I almost feel like old news watching them together. They’ve been spending hours playing cars and crawling around on the floor. The laughter and happiness these two share is more than I could ever ask for. The only thing that makes me feel like I haven’t been completely forgotten, is the fact that Liam appears to approve of my outfit because he constantly puts his arm around me, letting his fingers caress my bare shoulder.
By dinner time, Liam has made himself at home and took it upon himself to order dinner for the evening.
I’m picking the black olives off my pizza and putting them on Matty’s plate. Matty greedily pops them into his mouth with a hum.
“Not a fan of black olives?”
“No, they’re gross.”
“You could have asked for a different kind of pizza.” Liam laughs as he finishes cutting up Matty’s pizza.
“Habit. Matty loves them, so I pick them off and give them to him so he can go to town.” I pull off another black olive to give to Matty who shoves it into his mouth. “He can eat a whole can of them if you offer.”
“My boy,” he says proudly. “I’m the same way. “
“At least I know where he gets it from now. Nobody in my family likes them.”
“My brother doesn't like olives either. One of the many ways we are different.”
“Does your family know about Matty?”
“My brother does. I’m eventually going to have to find time to break it to my parents.”
“Are you and your brother close? I mean you’re twins—”
“No.” he snaps, cutting me off. Then he stuffs a large bite of his pizza in his mouth, and he looks as if he’s chewing glass instead of greasy goodness.
“Oh.” I frown.
“We used to be, but shii—” He stops himself and glances over at Matty. “Stuff, stuff happened and it changed things. He lives in California with his wife.”
“What about your parents?”
“What about them?”
“How do you think they'll take the news to being grandparents?”
“Honestly?” He raises an eyebrow and spins his plate around. Matty tries to mimic him, but his plate goes surging forward and flips, sending olives and cut up pizza flying to the table.
“Honesty would be nice.” I give him a tight smile as I collect the pieces of food and put them back on my son's plate, hoping we don’t have a repeat.
“I don’t think they will take the news well and, will assume you have other motives like I did initially.”
“Even though you are the father?”
“Even though. Like my brother, I don’t have the easiest relationship with them. Maybe after I tell them and with time, they’ll get over it, but I don’t hold my breath anymore when it comes to them.” He picks a black olive off his pizza and gives it to Matty, who happily squeals and pops it into his mouth. “Especially my father. What about yours? Do they know about me?”
“They do. My mother thinks you’re handsome. My dad, well he's a man of few words when it comes to showing his emotions, but when you guys meet, I think you'll hit it off. More so if you like football.”
“I can like football, but he wouldn’t happen to be into classic cars, would he?”
“I think you two will get along just fine.”
Matty is curled up on the couch, passed out. Cold. Blue’s Clues and You was exhausting to my little man and Liam. Both of them yelling at the screen every time a clue popped up and Liam getting annoyed when the host appeared blind at what was in front of his face.
I think it was an awakening experience to the life of parenting for Liam. Watching children’s cartoons.
“So, how come there isn’t a Mrs. Morgan?”
“A Mrs. Morgan.” He snorts.
“You asked me the other day if I had a boyfriend, so I think it’s only fair I grill you.”
“It’s because I’m not the settling down type.”
“Meaning you’re the whole big alpha, I can have whoever I want when I want type?
He chuckles. “If I said that was partly true, would that make me an ass?”
“Of course. But it would make you an honest ass.”
“It’s just I don’t know if I could ever see myself tied down, so I stick to one-night stands. I’m far from perfect and I guess I never wanted to have someone deal with my baggage.”
I’m blown away by his total honesty. “We all have baggage.”
“Mine is pretty hefty.” He sighs and shifts away from me. “My own family found the load too big to handle.” He puffs out a large breath of air.
“Well, you have a new family that is here for you now.” I bite my lip and divert my eyes from his. I can’t believe I said that. It’s been two days.
He gives me a weak smile and stands.
Great, I scared him off.
“It’s getting late,” he says glancing at his watch.
“Yeah, I should get Matty into his bed.”
“Can I come over tomorrow?”
“If you want to, yeah.”
“I do. Is that weird?”
“Why would that be weird?”
“Because days ago, I was just Liam Morgan, CEO of Morgan Securities. I didn’t answer to anyone but myself.” He slides back down next to me. “Tonight, I’m cutting up pizza and crawling around on the floor with a child who will rely on me. I have a car seat in the back of my classic Mustang.”
I giggle.
“Right now, I should be buried in my work. I had order, kept to myself as I went through the motions to distract myself. This is totally a flip side of what I’m used to, but as different as this all
