Keeper by Nicole Dykes

Author:Nicole Dykes [Dykes, Nicole]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2022-10-16T16:00:00+00:00

TWENTY-THREE

KINGSTON

Lucy is a really cute princess. She cracks me up as she twirls through the living room of her house, holding her Halloween basket and commanding Camden to pick up her toys because she’s the princess.

“Yeah. That’s not how this works,” Cam says, perched on the couch, his feet kicked out and resting on the coffee table.

His mom, Tracy, as she makes me call her instead of Ms. Prescott, comes into the room, dressed in a tavern t-shirt and tight jeans. His mom is really pretty. Young, too young to have an eighteen-year-old, and tired from so many years of doing it all by herself, but she is pretty. And really nice. “Hey, sweetie,” she greets me with a kiss on the cheek. “Thank you for watching these two for me.”

She winks playfully as Camden climbs up off the couch. “Yeah, right. He’s the responsible one,” he jokes, and his mom laughs, grabbing his shoulders and planting a kiss on his forehead.

“Thank you, baby.” She turns to Lucy, her eyes sad. “I’m so sorry I can’t take you trick-or-treating tonight, sweetie.”

I hate the sadness in her eyes, the desperate longing. She’s a good mom. No one can say she isn’t. But she works a lot just to keep afloat. She misses out on so much because she has to. And it’s really not fair.

Lucy looks a little sad, but then she brightens up—tough kid that she is. “It’s okay, Mommy. Kingston and Camden are fun.”

Tracy puts on a brave smile too, running her finger over her daughter’s cheek sweetly. “I know, and you better save me some peanut butter cups.”

Lucy giggles. “Of course.”

Tracy moves back to Camden. “Do you need anything? Thank you for grabbing pizza.”

Camden waves that off, not at all bothered about springing for pizza for dinner tonight so she doesn’t have to cook. “It’s not a problem, Mom, and we’re good. We’re going to take her out and then come back here for a spooky-movie marathon.”

“No! Caamm . . .” Lucy looks horrified, shaking her head. “No scary movies.”

He laughs easily, ducking down to pick up his little princess and hold her up in the air. “Not for you. Kingston and I are going to watch some after your little butt is in bed.”

She squeals happily in the air before struggling and making him put her down. “Okay, fine. But not while I’m still awake. I’m little.” She says this so damn adorably that we all laugh.

“Sure thing, kiddo,” he says and then hugs his mom. Lucy and I do the same before we head out to walk around the neighborhoods, begging for candy.

Luce is super cute and knows how to work a crowd to earn extra candy at nearly every house, I swear. When we finally drag our tired asses back to their house, it’s nine o’clock and way past her bedtime, but she’s still pretty hopped-up on candy.

I catch Camden’s eyes several times as we try to get her to sleep by reading stories and talking about all the houses we hit tonight, and finally—fucking finally—she’s out.

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