Okay!” She dashes off toward her room. A second later, her voice carries down the hall. “Cam! I need help with my hair!”
Kate smirks into her coffee. “Guess you’re on duty.”
I chuckle and follow the call. “On my way.”
In her room, she’s sitting on the bed with a hairbrush in one hand and Matilda tucked under her arm. “I tried, but it keeps going crazy.”
I take the brush from her. “Crazy hair just means you’re smart. All the smart ones have wild hair. Look at Albert Einstein.”
“Is that why your hair sticks up in the morning? Because you’re smart?”
“Yes, ma’am. That’s exactly the reason.”
She giggles as I part her hair and start braiding. I’m working off memory from the tutorials I’ve watched on YouTube over the past week. I twist, overlap, pieces stick out. It’s not perfect, but she beams when she looks in the mirror. “It’s pretty!”
I smile because her view of the world is still so innocent and good. Even mistakes made with the proper effort can be pretty. “Thanks. I might need more practice, though with all of these pieces sticking out.”
Her expression turns serious as she touches my arm. “Don’t worry about mistakes, they’re just part of learning something new.”
Well shit.
I know those words because I said them to her T-ball team during their first practice. I say those words to every T-ball team I coach. And she remembered them.
I’m not a man that cries often but damn it, my eyes sting a little bit.
“That’s right, Evie. That’s very right.”
Her eyes regain their sparkle. “Let’s go have pancakes!”
“You got it.” I lift her and place her on her feet and she bolts back to the kitchen.
When I walk down the hall in her wake, Kate’s mom is standing at the open front door, shaking her umbrella dry on the front porch. “There’s my girl!”
Evie squeals and leans into her grandmother’s arms. “We’re making pancakes!”
“Are you now? I hope you’re saving some for me. Go eat real quick so we can go to my house.”
I place a plate in front of Evie and Kate crosses the room, hugging her mom tightly. “Thank you for taking her.”
“Of course.” Her mom lowers her voice. “You two just focus on today. I’ll drop Evie off at Mrs. Dobson’s, then meet you there.”
Evie’s eyes dart between us. “Are you going to one of those boring meetings again?”
Kate kneels in front of her, brushing a loose curl from her cheek. “Yeah, sweetheart. But it’s important, and when we’re done, we’ll come pick you up, okay?”
Evie nods solemnly. “Okay. But don’t forget we need a new box of crayons. My last purple broke.”
“I’ll write it on the list,” I promise.
After she clears her plate, we both walk her to the door, and when Grandma’s car pulls away, Kate’s hand lingers in mine long after the taillights disappear.
The silence that follows is thick and strange. She exhales. “Okay. Time to get ready.”
In our bedroom, she sets out her earrings and necklace on the dresser, the small things that make her feel like herself.
I pull on the suit hanging from the closet door, the same one I wore to Knox and Brynn’s wedding.
The tie feels too tight, but when I catch her watching me in the mirror, her lips part slightly.
“What?” I ask, straightening the knot.
“Nothing,” she says, voice softer now. “It’s just…I forgot how good you look in a suit.”
I turn toward her, that small smile tugging at the corner of my mouth. “You trying to distract me, Wells? It might have worked in a coat closet, but we have things to do today.”
“Maybe a little.”
I close the distance, slipping a hand around her waist. It’s nice to see the tension ease from her, for even just a moment. “Careful, or we’ll be late to court.”
Her fingers brush my lapel as she looks up at me through her lashes. “If the judge saw you right now, they would definitely understand my predicament.”
“Flattery won’t help your case.” I laugh, leaning down to kiss her forehead. “But I appreciate the effort.”
Her laugh is quiet, the sound easing the tension in my chest.
When she turns to the mirror, I rest my hands on her shoulders. “We walk in there together. No fear. And we bring Evie home at the end of it.”
She meets my eyes in the reflection. “Yeah.”