After the contentious custody battle, Frank & Mary go on with their lives as usual. But it isn't until an eventful night at Ferg's that Frank starts to wonder if maybe his life might be missing something. Now that his niece has a normal life, maybe...
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Warnings: PG 13 some sexual content
Authors Note: Again, I'm very sorry about the long delay in this chapter. I've recently moved and trying to unpack and get used to my new normal. But it felt great to finish this chapter and get back to writing again!
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Joey stirred in her sleep and reached out across her bed for Frank, only to feel cold sheets in his place.
Where is he? Her heart seemed to call out the question and mourn his absence before her brain could actually process that she was alone. It was rare for Joey to spend the night with Frank and not wake up in his arms. They always teased each other and mocked their cheesiness, but both agreed that they always seemed to sleep better when they were all tangled up together.
Due to his absence, Joey considered, for a second, that her sleepy mind had played a trick on her and that she'd only imagined that Frank had spent the night with her and that he was really across the street sleeping soundly at his place.
No, she hadn't imagined their night together, Joey recalled, as her groggy mind start to work properly. Mary and Sam had had a slumber party a few doors down at her mom's house and she and Frank had gone out for dinner with Alice and Barry.
It had been a slice a heaven, when they'd come home and finished a bottle of Frank's delicious wine while they'd sat on her living room floor and talked for hours. They had dove into her vinyl record collection and had play faught and wrestled like hyper children. As the night had progressed, however, they might have acted more like drunk idiots as they'd danced barefoot and laughed until their sides hurt. But it had been a happiness that Joey had cherished and had only made her fall deeper in love with her man. She loved learning new things about him and was amazed to discover what graceful dancer Frank was as he'd swung her around her living room and kitchen without missing a beat; like a sexy dashing Fred Astaire.
Frank's laughter still meant as much to her as the first time that she had heard it that fateful night at Ferg's. His laugh still had a magically way of making her feel lighter and more carefree. Joey loved breaking him out of his shell and being be silly with him. The playful eyerolls that he directed at her dorkiness were becoming his own personal term of endearment and she loved it. Making him happy, even just for moment, made her feel more accomplished then earning a PhD. She had no idea what she had done in a previous life to deserve that kind of happiness.
Joey stretched out in her bed and noticed that her ribs still felt sore from Frank's relentless tickles, not to mention the other more tender parts of her anatomy that he had paid particularly close attention to once their play fighting developed into a familiar passion that tended to always consume them whenever they were left alone together. Joey rubbed her thighs together and made a mental note to google beard burn treatments later. Frank was always so insatiably relentless when it came to her pleasure, it was a small price to pay.
