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If you have been waiting patiently for this chapter, you should thank Michael P for bugging me incessantly - or this would probably have never happened.
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Sophie's dad - I still don't know his name - offered to help with the bags.
Sophie stuck her left index finger into my right, rear pant-pocket and said, "We've got it. We'll meet you in the dining room in 10 minutes. A glass of ice water would really hit the spot right now."
Her dad looked like he was going to object but Sophie's mom grabbed his hand and turned him towards the house.
I guided Sophie back to the Ranger where I flopped my seat forward and grabbed our backpacks.
My sexy, little Helen Keller took her pack, threw it over her left shoulder, and stuck her finger back into my pocket.
That's my indication that she's ready to go and I'm supposed to take the lead.
Since her mom and dad headed through the front door, that's the direction I went.
The brick path sloped from the drive, through a break in the waist-high hedge, and continued up to the two steps at the front porch - which was really just a landing one full step down from the entryway.
Sophie, obviously, already knew the way but I still slowed at each step so she could navigate the trouble-spots.
As I reached for the handle to the storm-door, she said, "There's a stairway straight across from the front door. My room is at the top of the stairs - 180 to the left - above the dining room - which you'll see on the way past."
I nodded.
"Unless my siblings have fucked with me, my room should be the way I left it. Mom won't have changed anything. We'll drop the packs on the bench below the front-window. After that, you can throw me on the bed, take my breath away with some naughty kisses, and then we'll head to the dining room to be assaulted with a million questions."
"Roger, Roger."
I paused, just inside the front door, while she closed it. As she did, I took a moment to look around the small area.
Seeing shoes to the right, I kicked mine off - worried about how my socks probably smelled after the trip.
Daredevil noticed, of course.
"My brother plays basketball - so mom will not say anything about your stinky socks - but we'll ditch them in my room and switch before we come back down. Mine probably smell almost as bad as yours."
Up the stairs we went..
In Sophie's room - which was *way* more pink than I had expected - I stowed the packs (retrieving fresh socks for both of us) while she climbed on the bed.
Since she was just lying there, pondering dreamily, I peeled off her old socks and tickled her feet with my fingertips.
She fidgeted and pulled them out of my reach as I alternated back and forth between the two.
"Enough, bastard!" she gasped, "There should be a small laundry hamper to the left of my door. Throw the socks there."
Having dealt with the offensive clothing, I climbed onto the bed - slithering up her small frame - and kissed from her right ear, across her nose, to the left, and then down, across her neck.
She lost a brief battle with the giggles, grabbed my face for a kiss, and then bit my lip.
Her eyes were open.
"I see you." I said.
She looked into my eyes, searching.
After a pause, she asked, "Do you love me?"
"What the fuck, Soph?!"
"We're doing this whole fucking parent thing and I'm just a little messed in the head. Alright? You're not fucking with me, are you?"
"I can't believe I don't already know your middle or last names because - if I did - I would call you by your full, likely-embarrassing, legal name and tell you to get your shit together."
"Electra".
"Sophia Electra?"
"Yes. Sophia Electra Andrews."
"Sophia Electra Andrews, you are the sexiest handicapped.."
"Ass."
".. person I've met - and I believe I have fallen completely in love with you."
"Fuckboi."
"When I'm with you, life moves so fast that I can barely catch my breath.."
"Man-whore."
".. and when we're apart, I feel like the air has been ripped from my lungs."
"Silver-tongued demon-spawn."
I looked into those stormy eyes.
"I am so worried about your parents liking me because I feel like, if I fuck this up, it would destroy the best thing I've ever had."
"Fine. I'll take that as a 'yes'."
"So, Ms. Andrews, are we ready to do this thing?"
"Tell me yours."
I paused for a second, finally realizing what she was asking.
"Geoffrey Alan Xander."
She laughed out loud.
"No shit?!" she guffawed, "So - if we get married - my initials with be S.E.X.?"
"I guess, yeah."
Her giggles were back.
I buried my nose against her neck and luxuriated in the musical tones she was creating.
She reached down between us, grabbed my dick, which - apparently - had been enjoying her jiggly little body - and planted the sweetest kiss on my lips - while rubbing her thumb around on my dickhead.
"C'mon, fucktoy, let's go be social."
Halfway down the stairs, we could hear multiple voices coming from the dining room.
"Great. You get to meet the siblings too. Just ignore them. They'll probably stay quiet until they get to know you - but just ignore them if they start any shit."
The last line was delivered a little louder than necessary - so - I assumed it was a message for somebody other than me - and didn't respond.
There were six chairs around the big table.
There was enough family resemblance in each of their faces to assure me that these were, indeed, the siblings I'd been warned about.
Mr. Andrews was sitting - with his back to the kitchen - at the head of the table, with his wife to his right. To her right was a high school female - the sister. To the sister's right - at the opposite end of the table from the family patriarch - sat a high school male - the little brother.
The boy looked more like dad; the girl looked more like mom.
Sophie had bits of both but - thankfully - took most of her adorable appearance from her mother's side of the tree.
Her piercing eyes, though, were her dad's.
The two empty chairs - to her dad's left - had glasses of water waiting for us. The others appeared to be having lemonade or something like that.
I attempted to put Ms. Sassypants in the seat nearest her father but she somehow pirouetted us and I ended up in the chair - facing her dad - while she sat across my lap - facing her mother.
I started to pinch her nipple, in protest, then realized we had an audience, and halted with my hand in mid-air in front of her.
I slid my hand under her armpit and pretended like I was scooching her farther up my lap.
Hoping that didn't look as dumb as I felt like it did, I left my arm draped across her lap with my thumb tucked into her waistband.
She put her left arm across my shoulders and used her right hand to fuck with my hair - since I, obviously, couldn't easily do anything about it and she knew it would drive me crazy.
"Mom, Dad, this is Geoffrey. He has a silver tongue and will probably take half of your crap home with him - at your insistence. Please treat him like the criminal he is."
"Geoffrey, this is Harold and Mandy Andrews who gave me about half of the bad habits that you abhor. The others I learned by hiding in lockers in the boy's shower room after football practice."
Sophie's sister snorted.
"This is Isabella. She's a senior. She turned 18 last September. Michael, behind you, to your left, is a Junior and will turn 18 just after school starts."
"Since all three of us have late September birthdays, you can guess what daddy's favorite thing to unwrap on Christmas Eve might be."
"Sophia!"
I looked from Sophie's evilly-arched eyebrows to her dad's stunned face - to her mother's hand covering her open mouth - from which the exclamation had come. From there, my visual tour took me to her sister's smirk - and, finally, to her brother's eyes - which were completing the same circuit that mine were.
"C'mon, mom! He may look innocent but he's not - plus - most kindergartens can figure that out without being told.. once they know where babies come from."
I attempted to intervene.
"September, huh?"
"September 25
th
, to be exact, and don't even think about buying me any more irises."
Time to switch tactics..
"Mr. and Mrs. Andrews.."
Sophie's face drew closer to my own - and she bit my ear.
"I've got to tell you that I am extremely nervous, meeting you - meeting your family."
Had her dad leaned forward slightly?
"As Sophie mentioned in her phone conversation with you - Mrs. Andrews.."
"Mandy, please."
Sophie laughed, "You can try but he's incapable."
".. our relationship started out rather unconventionally."
"Oh, go on, I love this part!" my little nymphomaniac taunted.
"I had met Sophie a few times over the last year or so. During that time, she was in a relationship with a classmate of mine."
"Cal." Sophie's dad uttered, emotionlessly - almost without exhaling.
"Yes."
I glanced at her mom and she nodded. I plowed forward.
"I was smitten."
"He was smitten." Sophie mimicked.
Sophie's mother cleared her throat and gave her a look. She looked back with a "What?" expression - like she could actually see her mom's face.
"I.. I am embarrassed to admit that I often made excuses to visit their apartment - and went out of my way to make sure my path crossed hers when we were moving between classes."
"That was you - hiding in the bushes?!"
Her sister gasped as the color first drained from my face - and then flushed fully red.
I turned to my assailant.
"I never hid in the bushes," - under my breath I whispered "Thank God!" - "but I did have a favorite bench to sit on to wait for you when you were leaving English class."
"I *knew* that was your cologne! Did you take two pictures of me?"
"Yes. I took the first after you'd passed and you turned and looked directly at me. I got embarrassed and deleted it. Two minutes later, I couldn't decide if you'd looked pleased or angry. I took the next picture the next time you had English - a Wednesday, I think. I waited until you passed, snapped the picture, and waited for you to look back. You never did."
"I figured if you were dumb enough to take the exact same picture twice in a row, you weren't worth the reaction. I wore the same outfit the second time, you know."
"I know."
"Do you like that skirt or something?"
"It *does* suit you. You strut like a cat when you have that outfit on."
