Hunting the Fairy Tale

Chapter 105 - Sunday Lunch

Devan

Not the kind of first impression I would've wanted to make on the daughter of the woman I'm trying to date, but it's pretty accurate, so... I guess it's perfect... 

It's all good in the spirit of honesty, right?

I have Hunter in a headlock, and he is trying to remove my leg or something, and it doesn't take long for us to fall over bean bags and end up tangled on the floor. This is how we always greet each other when I come over.

"Hi," I say to the girl standing at the door leading into the kitchen, nervously clutching the wispy little rat that tried to kill my ears before humping my leg and eating my face when I just arrived. "I'm Devan Taylor."

"P-pleased to meet you, Sir."

"Sir?" Hunter scoffs, letting me go to sit up, and the way he is looking at the girl is making me smile. So, like mother, like daughter. Becca has me grinning like an idiot, and this sweet little girl has the same effect on my boy, Hunter. "Missy, this guy is no 'sir'," he assures her. "He is barely house-trained."

"A little like you then," she smiles, surprising me. Up until this moment, she'd seemed almost terrified of me. I laugh, finally letting go of Hunter's head and getting to my feet.

"Nah, don't think Hunter is house-trained yet."

"Coach!" Paisley squeaks, appearing from the door behind Willow, probably shooed from the kitchen by Tanner. I catch her when she launches herself at me, and I grunt, pretending to feel her weight. The girl is made of feathers.

"How's my girl?"

"Good! How's my coach?" she asks, clamping her thin arms around my neck in a stranglehold. I don't actually coach her in anything, but the name stuck. I haven't seen her for almost two weeks, and now that I have her in my arms, I realise just how much I've missed her.

"I'm good too," I grin, enjoying the hug.

Whenever I fear that I'll never actually be a father, I comfort myself in the knowledge that I already have a whole brood to love and to be abused by. I'm still swapping stories with Paisley, setting her back on her feet, when I hear Jake's voice coming from the study behind me. He is arguing with someone about things that might be made-up terms; most of them are unpronounceable and don't make sense to me at all.

I pop my head in the door and am shocked to see that it is not Ryan that he is having the highly scientific argument with (as usual); it is a girl made of cobwebs and sunshine. A very beautiful snow princess and her cheeks are flushed, while she happily drives Jake's blood pressure up by arguing with him about something called special relativity... as far as I can tell.

"Seriously, how do you manage to sound like you're trying to disprove Einstein's theories by agreeing with him?" Jake growls, and I think I like this girl because I've never seen Mr Unflappable unravel like this before. She is giving him an almost flirty look, and if he'd set his equations and theories aside for one minute, he might notice it... unless this is their way of flirting.

I don't speak scientist...

"It's, what you say? Gift?" the girl smirks at him and then she sees me, and her eyes widen in surprise. She doesn't look terrified the way Willow did, but she definitely did not expect me in the door.

"Hej," she says, giving me a smile and a nod.

"Hi, Coach, meet Ronja; she's a friend of Willow's, dragged here to piss me off," Jake mutters, and now I like the girl even more.

"Hi, Ronja," I grin. "Nice to finally meet someone that manages to piss Jake off on behalf of the rest of us mere mortals."

Actually, we usually do a pretty good job of that ourselves, just never quite on his mental plane.