“That’s all I’m asking.” He shifted position and his hand slipped from her knee, accidentally sliding up her thigh, where his fingers touched wetness.

He looked at her, eyebrow raised. “Really?”

She nodded, smiling.

Leaning back on the bed, she spread her legs, and he got on top of her. They did it wordlessly, silently, and when he sensed that it was about to happen and she was going to make some noise, he put his mouth over hers to muffle it, so the girls wouldn’t be awakened.

Afterward, they both used the bathroom, then both went back to bed.

Where they both fell asleep.

****

When he awoke in the morning, Patty was gone.

The girls were still in bed, and a note on the kitchen counter told him to make them breakfast. He was angry that, even after her promise last night to spend more time with the kids, she’d left him here without telling him where she was going, while he was supposed to get them ready and take them to school.

Only it wasn’t a school day, he remembered. It was Saturday. With so much going on, he was losing track of time.

So who was going to watch the girls? He still needed to be in the office by eight, and he grew even angrier as he realized that he was also going to have to arrange for daycare.

What could Patty have been thinking?

“Time to wake up!” he called out.

Judging by the screams and laughter that greeted his words, Sue and Jillian were already awake. Brad was not much of a cook, and the only breakfast foods he knew how to prepare were cinnamon toast or Cheerios, but he offered them their choice of either, and they both voted for cinnamon toast with hot chocolate.

He drank some coffee and checked his phone while Sue and Jillian ate their breakfast, hoping Patty had arranged for someone to watch the girls. There were no messages, but Patty called right at that moment, apologizing profusely. An emergency had come up, she told him.

“Emergency?” he said. “I’m the goddamn sheriff. I deal with real emergencies.”

Jillian’s eyes grew wide. “Daddy said a bad word!”

“Keep eating,” he told her. He took the phone down the hall to the bedroom. “It wasn’t a real emergency,” he told Patty. “It was a real estate emergency. There’s a big difference. You should have woken me up and told me. Now I have to get to work and find someone to watch the kids.”

“Just drop them by my office on your way,” she said. “I’ll be there before you will. And you’re right. I should have woken you up. I’m sorry. Forgive me?”

He couldn’t stay mad at her when she used that voice, and he apologized for getting angry, and she apologized again for not waking him, and they hung up on good terms.