A.N: Hi y'all! Yesterday I tried to upload this chapter and somehow ended up posting a chapter further along down the line (I'm genuinely convinced that the Fanfiction app hates me and is trying to ruin my life). Thank you to @Shola2001 for pointing it out, otherwise I would have just kept living my life and not noticed. fingers crossed this actually works this time!

- Daisie.xo

Chapter Ten:

"What about this one?"

I looked over Jax's shoulder at the laptop and frowned. "No."

"Why not?" He huffed out in annoyance.

We'd been looking at houses for three days, one of us loving one but the other one disagreeing. We couldn't agree, something was wrong, or they didn't have enough bedrooms.

"Because look how small the backyard is!" I clicked on the next photo. "Where are we goin' to build Abel's cubby house in that?"

"Abel's got a clubhouse, he doesn't need a cubby house." Jax dragged his hand down his face.

I pulled my clothes on for the day. "Jackson, our son is not using the clubhouse full of naked women and his psychotic uncles to escape us. We need to make somethin' that makes him want to hang out at home with our lame asses."

When he stayed silent, looked at him over my shoulder and frowned. "Okay, maybe you don't have a lame ass, but all I've got goin' for me is Larry."

He still didn't speak, just kept watching me with a warm smile on his face and I spun around. "What? You're freakin' me out."

Jax stood up and walked over to me, his smile only grew as he put his arms around my waist and leant back enough to look at my face. "You just called Abel our son."

"No, I didn't." I frowned at him like he'd lost a piece of his damned mind.

Jax chuckled. "Yes you did, babe."

I thought over my rant and realised that he was right, I had called him partly mine, and I felt my cheeks burn. "Sorry, I didn't mean to-"

"Don't say sorry." He shook his head, cutting me off before he pressed a chaste kiss to my forehead. "I love that you love him enough to consider yourself his ma."

I hadn't been sure how to broach the subject because I wasn't sure what his reaction would be, but I decided to just bite the bullet. "He called me mommy when I was givin' him his bath yesterday."

"Why didn't you tell me?" Jax's smile only grew.

I shrugged my shoulders. "I was worried you'd get worried he's gotten too attached to me."

Jax laughed when he let me go so that I could finish getting ready for work. "Darlin, he got attached to you as soon as you brought your deranged dog into his life. No escaping now. Especially with my Crow tattooed on that sexy little body."

Maggie cornered me as we were locking up the shop for the evening. "I found you a house!"

"You've been lookin' at houses for me?" I deadlocked the door.

She rolled her green eyes and flipped a lock of her newly-died pastel blue hair off her shoulder. "Yes, Ellie, I have been looking at houses for you to try and help you find the perfect one. Fuck, sometimes I think you don't understand how friendship works."

"All of my friends are married off with babies." I commented dryly as I joined her, leaning against my car while she pulled up the listing on her phone. "Apart from Chloe, but she's decided to go travellin' all around the country, I haven't seen her since I was eighteen, I don't know what she's doin' with her life."

Chloe had gone all through school with me but, instead of conforming to our hometown life and following in everybody else's footsteps of settling down, she'd chosen to be like me and follow her own path. She'd gotten on a plane and left a few days after graduation and, as much as I missed her cheerful face, I was happy that she was following her dreams rather than being stuck. Last I'd checked, she'd been settled down somewhere just this side of Canada and had planned to go there at some point in the near future, but that had been a year before and her number had gone dead after that.

I longed for my friend, longed to hear her voice and see her beautiful face, but I appreciated that she was living her life.

"I've just sent you the link to the house." Maggie kissed my cheek. "And call me crazy, but I think you're going to be buying me an endless amount of coffee to say thank you for finding you and Prince Charming your castle. You know, since the coffee machine is going to die soon."

We'd agreed that we wouldn't get anyone out to look at the coffee machine that we'd had since the store opened, even though we both knew it was on the way out. Maggie had found a retro-style machine that we'd agreed to buy when it finally went to heaven.

We drove away with calls that we'd see each other the next morning and a smile on my face. My life had turned out pretty perfect for a small-town girl who'd thought everything was falling apart for a while.

"What's that?" Jax asked when he'd arrived home for the evening and caught me playing on his laptop.

I grinned up at him as he took his Kutte off and gestured to the computer screen. "I believe, my darlin', that this is our home."

The look on his face told me that he didn't have his hopes too high, but he dropped onto the couch next to me and put his arm around my shoulders so that he could pull me into his side as he looked at the laptop.

The house that Maggie had found was perfect.

It was three bedrooms, something that Jax had put his foot down on in case we ever decided to expand our family. It also had the biggest back yard of any that we'd looked at, more than enough space to add a picnic table as well as a space just for Abel and Larry to enjoy.

It was a country-style home, filled with wood and lace curtains and-

"I think that's solid oak hardwood." He murmured under his breath when he scrolled through to and photo of the floors.

I tilted my head. "What does that mean?"

"Means, if it is, this is our fucking house, babe."

I looked over at him and grinned. "Yeah?"

"We'll go and look at it this week, I'll call and make an appointment." He returned my grin. "Good job, babe."

I returned his kiss and laid my head on his chest, eyes on the screen of what we thought could be our forever-home. "It was Maggie, actually."

"Now you're going to have to buy her a fuckton of coffee to say thanks." He chuckled lightly.

Abel walked into the living room to join us, Larry trailing by his side as usual. "What's going on?"

"Come here, buddy." Jax moved the laptop back onto my legs and picked his son up so that he was sitting on his lap, then pointed at one of the photos. "Mama and dad have found a house that we like the look of, but we want you to have your say, too."

Whether he'd done it on purpose or it was a slip of the tongue, I'm not sure. All I know is that Abel's demeanour didn't change in the slightest when Jax had said that I was his mama, and I let out a breath I didn't know I'd been holding. I hadn't known if Abel had even realised what he'd called me the day before.

Abel looked over the photos of the house, face blank before he tilted his beautiful little head to meet my gaze. "Mommy likes it?"

"Yeah, baby, I do." I nodded my head. "I mean, we're goin' to have to put a swing on the porch, but I think it's pretty perfect apart from that. What do you think?"

Abel grinned, a spitting image of his father's, and then looked back at Jax. "I like it, daddy."

Jax kissed my forehead. "Tell Maggie that I'm buying her that fucking coffee machine."