Page 31 of One Kind Goal

She gathered various bags and a purple suitcase from his vehicle and took it all inside the cottage, laughing when Nia and Sawyer giggled from one of the bedrooms. This wasn’t what she’d had planned for their getaway, but shit, if that wasn’t the cutest sound she’d ever heard.

Morgan dumped their stuff in the living room and peeked into the larger of the bedrooms. She found Sawyer on his back on the bed with Nia sitting on top of him.

“What’s going on in here?” she asked.

“Some general shenanigans.” Sawyer sat up, letting Nia roll to his lap.

“What’s shegiganins?” Nia pushed her hair out of her face.

Morgan barked out a laugh. “She-nan-igans,” she said slowly.

“She-nan-igans,” Nia said. “What are they?”

“They’re silly stuff,” Sawyer said. “Like this!” He flipped Nia to her back and tickled her until her face was red from squealing.

“You’re good at shenanigans, Daddy!” Nia said when she caught her breath.

Sawyer looked up at Morgan and winked. He was more than good at shenanigans.

“Okay, let’s get building those snowmen,” Morgan said. The more activities they did with the kid today, the more likely she’d conk out and sleep soundly tonight.

Then Morgan and Sawyer could get to the adult shenanigans.

“My snow boots are in my suitcase.” Nia hopped off the bed and raced out of the bedroom.

Morgan went to follow her, but Sawyer snagged her arm. He parted his legs and pulled her into the space between his knees.

“Thank you for being so cool about this.” He traced a line along her stomach and up to the undersides of her breasts. The touch pulled a low moan from her that she quickly bit back.

“I feel honored to get to meet Nia.” She cupped his face in her hands and dropped a kiss on his forehead. “How did you end up with her?”

Sawyer told her about Carina calling him and saying Nia wanted to see him.

“Of course you couldn’t give up that chance,” Morgan said. “I would have been pissed if you did. A trip like this could do so much for your relationship with her. Promise me one thing though.”

“Anything.”

“Don’t be afraid to tell me stuff, okay? You could have called me as soon as Nia was going to be a part of our time together. I want us to not have secrets, Sawyer. My sister Summer . . . she had secrets.” She swallowed around a tight throat. “She had secrets and she ended up dead.” She closed her eyes for a moment, but she opened them when Sawyer’s rough palm pressed to her cheek.

“You had another sister?” His eyes were full of compassion and Morgan took the comfort they offered.

“She was four years younger than Brooke, Claire, and me. She was a singer and went by the name Reesa Hill.”

Sawyer’s eyes widened. “I remember the name. She was talented.”

“She was, but she also didn’t tell the rest of us about her struggles with drugs and she overdosed. Promise you’ll always be honest with me, Sawyer.”

He stood and pulled her into a hug. “I promise.”

“Thank you.” She pressed a kiss to his cheek. “Now let’s build some snowmen.”

Morgan led Sawyer out to the living room where Nia had the entire contents of her little purple suitcase strewn about the floor. She wrestled with her snow boots, but she hadn’t put on her snowsuit yet that peeked out from under the cutest pair of tiny jeans Morgan had ever seen.

“Hold up there, Nia,” Sawyer said. “There’s an order to these things.” He kneeled on the floor beside her and yanked off the one boot she’d managed to get on.

“Daddy!” Nia flopped her hands around. “That took forever to get on!”

“That may be so,” he said calmly, “but you need to put the snowsuit on first, Nia-bunny.”