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Sage so badly wanted to believe him.
“If you’re uncomfortable,” Ethan continued, “I’ll understand if you’d rather not join my family for dinner tonight.”
Sage shook her head. “I can’t disappoint Ricky. Baking cookies with your mother was the first thing he mentioned this morning.”
“You sure?”
She nodded.
“I don’t know the name of the man who hurt you. Whoever he was, he didn’t deserve you. I’m not that man and I’ll do whatever necessary to prove it.”
Closing her eyes, Sage was uncertain if she should believe him. The thing was, she wanted to trust Ethan.
“Do you feel better now?” he asked.
Again, she nodded. “I do. Thanks for listening.”
“Of course.”
Sage wasn’t entirely convinced. He must have read her thoughts, because he added, “I’ll tell you what. If you’d rather, I’ll collect Ricky and the two of us can go. That way you can have the evening free.”
She automatically discounted the idea. “Thanks, but I need to be there, too. I go where Ricky goes.”
“Rest assured Ricky will fit right in.”
Sage had no doubt that was true.
It was just Sage’s luck that Erica happened to be walking by as Sage exited Ethan’s office. She matched her step to Sage’s as they continued toward her office.
“What was that about?” Erica asked, tilting her head toward Ethan’s office.
Sage hesitated.
Erica grinned as if she already knew. “Ethan agreed to be Santa for Ricky, didn’t he?”
“Yes, and he’s been super thus far.”
“I knew he would do a great job.” Her assistant had been championing Ethan from the get-go, and she’d been right. Ethan had been perfect with Ricky, gaining the young boy’s confidence and adding excitement and fun.
They entered Sage’s office, and she lowered her voice when she noticed Troy was within hearing distance. “Ethan is taking us to have dinner and meet his family tonight.”
“Nice,” Erica said, before sitting down at her desk, getting ready for the day.
Sage followed suit, entering her own office. She found she really wanted to trust Ethan. He wasn’t anything like Mark. The last couple days she’d seen an entirely different side of him. She’d been attracted to him before and was even more so now.
Ethan was charming and fun. She envied the easy camaraderie he had with Ricky. She’d enjoyed the time they’d spent together far more than she’d expected. Hard as it was to admit, she looked forward to spending even more time with him.
Sage insisted that she meet Ethan at his family home rather than have him collect her and Ricky. That gave her the freedom to leave if Ricky became overly tired.
Her nephew spoke of little else from the time she picked him up after work, asking Sage questions she couldn’t answer.
“What kind of cookies are we going to bake?”
“Sorry, I didn’t think to ask,” she told him.
“I hope it’s snowball cookies or chocolate-chip,” he said, and then grew thoughtful. “I bet it’s sugar cookies. Mom baked sugar cookies every Christmas and she let me decorate them. They were really good, too. I made them pretty. Mom said so.”
“I guess we’ll find out later.” When Ricky was happy, that made Sage happy.
