Chapter Text
Leanne would have liked to be able to say that she didn’t know when this started, but she did. She knew exactly when her crush on Roy Kent, English football legend, began. His niece, Phoebe O’Sullivan, had been in her year two class. Phoebe’s mother was a very busy doctor and a single mother, which meant that her brother ended up helping her quite a lot and therefore Leann saw him a lot. He was kind if gruff and charming in a way that she found irresistible. But he also had a girlfriend (a former model, in fact) and was far out of her reach. So, she ogled him from a distance, and when the school year ended, she was mildly relieved that she wouldn’t have to see him as much as anymore.
For the next two years, she saw him at a distance here and there. The first year, he was often seen picking up or dropping off his niece. But when Phoebe was in year four, his presence around the school declined as her mother’s boyfriend became more involved in her life and then during that winter, her mother had a baby (adopted, apparently) with the boyfriend (who was now her husband) and was on family leave. Dr. O’Sullivan walking her daughter to and from school with the baby in a pram became a regular sight around Richmond Primary. A few teachers commented here or there about missing seeing Coach Kent or Dr. O’Sullivan’s husband, but mostly they enjoyed seeing the pleasant doctor with her daughters.
But this story really begins the fall that Phoebe was in year five. It was a Friday night in October. Leann was sitting in front of a pub with a few friends when she suddenly heard someone calling her name enthusiastically. She looked up to see Phoebe approaching, followed by her uncle pushing a pram. “Ms. Bowen, hi!”
Leann jumped to her feet and walked over to her former student. “Phoebe, hello! How are you?”
“I’m good,” she replied, bouncing on her feet. “Uncle Roy is taking Natalie and me for ice cream.”
“Natalie is not getting ice cream,” her uncle grumbled as he joined them.
“But Uncle Roy!”
“She’s a baby, Phoebe. She doesn’t need ice cream.”
“She’s almost one.”
Roy rolled his eyes. “She won’t be one for almost two months, Phoe. She can have ice cream then.”
“Fine.”
Leann was about to slip away when Roy’s attention shifted to her. “Ms. Bowen, it’s been ages. Good to see you again, how are you?”
She smiled. “I’m doing well, keeping busy. How are you, Coach Kent?”
He nodded. “I’m good, yeah.”
“I had heard you became the manager last season, but I’m afraid that I should alert the press.”
“About what?”
“Well, it seems as though Ms. Welton isn’t paying you well enough if you’re picking up babysitting jobs on the side.”
He chuckled at that, lighting up his face. “That’s a good one. But no, my sister and her husband are having a date night, so I told them I’d take the girls.”
“He made us dinner, and now we’re getting ice cream.”
“Coach Kent cooks, eh?”
He blushed a little at that. “I cook well enough for this one.” He paused, then motioned to the pram. “Have you met little Miss Natalie yet?”
“I’ve seen her with her parents during drop-off and pick up, but I haven’t had a proper introduction.”
To Leann’s surprise, he reached into the pram and picked up the baby. She was almost surprised by how natural he was with the baby as he cooed to her and settled her on his hip. “Well, this is Natalie Tartt. Natalie, meet your sister’s long-suffering former teacher, Ms. Bowen.”
She grinned at the chubby, smiling baby. “Well, hello, Natalie, it’s nice to meet you.”
“Do you want to hold her?” Phoebe offered. “She’s a very good baby.”
“You don’t have to,” Roy quickly reassured her.
She was about to say no, but the baby reached an arm towards her. Leann’s heart melted. “Oh, could I?”
Coach Kent didn’t even reply; he simply handed the baby to her. “Careful though. She’s a squirmy little thing.”
He wasn’t wrong, she observed as she settled the baby on her hip. “Well, hello, Natalie, aren’t you the sweetest little thing?”
The baby looked at her solemnly, her big blue eyes seemed to be scanning Leann’s face. She reached up a hand towards the new-to-her face, but Leann quickly grabbed the hand. Natalie grabbed one finger hard and held on, a smile appearing on her face as she gripped on.
“She’s a pretty good baby,” Phoebe commented. “She likes to cuddle, and I think that she sleeps pretty well. And she’s very smiley.”
“She definitely likes her big sister,” Roy added.
Leanne smiled at the baby in her arms. “They say that babies smile more if they see people around them smiling lots.”
“Well, between her parents and her big sister, this one definitely sees lots of smiles every day.”
Phoebe narrowed her eyes at her uncle and took a scolding tone. “You say that like you don’t smile like anything every time you see her. You smile more around her than you do around anyone else I’ve ever seen.”
“That’s why Ms. Welton needs to stop letting your stepfather bring her to training.”
“She’s ruining your tough guy image?” Leanne queried.
He rolled his eyes. “She’s distracting is what. And speaking of distracting, we’re distracting you from your friends.”
“I don’t mind,” she replied, realizing as she shifted the baby in her arms just how true that was.
“We really should let you go. I need to get that one ice cream as promised and then get this one home and to bed.”
“Right, of course,” she replied quickly.
“Don’t be sorry,” he told her as he took the baby from her arms. “I’m sorry to cut your baby cuddle short.”
Leann shook her head. “It’s fine. It was a pleasant surprise anyway; it’s not like you’re depriving me of anything.”
“Still,” he persisted, bouncing the baby a little. “I think you liked holding her, and I do feel a bit bad taking her back.”
“Thanks,” she said, looking down so as to avert his eyes.
He smiled as he kissed the top of the baby’s head. “Say goodbye to Ms. Bowen, Natalie.”
Leanne waved at the baby and took a step back. “Bye-bye, Natalie.”
He waved the baby’s hand at her, and she started to turn towards her friends. She startled when Roy cleared his throat. “I…I feel a bit weird doing this, but can I get your number?”
“My number?” she repeated turning back to face him.
He nodded. “I feel like a stupid kid doing this, but I’d like to take you out for coffee or dinner or a drink or something.”
She smiled at his verbal fumbling. “Yeah, that’d be nice.”
“So…”
“My number?” she said.
He took his phone out of his pocket. “Yeah.”
She recited his number as he typed into his phone. She was amazed at his dexterity as he balanced the baby.
“That right?” he asked showing her his phone.
She smiled. “Yep.”
“Great,” he replied. “I’ll text you soon.”
She smiled more. “I’m looking forward to it. It was good to see you. Bye, Phoebe!”
Phoebe looked up from the book she’d pulled out of the bottom of the pram. “Bye, Ms. Bowen! See you on Monday!”
“Was that Roy Kent you were talking to?” One of her friends asked as Leanne rejoined the group.
She nodded. “Yeah, I taught his older niece a couple of years back. She wanted to say hello.”
“You pair seemed friendly.”
She shrugged. “He’s always been nice to me.”
Louise leveled her gaze on Leanne. “Lee, you were holding the baby.”
“It was Phoebe’s idea.”
“And it might give him ideas.”
Leanne blushed. “Lou!”
“What? You want to have babies someday. A fucking fit man offered to let you hold a baby. Tell me you weren’t trying to give him the slightest hint of an idea.”
“If he got an idea, so much the better,” Leanne replied. “And she is a cute baby.”
Lou shook her head. “You’re impossible.”
Leanne shrugged. She wasn’t about to tell Lou that she’d given Roy her number or that the image of him with his niece in his arms, his lips pressed to her forehead was going to carry her through plenty of lonely nights.
Roy texted her around nine-thirty. “Hi, this is Roy Kent. I’d like to take you out for dinner or a drink or coffee-something.”
She smiled at the text. “I’d like that.”
“When are you free?”
She bit her lip as she typed her answer, her phone in her lap and out of her friends’ line of sight. “Definitely Tuesday, maybe Thursday and Friday.”
His reply was quick. “I can do Tuesday.”
“What time are you thinking?”
“I’m free after six.”
“We could get drinks and then dinner if we wanted?”
“Sounds great.”
“Do you want to go to the Crown and Anchor?”
“Could we go somewhere else?”
“Too many fans there for you, Coach?”
His reply took a few minutes that time. “It’d be nice to have a little bit of fucking privacy.”
“That’s fair.” Roy Kent struck her as someone who really valued his privacy. She looked up for a few minutes to answer a question Julianne was answering and to make sure that her friends didn’t think that she was ignoring them.
When she looked back down at her phone, there was a new message. “I prefer to go to Bones and Honey.”
“Isn’t that kind of exclusive?”
“I’m a member.”
Leanne took a cautious breath. Of course he was. “We really are from different worlds.”
“Is that going to be a problem?”
She sighed, forgetting momentarily that she was trying to hide her texting from her friends.
Lou turned her gaze on Leanne. “What are you up to?”
“Nothing.”
“That’s not true. You’ve got your phone in your lap. Who are you texting?”
“No one, just a guy from an app.”
“Just a guy?” her friend repeated. “That doesn’t sound like nothing.”
Leanne shrugged. “I don’t know. It probably won’t be anything. You know my history.”
Theresa, her friend who had been married for more than a decade, patted her on the back. “Someday you’ll meet a good one, Lee. I promise.”
“That’s what everyone tells me,” she replied before taking a quick glance down at her phone.
Roy had texted again. “If Bones and Honey makes you uncomfortable, we can go somewhere else. It’s not the only place I know.”
She pressed her lips together. Damn that man, he was willing to go somewhere that would make him less comfortable to make sure that she was more comfortable. She quickly typed an answer. “Bones and Honey is fine.”
Then she turned her attention back to her friends.
Monday morning, Leanne dressed with extra care. It wasn’t very likely that Roy would be bringing Phoebe to school, but she wanted to look cute on the off chance that she saw him. She wore a flattering dress that she knew emphasized her eyes and a pair of slight heels.
She didn’t see him. Instead, Dr. O’Sullivan walked her older daughter to school, the younger one in her pram. After leaving Phoebe with her teacher, her mother walked over to Leanne. “Good morning, Ms. Bowen!”
“Good morning, Dr. O’Sullivan,” she replied with a smile. “How are you this this morning?”
“I’m doing well. Phoebe said that she ran into you on Friday evening when she was out with her uncle and her little sister.”
“They did. And I got to meet little Natalie, which was delightful. She is such an adorable baby.”
Dr. O’Sullivan smiled. “Thank you. We’re pretty fond of her.” She reached into the pram and adjusted the blanket. “She’s a very good baby.”
“I’m glad to hear that. She seemed very sweet.”
“I should get going, but I wanted to stop by and say hello. Phoebe still talks about you often.”
Leanne smiled. “She is a delightful child. I really enjoyed having her in my classroom. And maybe someday I’ll have Natalie in my classroom.”
“That could be nice. We’ll see where we all are in seven years.”
The next morning, Leanne took a little less care with her morning outfit, figuring that she’d come home after work and change before her date with Roy. She pulled on a comfortable skirt, a sweater that paired well with the skirt, and one of her many pairs of sensible ballet flats.
That morning, Jamie Tartt walked his stepdaughter to school, baby Natalie again in the pram. She watched with a smile as Phoebe hugged Jamie as she said good-bye and he pressed his lips to the top of her head. She was struck not for the first time that while the Kent/O’Sullivan/Tartt family was a little untraditional she never worried about whether Phoebe was loved or cared for at home. Phoebe was a mostly happy child, and the adults who surrounded her clearly were invested in her happiness and well-being.
That evening, Roy offered to pick her up, an offer she mostly accepted because she didn’t want to figure out taking the tube to and from Bones and Honey. She straightened her already-straight hair. She put on slim-cut black pants with a dark blue top and her highest pair of heeled boots. She was fixing her mascara when he rang her bell.
Roy Kent was, unsurprisingly, dressed in black jeans, a black t-shirt, and a leather jacket. She wondered how many variations on each of those items he owned. But his smile when he saw her grabbed her attention the most. “You should smile more.”
“I should?”
She nodded. “You look…it lights up your face.”
“Well, I wouldn’t want that near the football pitch.”
“That’s fair. It might confuse people.”
He nodded. “Shall we?”
She grabbed her jacket off a hook and nodded.
“Can I ask you a question?” Leanne queried once they were seated with their drinks.
“Isn’t that the fucking point of a date?”
“It’s kind of a weird question.”
Roy shrugged. “Go ahead.”
“The whole World’s Greatest Uncle bit, have you always…were you…” she blushed. “I sound stupid.”
He smiled wryly. “No, you don’t.”
“Have you always been really involved in Phoebe’s life?”
He thought for a moment. “Sort of.”
She leaned forward. “What do you mean?”
“Do you remember how I once told you that Phoebe’s dad was a living piece of shit?”
She nodded.
“He was always like that. When my sister got pregnant, he wasn’t very interested or excited. And then he was out of town when Phoebs was born, so I was there instead of him. But I didn’t really get involved until he fucked off. I was around once in a while, not all the time if that makes sense.”
She nodded again.
“I signed with Richmond after he left. There were other reasons for leaving Chelsea, but that was why I came to Richmond. I wanted to fucking be there for Ru and Phoebs.” He paused and took a sip of beer. “They’re the most important thing in my life. Well, and Natalie now.”
“What about Jamie?”
“He can stay.”
She smiled. “I think you secretly like him.”
Roy shrugged noncommittally. “What about you?”
“Well, I don’t really know Jamie, so I can’t secretly like him.”
Roy rolled his eyes. “You know what I mean. Any siblings? Nieces? Nephews? Mildly obnoxious brothers-in-law that you don’t mind getting a beer with?”
“I have two sisters and a brother. My younger sister is married.”
“Is your brother older or younger?”
“Younger,” she replied. “Were you scared of a big, scary older brother?”
Roy chuckled. “I do fulfill that role in my sister’s life. Or at least, I used to. I don’t think that Jamie needs me to scare him into treating my sister well.”
“That’s good.”
He nodded. “He’s turned out alright, I guess.”
“I love seeing your sister or him dropping Phoebe off in the morning. They always have Natalie with them, and it just seems like a sweet family.”
“I guess they are, but enough about my family. I want to know about you.”
Leanne took a sip of her drink. “What do you want to know?”
“Well, you have siblings, but do you have any nieces or nephews?”
“One of each,” she replied. “My younger sister is married, and she has two children.”
“Do you see them often?”
“At least once a month, and Olivia stayed with me last summer when Charlie was born.”
“How old are they?”
“Olivia is three going on thirty, and Charlie is three months old.”
He smiled. “From what I remember of Phoebe, three is an interesting age.”
“I imagine she must have been a handful at that age.”
He chuckled with a shake of his head. “I wasn’t around her as much back then, but from what I remember, she was about what you’d probably expect.”
“Olivia thinks she’s in charge all of the time.”
“She try to tell you what to do?”
Leanne laughed and ran a hand over her face. “You have no idea.”
“I bet you don’t stand for that. You put her in her place, don’t you?”
“I try.”
He grinned. “I bet you’re great at it.”
“Because I’m a teacher?”
Roy thought for a moment. “No, actually no; it’s more because you seem like you hold your own. It’s probably why you’re a fucking good teacher.”
She smiled and blushed a little at that comment. “I don’t think that I’m as good at holding my own as you think I am.”
“You put up with Phoebs for an entire year.”
“She’s so far from the worst kid that I’ve had to deal with over the years. She’s a picnic compared to some of my former students.”
His bushy eyebrows shot up. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
“No, absolutely not.”
He shook his head. “I don’t know how you do it. You’re a fucking saint if you ask me.”
Leanne could feel her cheeks growing pinker.
“I’m making you uncomfortable, aren’t I?”
She nodded.
“Fuck.”
Leanne looked up at him. “Don’t feel bad. I’m just…I don’t know. I’m not a saint.”
“You’re a teacher. I could never do that, having all those kids needing my attention all the time.”
“And I couldn’t be a football coach.”
“Did you always want to be a teacher?” Roy asked. They’d moved on from Bones and Honey to a small Mediterranean restaurant nearby.
Leanne put a scoop of hummus on her plate. “Well, I had some pretty ridiculous dream careers when I was really young.”
“Such as?”
“Don’t laugh.”
He traced an X over his heart with a smile.
“Well, for a bit, I wanted to be an equestrian.”
“How old were you?”
She thought for a moment. “Six, maybe seven.”
He nodded. “What else?”
“When I was very young, I wanted to work at the zoo because I wanted to be around cute baby animals all day.”
“And now you’re around small children all day.”
“Who are definitely not babies and not always cute,” she replied. “I wanted to be an author for a while growing up.”
“What kind of books did you want to write?”
“Mysteries, well now, I want to write a parenting guide.”
He chuckled. “If you wrote mysteries, I’d fucking read them.”
“Do you like to read?”
He nodded. “I wasn’t really into reading until Ted, the gaffer before me.”
“I remember him.”
“His first month in Richmond, he gave each one of us a book that he claimed was somehow fucking right for us.”
“What did he give you?”
“A Wrinkle in Time.”
Her eyes lit up. “Oh, I loved that. That was one of my favorites when I was a kid.”
“I wasn’t much of a reader as a kid.”
“Too much time playing football?”
Roy shrugged. “I went to Sunderland when I was nine. I didn’t really have a normal childhood after that.”
She nodded. “That must have been hard.”
Another shrug. “I didn’t know any different.”
“Did you always want to be a football player?”
He chuckled wryly. “It was all I fucking knew how to do. I was good at it. I liked it. It was decided pretty fucking early that was what I was going to do with the rest of my life.”
“Wow, retiring must have been hard.”
Roy nodded slowly, his eyes looking somewhere over Leanne’s shoulder. “Yeah, it was. It really fucking was.” He paused for a moment. “You might be the first person other than my sister to have said something like that.”
“I’m sorry,” she said gently.
He shrugged. “Not your fucking fault.”
She reached across the table and rested her hand on top of his. “Still, that sounds like it was really hard. I’m sorry that you had to go through that.”
Roy squeezed her hand gently and smiled. “You’re too kind.”
The rest of the date went well. At the end, Roy drove Leanne home and kissed her before she got out of the car. The second date went even better. Roy walked Leanne to her door, and they shared a long kiss.
“Let’s do this again,” he said as they pulled apart.
“Yes, soon.”
“Tuesday?” he offered.
Leanne grinned. “Perfect.”
“If you like, you could…you could come over to my place and I could make us dinner. If you want…”
She nodded. “That sounds great.”
“Good, great, yeah, I’ll be home around half six. You’re welcome to come over any time after that.”
And with that, he kissed her again and left.
Leanne found herself exchanging text messages with Roy. He could make her both smile and blush in a five-minute span. He cursed in text messages almost as much as he did in person. He was direct. She liked him even more in those text messages.
She watched the Richmond game that weekend, blushing and smiling every time that the camera panned to the Greyhounds’ manager. She felt like a thirteen-year-old, blushing and smiling at the sight of her crush. She was really glad that none of her friends could see her giggling or burying her face in her pillow over Roy Kent. She also didn’t have to talk about Just How Good Roy looked in that light blue jacket that he wore during the match. He might have preferred his blacks and greys, but she had to admit that blue was a really good color for him.
When Richmond won, she texted him to congratulate him. “Watched the game today, Coach. Congratulations!”
He replied faster than she had expected. “Thanks, we’ll have to get you to a game in person sometime soon.”
She grinned as she typed. “Sounds great! I’d love that!”
“We’re out of town the next two weeks. Week after that, you’re coming.”
“I can’t wait,” she replied, pleasantly surprised as she realized just how true that was.
Tuesday morning, Leanne woke up and put on a light blue dress that she really loved. She wasn’t sure if she’d have time to go home before going to Roy’s, and she wanted to be sure that her outfit would go smoothly from day to night, from work to a date at the guy’s house. She chose a dress that she knew flattered her. She picked practical shoes.
Before she left for work, she stopped in the bathroom, and she discovered that her period, which her tracking app claimed was still three days off, had started. She sighed and put in a tampon. “Fuck,” she muttered.
By the end of the day, she was tired. Her cramps were bad, and the paracetamol wasn’t helping. She was feeling a little dizzy, a little light-headed. She pulled out her phone and texted Roy. “I feel terrible doing this, but I’m not feeling well and I think we might need to postpone tonight. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it,” he replied. “Those fucking kids messing with your immune system again?”
She smiled, and then for some reason that didn’t entirely make sense to her, she chose to answer honestly. “It’s not something that I got from the fucking kids actually. My period started today, and I’m just…I don’t know. I feel like rubbish.”
Leanne felt a tinge of embarrassment at that message. She wasn’t sure if he would reply. What guy wanted to know that about a woman he’d only been on two dates with?
But Roy replied quickly. “In that case, I could bring the shit to your place and make dinner there. You wouldn’t have to do anything really, just fucking lay on the couch. You can say no if you want, but I’m happy to do it.”
Leanne chewed on her lip for a moment. She wasn’t sure that she really wanted to do this, but also…she liked Roy. He was offering to do this. He was offering to change his plans to suit her needs and make her dinner at her flat so that she could rest.
Roy sent her another message before she could reply. “I could make sure that it’s something high in iron if that helps.”
She smiled. “That sounds great. I’m heading home. Come by whenever you want.”
“Sounds like a plan. I’ll text when I’m on my way. Get some rest.”
Instead of the blue dress she’d been planning on, Leanne wore a pair of black yoga pants and a navy-blue top on her third date with Roy. In fact, when he rang the bell, she had been curled up on the couch for at least half an hour. When she opened the door, she could tell from the look on his face that she didn’t look well. He put a hand on her elbow and kissed her cheek. “Oi, let’s get you back to the couch and point me in the direction of the kitchen.”
“You don’t have to do this,” she replied.
He shook his head. “I don’t tend to do things that I don’t fucking want to do.”
“This just seems like it’s a bit much for a third date.”
He grunted as he began unpacking groceries in her kitchen.
“I’m not trying to say that I don’t appreciate this,” she said as she sank down into the couch, resting her head on a cushion.
“Are you drinking enough water?” he replied. “Where’s your water bottle?”
“Floor,” she answered.
He walked over to her and picked up the blue water bottle from the floor. “Just going to refill this for you. Hydration’s important.”
She blushed and nodded. She closed her eyes until he came back and then she cracked one open. “Do you want kids?”
He stopped and looked at her. “What?”
“I know it’s a weird question especially this early, but you just…you seem like you’d be a really good dad someday. You’re really good with kids.”
“You know that I’ve had a lot of practice with my nieces.”
“I know,” she agreed. “But you…you’re a very kind person.”
“Most people wouldn’t say that.”
“Most people only see you on television.”
He smiled slightly. “Fair point.”
“But anyway,” she said softly. “I was just wondering. Do you want kids? It’s okay if you don’t want to answer. I know it’s only our third date, so it’s early to talk about it, but I was just wondering…”
Roy reached out and squeezed her hand. “You’re fucking rambling, Leanne.”
“I just wondered…”
He shook his head, still holding her hand. “It’s okay. You’re fucking fine. You’re allowed to ask a fucking question. And I’ll even answer it.”
“Yeah?” she looked up at him.
He smiled, just a little. “Yeah.”
“Yeah? What’s the answer?”
“Fucking hell, woman.”
“What?”
“Yeah is the fucking answer. The answer is yeah.” He rolled his eyes a little. “I do want kids. Well, I’d like to have kids if possible.”
“You do? You would?”
He nodded. “Yeah, I fucking want kids. Being an uncle is great, but I’d like to have my own kids, to be someone’s dad.”
She smiled. “That’s a relief.”
“It is?”
She nodded. “I want kids, and you’re a pretty great guy, and I feel like we’ve been having fun together, and it would be pretty shitty if we didn’t want the same things.”
Roy smiled and squeezed her hand. “Spending all day trapped in a class for, what, the last five years hasn’t cured you of that?”
“Five years?” she repeated. “How old do you think I am? I’ve been teaching for more than a dozen years.”
He chuckled lightly. “You don’t look old enough.”
“Trust me. I feel old enough.” She paused for a moment. “Now, aren’t you supposed to be making dinner?”
He squeezed her hand again, then released right. “Right you are, I’ll hop to it.”
Leanne fell asleep while Roy was cooking, and he had to wake her up when dinner was ready. “This is the most embarrassing date of my life,” she commented as she wiped drool from her cheek.
“I’ve had worse.”
“That’s because from what I’ve heard you once dated someone who stole your watch for drug money.”
“And you’ve never had that happen to you?”
She looked at his perfectly straight face and burst out laughing. “I can safely say no.”
He shook his head. “You’ve lived a boring life.”
“I’m okay with that,” she said as she pulled herself into a seated position.
“You can stay on the couch.”
Leanne smiled slightly. “That was my plan.”
“You think you’ll be feeling more yourself on Thursday?” Roy asked after dinner. He’d washed the dishes and put the leftovers away in Leanne’s fridge so that she’d have meals for the next few days.
“Probably, why?”
“I was thinking that if you were up to it you could come over to mine on Thursday and I’d make you dinner there.”
“Oh!” she replied. “That could be really nice.”
“So, we’re on?”
She nodded. “Yeah, it’s a good idea.”
“You should get some sleep,” Roy commented after they finished watching About Time, one of Leanne’s favorite movies.
“I’ve slept!”
He rolled his eyes. “In your own bed, muppet.”
She yawned. “I suppose.”
He held out a hand. “C’mon. Up you go.”
Leanne grabbed his hand and carefully rose from the couch. “Thanks.”
“My pleasure,” he replied, his hand firm against her lower back. “You doing alright?”
She blinked a few times and nodded. “You’re right. I need to get to bed.”
Roy headed towards the door. “Alright, get some rest. I’ll see you Thursday.”
“See you Thursday,” she replied. “And thank you for this evening. It was really nice.”
“My pleasure,” he said before kissing her. When he pulled away from her, he continued. “I put the leftovers in meal-sized portions in your fridge, so you should be good on lunches for the rest of the week. Let me know if you need anything. And I’ll see you on
Thursday evening.”
She smiled and kissed him again. “See you then. Text me when you get home?”
“Sure, but go the fuck to sleep.”
As she closed the door behind him, Leanne realized that she was in serious danger of falling in love with Roy Kent.