"Good night, Bun," I whisper, tucking the blanket around the toddler's tiny shoulders. Her eyelids droop, but she still fights sleep like it's her mortal enemy.
"Quack," she mumbles, her duck bill morphing back to human lips mid-yawn.
Sara rolls her eyes from her nest of blankets. "Just ignore her. She'll be asleep in thirty seconds."
The feral baby protests with a grumpy babble, but it's soft.
I smooth down a wayward curl on her forehead. "Sleep tight, baby."
True to Sara's prediction, soft snores rise from her little bed of blankets before I've even made it five steps away. The rest of the makeshift bedroom settles into comfortable silence—Ron's already asleep, Jer's fighting it, and Sara's watching me leave.
I linger in the main room, fluffing a pillow that doesn't need fluffing, zipping and unzipping my hoodie. It's strange how quickly these kids have wound themselves around my heart. It's only been a few hours, but my heart's all-in on their orphaned life.
