Page 34 of Nothing Without You

I nodded and looked at Keegan. “Why are you even in here?”

He blinked at me. “What you mean?”

“Don’t you have some work to do?” I asked as I propped my hand on my hip.

This was the first year I participated in ‘bring your kids to work’ day. All the kids pleaded with me to allow them to come. They weren’t slick. I knew it was just because they wanted to skip school. The girls, at nine years old, liked school well enough, but they wouldn’t skip out on the opportunity to miss a day.

Liam and KJ were a different story. At thirteen years old, they hated school and often concocted plans to skip days. They were just as mischievous as they had been when they were toddlers, and their sisters were no better.

“No,” he replied simply.

“Great. Then take your kids and get out of here. Let me finish this meeting, and we can leave.”

“But, Mommy, who will make sure Mr. James is listening to you?” Kori asked. Her innocent face gazed at me, and I huffed.

“You know what, James? How about we pick this up again tomorrow?” I asked the older white man who sat there looking confused and like he wasn’t allowed to move a damn muscle.

Quickly, he stood up and gathered his things. “That sounds perfect. Just email me the time.”

He didn’t wait for my response. Before I could blink, he was out the door.

Keegan clapped his hands with a smile on his face. “Looks like your afternoon just freed up. How about we all go grab some lunch?”

I shook my head and pulled him into me by the collar of his dress shirt. “What am I gonna do with you and your bad-ass kids?”

“Mommy, I’m not bad,” Kya said before she flicked KJ’s hand away. He had been trying to dig in her ear to annoy her.

I rolled my eyes away from them and focused back on my husband. The past ten years had been glorious, even with all their crazy asses. I wouldn’t have it any other way. My life was absolutely perfect, and it was all because of him. Keegan Slater was a force to be reckoned with, but he was the softest man on Earth for me. Somehow, fate found it fit that we mesh together as one. How did I get so lucky?

“You love me?” Keegan asked, ignoring my original question.

“More than anything.”

He gazed at me with so much love swimming in his eyes, I couldn’t help but to melt into him.

“You wanna know something?” he finally asked after planting a kiss on my nose.

“Of course.” I looked up at him like he had personally bullied the moon to stay in the sky while the sun was away.

“You are my everything.”

“Everything?” I beamed up at him. After all these years, he still knew how to make my heart flutter.

“Everything. I may not know everything in the world, but one thing I do know, Mrs. Slater, is I would be Nothing Without You.”

The end.