“All good.” I turn to Franny. “This is my brother, Tucker, his wife Miranda, and their kids, Jenny and Kingston. Guys, this is Franny. She lives here on the first floor.”

“It’s nice to meet you.” Franny smiles as Kingston goes over to stand in front of his mom.

“You too.” Miranda returns her smile with one of her own.

“Tucker isn’t my real dad; he’s my stepdad,” Kingston says, then adds, “But I still call him dad.”

“Cool.” Franny laughs.

“Are you Uncle Dayton’s girlfriend?”

“No, we’re just friends,” she tells him softly.

“That sucks. Mom and Aunt Emma say he needs a girlfriend, and you’re pretty.”

“Oh, wow, thanks.” She laughs again as Miranda reaches her hand down to cover Kingston’s mouth.

“Okay, well, I think that’s our cue to leave,” she says with her cheeks pink. “Sorry about that. He doesn’t have a filter right now, and everything just kind of comes out… all the time.”

“He’s adorable,” Franny assures, with laughter in her voice.

“I’m not sure you’d feel the same if you received some of the phone calls I’ve gotten from his school.” She chuckles, adjusting Jenny in her arms when she begins to wiggle. “It was nice meeting you, Franny. Hopefully, we’ll see you around.”

“Yeah, hopefully,” she agrees as they move past us and out the door, saying goodbye as they leave. “They seem nice.”

“They are.”

“And your nephew is cute,” she adds softly as we start down the hall toward her apartment.

“He is. He’s also a handful, and that only gets worse when he’s with his cousin.”

“How many nieces and nephews do you have?”

“Four. Tucker and Miranda have Kingston and Jenny, Miles has Winter—he just recently got married, and Winter’s biological mom lives in Colorado—and Willow and Clay have Rowen.” We stop at Franny’s door, and as soon as she opens it, PJ excitedly starts to jump around at her feet… until he notices me and starts backing up.

“Don’t act like that. You remember Dayton.” She lifts him off his feet, and I rub the top of his head.

“Does he need to go out before we go upstairs?”

“Yeah, I’ll take him.”

“How about I do that while you get your stuff together?”

“I—”

“He’ll be fine,” I assure her when she gives me a nervous look.

“All right.” After she gets him on his leash, I take a few treats she hands me, shoving them in my pocket, and pick him up since it’s obvious he’s not willingly going to go with me without his mom. No matter how many treats I try to bribe him with.