The Sweetest Gift - Scarlett Cole Page 0,27

to Santa and take a family photograph.

Family.

The word caught him off guard.

He’d always known his path to fatherhood would be to build his family through fostering or adoption. How could it not, with both he and Jenny being a product of the system? But he’d thought they’d spend time fostering, help lots of kids, before progressing to adopting. Yet, the idea of letting those three beautiful kids disappear back into a system that may be forced to break them up soon, as Jefferson moved into the older category of children, was more than Nik could handle.

Quietly, he slipped out of their room in the two-bedroomed suite he’d booked for them all. Housekeeping was going to have a field day with all the fake snow footprints Jenny had made around the table they’d left the food and their letters to Santa on. He’d paid to have a massive tree brought into the suite just for them. Sure, they had to be here for the wedding, but there was no way the boys weren’t having a full Christmas morning.

He nudged the door open to their room. Jefferson lay as stiff as a log in the position they’d left him when they’d said goodnight. Charlie was snuggled up in a ball with his favorite stuffed cat, Stinky Paw. He held it by the leg and pressed the paw up against his nose while Charlie sucked his thumb. The cat smelled so bad and was likely unhygienic, but the kid wasn’t for letting him put the darn thing in the wash.

But Henry. The covers were all untucked and he was lying sideways across the bed, so close to falling off that Nik crept to the edge of the bed and straightened the poor kid out. As he placed the cover across Henry’s chilled frame, he wondered if the kid was having nightmares or was just an active sleeper.

Closing the door behind him, he walked back toward his and Jenny’s room. In the living room were piles of gifts that had been hidden in suitcases in Lennon and Gia’s suite the day before. Stockings hung from door handles.

Waiting for the boys to wake up was going to be torture. He was actually… excited. Excited in a way he hadn’t felt before. It wasn’t just because of the boys. Something about this Christmas felt different to him, too.

With lightness in his heart, he crept back into his bedroom and shut the door.

Jenny rolled over, just her head sticking out of the covers. “Why are you awake so early?” she mumbled.

Pulling the covers back, he slipped in bed beside her and pulled her into his arms. Her body was warm to the touch, her sweet curves lining up along the side of his body. “Couldn’t sleep so I checked in on the boys.”

“Are they okay?” she asked, placing a chaste kiss on his chest. Her fingertips traced the ho-ho-ho on his pajama top.

“They’re fine. Remember when we lived in the apartment?” he asked, thinking about the tiny place above the Greek restaurant on the Danforth. They owned it now, and two nineteen-year-old men, Kyle and Fletcher, lived in it, as they’d aged out of care and had nowhere else to go.

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times,” Jenny said.

Nik laughed. “It’s a bit early for Dickens, Babe.”

“Perhaps. But it’s true. We had each other, and some good memories. And it was so very hard.”

“Perhaps nostalgia and distance take the edge off those memories. It’s like the impact of them takes on a soft-focus instead of a harsh image.”

Jenny pushed herself up on one elbow. “What’s on your mind?”

She knew him well.

“I’m just thinking about Jefferson, Henry, and Charlie. This is still very much in harsh focus for them. They don’t have the benefit of time, experience, and success later in life to feel stable. They are still very much in the tumultuous waves of it all, trying to keep their little heads above water. Especially Henry.”

Jenny leaned forward and pressed her lips to his, the connection soothing the sudden discomfort pushing its way through his bones. Nik placed his hand behind her neck, holding her against him.

“I love you,” she said, her lips barely leaving his. They kissed for a moment longer before Jenny pulled back. “You are a great dad, Nik. Seeing you with those boys the last eight months… you’ve proven yourself to them and to me over and over.”

“It just doesn’t feel like enough when I know there is