CLANDESTINE | HS |

BEST YEARS

Harry

"That's not the right way."

I grumble as I mess with the stack of wood in front of me and ignore the way Logan has her elbow lodged into the side of my ribs.

"Shut up." She smiles, turning to look at me with wide eyes. "Nobody asked you, Bob the Builder."

"What? I'm just saying they said to put it next to the window and not on the roof—"

"Harry—"

"Daddy! Look what I did!"

Tearing my eyes away from the ones I fell in love with years ago, I look down at the bright eyed toddler sitting in her lap.

Leaning forward, I let my fingers dance across his ribs and listen to the sweet sound of his giggles. "What did you do, Fletch?"

"I glued it!" Clasping his hands under his chin, I push back the dark curl that falls across his forehead. "Loooook!"

Looking at his birdhouse, I can't help but smile.

The pieces are glued in all the wrong places and he's already dipped into the plate of paint that Logan poured out for him. Streaks of yellow and blue mark his chubby cheeks and the front of his shirt, despite the apron I tied around his waist and looped over his head.

"It looks perfect." Looking up at his mom, I press a kiss to her lips. "Absolutely perfect."

"Kissy!" Gripping the front of my shirt in his little paint covered fist, he tugs on it. "My turn, Daddy!"

Logan laughs as I lean forward, pressing kisses all over our son's little face — minus the paint — and listening to him laugh and forgetting about the disaster of a birdhouse in front of us.

"Are you gonna put your birdhouse next to daddy's?" Wrapping her arms around him, she tickles his sides and presses her own kiss to his cheek.

He turns on her lap with his paintbrush dripping with an oversized glob of paint, a cute crease cutting between his brows. "No! Want to put it at Nana's! Can I?"

When he looks between the two of us, not a damn thing in this world could make me tell him no.

"I'm sure we can take it to Nana's when we leave here." I smile. "Nana might even let you spend the night if you ask her."

Dancing in his seat, when he turns around to press the mixture of paint to the top of his birdhouse, I let out a content sigh.

Nine years ago I slipped a diamond mounted on a gold band onto Logan's finger and asked her to marry me and every day since then has been the best day of my life.

I still remember the way she looked when we got married on the dock at the lake house, a small wedding with just the people that meant the most to us.

God, and I thought she was beautiful then?

That was until I saw her pregnant with our child.

Even when she cried because she couldn't see her feet anymore to paint her toes, she had never been so stunning.

Fletcher Grant Styles came into the world surrounded by a whole bunch of people who were already so in love with him that he'll never know what it feels like to be alone.

Our beautiful, healthy baby boy was the thing that neither of us ever knew we were missing.

From the very first time I held him in my arms he's been my tiny best friend.

Logan claims that he's a momma's boy, but we both know that he's been attached to my hip from the very beginning.

"If Fletcher stays at my moms tonight, do you want to go on a date with me?" Logan leans over, her lips brushing against the shell of my ear.