10. Chapter 10
Seren
“High, high, more!” Cai yelled, his little trainers kicking out as I pushed him on the swing.
“Alright, alright.” I laughed, giving him another gentle shove. “You’re going to touch the clouds at this rate.”
“Cowds!” Head tipping back, he tried to spot them, legs still pumping wildly. “Moooo!”
I chuckled at his perfect little brain. “Not like cow, buddy. That’s the farm animal. Up here”—I pointed—“are clouds.”
“Mooooo!” he replied, and we both laughed again.
The park had been one of the first things I’d found when we moved.
Close enough to walk, right by the beach, a tiny coffee truck on the corner.
It made everything feel a little more like home.
Granted, when we lived at my parents’ house, that was only an hour away, but this was all new, and making things easy for me and Cai was my priority.
Not six-foot something rugby players I couldn’t get out of my head.
“Again!” he demanded.
“Yes, sir,” I said, pushing him once more, watching the way his laugh bubbled out of him, completely carefree.
God, I loved him. If anyone had told me the all-encompassing love I’d feel with him, I couldn’t have imagined it.
He might not have been planned, but he was destined to be mine, and it didn’t matter how many sleepless nights we shared, I’d always show up for him and have him be the center of my world.
After multiple attempts at reaching the sky, eventually, his legs slowed, his attention drifting to the next thing.
“Beach,” he said suddenly, twisting in the swing to point at the sand.
“You want to go see the water?”
“Mommy too?” he asked and wriggled like he was about to launch himself out.
“Of course, baby—Hang on,” I said, steadying the swing before I got him out.
The second his feet hit the ground, he grabbed my hand and tugged. “Go, go, go.”
We walked the short path down to the sand, his hand wrapped tight around mine.
“Fast,” he insisted, his little body leaning forward, searching for momentum.
“I’m going as fast as I can.” I laughed as I adjusted my stride to match his, even though his version of speed was more enthusiastic than effective.
The path opened out onto the sand, and he slowed the second his feet hit it.
“Let’s take our shoes off, okay?” I said, crouching down to unfasten his, then slipping my own off. When I stood again, he was transfixed.
“Woah,” he said quietly.
I watched him instead of the ocean.
“Big bath,” he added.
Chuckling, I pulled out my phone to snap a picture of him as we walked closer to the edge of the water. “Yeah, but it’s cold. Feel it.”
His little toes wiggled, and just as they were submerged in the ocean, he squealed and ran back to hug my legs. “Cold, Mommy, cold!”
I rubbed the top of his light curly hair. “You didn’t like it?”
He considered that for half a second, then ran back to splash once more in the water.
I stayed where I was, feet half sinking into the sand, watching him dart in and out of the tide like he was learning something new with every step—how far he could go, how cold was too cold, how brave he felt today.
My chest was warm and so full watching him be happy.
But there was also a lingering pulse of disappointment that Derek wouldn’t see this…
that Cai wouldn’t get to share this with his dad.
He’d never be this innocent and small again, and Derek’s missing all of it.
The tide rolled in again, and he shrieked, stumbling back before immediately charging forward to meet it, laughter spilling out of him so freely it made my heart ache.
I snapped more pictures of him and decided to send some to Derek.
Seren
First beach day in Solterra!
I hadn’t expected him to reply so quickly. He didn’t always have his phone when he was working.
Derek
He’s gotten so big.
He had. We hadn’t seen Derek in around six weeks. This particular working schedule had him in Canada, and it wasn’t easy to visit us while we moved anyway.
Derek
I’ve got some time off coming up. I was hoping to come visit? See him, see both of you.
There was a familiar tug with that message.
Not because I had unrequited feelings for Derek, but because he and I shared Cai.
And even though we didn’t work out then, sometimes I found myself wondering if we could ever make it work.
Would that be an easy option to give Cai both parents together?
What would that even look like for Derek and me?
It wasn’t ever really an option before, so I’m not sure why I even let that thought process grow legs once in a while.
Maybe because I knew what that life looked like. I’d grown up with it, parents still together, steady in a way that never made me question anything. And I caught myself wanting that for Cai, like I could recreate it just enough that he’d never feel the gap.
But Derek and I weren’t that. We never had been. And trying to make us into something that only worked in theory didn’t feel right.
Seren
Yeah, Cai would love to see you.
I kept my reply simple and focused on spending time with Cai because it was easier that way.
Another buzz of my phone, but it wasn’t Derek. It was Nate calling me.
“Hey,” I answered. “What’s going on?”
“You guys aren’t home,” he said by way of greeting. Trust my brother to be his usual grumpy self.
“We’re at the beach.”
“Which one?”
“I don’t know what it’s called, but I can ping you my location. Are you coming here, or just checking up on me?”
There were voices in the background, and I couldn’t tell where he was. “Very funny. Send me where you are, and we’ll come to you.”
He hung up, and I sent him my location, watching Cai run in and out of the water.
Within twenty minutes, he was soaked, and I was thankful today was sunny, though I had come prepared with a million extra clothes for him.
There was shouting from behind me, but I didn’t pay it attention until I heard my name.
I grabbed hold of Cai’s damp hand and turned to see the entire Knights and Valkyrie teams heading toward me. What on earth…
The guys were carrying coolers and the girls had deck chairs and bags stacked under their arms and over their shoulders, and suddenly I couldn’t swallow properly. Surely, they weren’t all here for me? That would be ridiculous.
“Hey, girlie pop,” Evie shouted, waving her one free arm in my direction. Lola followed behind.
I waved back, my mind still scrambled by their impromptu visit to the beach, my beach. “Hey,” I said weakly.
Nate came into view, and Cai took off running shouting, “Nighty, Nighty.” All the others were laughing at that, but I was still trying to take it all in.
Even as the girls hugged me and set up their deck chairs, including one for me.
Even as the guys did the same and handed everyone a snack pack full of what looked like homemade protein bars and fruit…
I was losing cognitive function here. I watched it all unfold like I was slightly outside of it, like if I blinked too hard, the whole thing might disappear.
“Did you plan this?” I asked Lola as she dropped into the chair beside me like this was the most normal thing in the world.
She snorted, pulling her sunglasses down from the top of her head. “We all planned it, but Nate found you.”
I watched my brother with Cai, and I knew immediately this wasn’t just Nate checking in. This was him making sure I wasn’t alone without saying it out loud. It was also Lola making plans to suit both me and Cai, like she’d mentioned in the gym this week.
I swallowed against it, dragging in a breath of salty air, trying to steady my emotions before I embarrassed myself in front of two entire rugby teams.
“Bit of a crowd you’ve got here.”
Jake’s voice came from my side, warm and deep, and my stomach did that annoying, traitorous little flip before I even looked his way.
When I did, I had to tip my head back slightly, squinting up at him.
The sun sat right behind his form, catching on the edges of his frame and turning everything gold in a way that felt unfair, including the tips of his hair peeking out from a baseball cap.
His boyish grin could probably heal the world.
Those dimples were deep enough to come with a warning sign.
One that I found myself astutely ignoring and opting to just bask in the loveliness of his unfairly charming smile.
His eyes flicked down my body, caressing every part of me without touching. He shook his head once and smiled. “You look really fucking pretty today.”
The ease in which he said it made me want to protest. Every time any compliment was meant for me, I’d brush it off, but something about this didn’t inspire that same response. “Thank you,” I said instead, looking down at my clothes.
His mouth curved slightly, like he’d expected a fight and was a little pleased he didn’t get one. “You’re welcome.”
I glanced away first, looking for my son, and when I found him happily being swirled around by Nate, I smiled.
“Wait,” he said, lifting a hand. “There’s something in your hair.”
My body tensed. “Please tell me it’s not alive.”
A quiet laugh escaped him before his fingers moved carefully through the strands beside my temple.
There was a tenderness to the gesture that was at odds with the smugness he wore so well, and I found myself incapable of movement the moment his knuckles brushed my skin.
It was the lightest touch, hardly anything at all, and yet my pulse betrayed me instantly.
“Relax,” he said, holding up a tiny white feather between his fingers. “You’re safe.”
That sentence shouldn’t have made any difference to my oxygen levels, but it did.
He held the feather out between us instead of dropping it. “Go on,” he whispered. “Make a wish.”
Laughter exploded from me. “What?”
“Humor me.” He smiled, pointedly moving the feather again. “Blow it away after you make your wish.”
I stared at him, waiting for him to joke and say he didn’t mean it, but it didn’t come.
Jake Ledger was really asking me to make a wish on a feather, and it might’ve been the single most adorable thing.
“Okay,” I whispered back. Closing my eyes felt strangely intimate beneath the weight of his attention.
There were a thousand things I could’ve wished for, sensible things and impossible ones alike, yet only one settled at the front of my mind.
I held on to it for one brief second before I blew softly.
The feather lifted from his fingers and spun between us, catching the sunlight as it drifted off into the light breeze.
“Well?” he asked, head tilting slightly. “Good one?”
I pressed my lips together. “If I tell you, it won’t come true.”
“Then I guess I’ll just have to stick around and find out.”
And then he stepped away from the group without any announcement. I followed him without meaning to, watching as he dropped down into the sand beside Cai, who lit up instantly.
“Mommy, look!” Cai shouted as he flung a handful of sand behind him.
“You having fun, baby?”
“We’re gonna build the biggest sandcastle, my guy, fit for a king.” Jake was being sincere as he began digging right next to my son.
Cai’s cries of joy were music to my ears.
Jake didn’t grab a drink, didn’t get pulled into whatever the others were doing. He just stayed there, legs stretched out, fully invested in whatever Cai had going on, listening like it mattered, like this was exactly where he wanted to be.
Before long, I’d moved back to the chair and was chatting with the girls. Teddy joined us, nodding at me. “Walk a little with me, Seren?”
I checked around the group, noticing they were smiling. Was I missing something? “Sure,” I said anyway as I stood.
“I know it’s our day off and we don’t talk work right now,” she said, hands tucked into the pockets of her shorts as we walked toward the water. Her tone was careful, but it still carried that captain edge she never really switched off. “But humor me for a second.”
Already wary, I turned toward her. “Okay?”
“We’ve never had a single mom on the team before.” She continued, her gaze flicking briefly past me to where Cai sat between Jake and Nate, fully engrossed in whatever snack negotiation they were currently losing. “And I want to make some changes.”
“Teddy, you don’t have—”
“No, just—hear me out,” she said gently.
She wasn’t steamrolling me, but she wasn’t backing down either.
“If we need to adjust things, we adjust things. If that means starting later so you can do daycare drop-offs without rushing, then we shift the schedule. If you need to leave earlier some days, we build around that. We can move gym blocks, tweak recovery sessions, split things differently—whatever makes this actually sustainable for you.”
My lips parted, speechless. Was she saying that the entire team would change just for me?
“I don’t want you feeling like you have to choose between being here and being his mom,” she added, glancing back at Cai. “You’re both. We just need to make the system fit that.”
My throat burned with a gratitude I couldn’t possibly express. I’d forgotten how it felt to have a team. Sure, my parents had helped me when Cai was young, but sometimes, it was hard to ask for help, and here Teddy was, making space for both of us without me even asking.
I swallowed, trying to keep it all in, to keep my voice level when it felt anything but.
“I…” I shook my head slightly, a breath leaving me as I tried again. “I don’t even know what to say to that.”
Teddy’s lips curled into a half smile. “We’ve got you, and we want you here on this team with us.”
A small, disbelieving breath slipped out of me and my nose tingled with emotion.
“I’ve spent a long time making everything fit around him on my own,” I admitted, more to the sand than to her. “I think I forgot it could ever work the other way.”
“Let’s talk schedules first thing Monday morning, okay?”
I nodded because, truthfully, I was seconds away from grabbing her in a bear hug and sobbing into her braids. “Sounds great.” Sounds amazing. Sounds like I’m finally finding a place again.