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I close the cookbook. “No more cookies?”
Sev rolls her eyes, sliding down off the counter and dramatically onto the floor. It reminds me of an inflatable being deflated. “Enoughs already. It too much.”
She might be right. I had to send Lillian to the store because we needed more flour and sugar. Maybe the counter being covered in cookies is enough.
Camdyn sighs, climbing down from the chair and staring at her sister and then me. “I need to take a bath. My armpits stinkin’.”
I watch her take off down the hall. “Do you need any help?”
“Nope.” She flips her hand behind her. “I gots it.”
I smile, a laugh leaving my lips as I remove the apron wrapped around my waist. I never want to leave this house. I’m dreading it. These girls are my people. People I can really be myself around. And that includes Lillian, who just walked through the door.
“I got the essentials.” Lillian sets a wine bottle on the counter and then a case of beer for Barron. She eyes the cookies on the counter. “You made enough for an army.”
I place the lid back on the jar of marshmallow cream and quickly realize the cat had been licking it. There are black hairs on the outside. “Ew, Vader.”
Lillian and I both look over at where Sev is sitting with the cat, using Barron’s brush to comb his hair. Lillian laughs. “Don’t tell him.”
“I won’t.”
Uncorking the wine, she glances over her shoulder at Sev. “So, now that the girls are distracted, what the fuck happened yesterday? Morgan said Tara showed up here.”
I hadn’t had time to tell Lillian everything that happened with Tara showing up and then the sex against the counter. Not that I need to tell her the sex part. I hear the water running in the bathroom and wonder if I should leave Camdyn alone in there. She’s five. She can take a bath by herself, right?
You can leave Camdyn unattended for a few minutes. Sev, not a chance. Turn your back on her, and she’s trying to rip the wings off a bee to get its stinger. True story. How bees survive in these winters is beyond me, but she found one. That has nothing to do with what’s going on around me though, amongst a Christmas cookie explosion.
“Hello?” Lillian pours herself a glass of wine and snaps her fingers in my face. “What happened?”
My eyes drift to Sev, unsure if she can hear us. Not that she would care what we’re talking about, but she’s currently taking all the Christmas ornaments off the tree. This happens daily and it drives Barron crazy because he’s constantly stepping on them. “Yeah, she showed up and outed me in front of Barron.”
Lillian’s eyes widen, mid-sip. She swallows the wine. “Seriously?”
“Yep.” I busy myself with putting away the cookie-making supplies, afraid if I don’t have something to do, the calm façade I’ve been trying to maintain will fade. I’m scared of what happens next. After Christmas. He asked me to stay for Christmas, but then what? Do I leave?
“What did he say?”
I shrug. “Not much, really. He asked if it was true, and then we fucked on the kitchen island.”
Lillian’s jaw drops, and then her eyes land on the island she’s currently sitting at. “Did you sanitize it?”
“Yes. Did you sanitize Jace’s Jeep?”
A grins forms as she takes another sip of her wine. “Nope. So, like, he wasn’t mad?”
I think about the angry sex and his lack of words that night. “He was mad all right, but I don’t know. It’s awkward, and I don’t know what to say. Besides I’m sorry for not telling him. And I feel like the world biggest asshole.”
She’s finished with her wine now, so she pours herself another. I’m jealous she’s drinking, so I get out the whiskey, and before we know it, we’re day drinking. Twenty minutes later, as I’m spilling all my deepest secrets to her and Sev, who does not care about anything we’re saying, I realize the water is still running in the bathroom. I listen and hear splashing and giggles.
I jump up from the stool, trip over the cat, and face plant into the coffee table. Thinking I knocked myself out, I recover enough to crawl down the hallway. I now completely understand why Barron installed a drain in their bathroom.
There, amongst every—now soaked—towel they have, Camdyn is having a pool party with her Barbies. Sev comes around the corner, buck-ass naked. “I wanna takes a bath.”
Before I know it, they’re both in there, and Sev has turned the water bright red with the food coloring from the cookies. “We swims in blood!” she announces.
Camdyn looks horrified. I have to admit, I’m a little freaked out too.
I look to Lillian. “Do you think that’s going to stain their skin?”