Page 3 of Hot Tea & Bird Calls (Kissing At Work #2)

Unsatisfied with the hotel lobby’s selection, Edna Vale brewed a dark roast she brought from home, splitting the pot equally into white paper cups. It scented the air in a fruity richness that reminded Celene of childhood, under her mother’s roof.

Briana, Donovan’s wife, tucked their six- and four-year-olds in the king-size bed, leaving them as two lumps beneath the thick duvet. Donovan lay passed out atop the covers, too spent from fatherhood and bottomless cocktails for the bride and groom’s families.

“I haven’t danced like that in years,” Byron Vale said, his voice like worn sandpaper, conscious of the sleeping children. He’d had his eye on the recliner ever since Elise gave them the grand tour, and now he’d sunk deeply enough to leave an imprint.

“At Don’s wedding.” Celene’s mother jogged his memory, tapping his hand with a cup of black coffee. “You were seven years younger. I think your age is finally hitting you.”

He laughed deep from his belly, as he always had. Celene admitted her father had a youthful spirit. Suitable in her childhood, irritating as a young adult, then a relief after he passed sixty. Byron gritted his teeth at a hot sip. “Never. I’ll be twenty-five forever.”

Edna lifted a brow underneath her short, no-nonsense hair. She’d gone up to her private room thirty minutes after the newlyweds’ big reception entrance. Celene inherited her mother’s need for alone time, along with her sharp profile which became more regal on Edna with age.

From her dad, Celene acquired the dominant Vale traits: partially hooded eyes, a resting unimpressed face, and dense, mildly textured black hair. Byron raked a palm over the top of his head, not a single white strand in sight. His beard, however, grew about fifty-fifty salt and pepper.

“I sure don’t feel twenty-five anymore,” Briana grumbled, toppling onto the couch. She blew over her cup while helping herself to half of Celene’s throw blanket.

Byron, Edna, and Celene groaned in unison, as Briana was only twenty-eight. She hadn’t gained the midlife mileage to vent yet.

Briana rolled her brown eyes openly, a familiarity achieved even before she and Donovan got married. She dug two bobby pins out of her bouncy dark updo, greeting Celene with a strained smile. “How was catching up with Quinn? Your face gave nothing away when we came to the table.”

“Quinn hugged me,” Edna stated from a shorter couch. And, because she couldn’t help herself, inserted an academic’s love of probing with, “I asked her girlfriend some basic info. What she does for a living, her hobbies, intentions on her and Quinn’s future…”

Celene’s lip twitched. “Mom. Don’t do that.”

“I want to know what’s so great about her over you.”

Any mother wouldn’t be thrilled to run into the person who broke their child’s heart three years ago. But Celene didn’t need an unauthorized guard dog. Edna tightened the sash of her long hotel robe in a huff.

Celene waved off the indignant gesture, addressing Briana instead. “Awkward, but manageable. She and Ramona match each other well.” Then, she stopped here. Going into the whole labyrinth and GPS analogy didn’t make full sense to her, never mind her nosy family.

“Ramona’s so different from you. She stomped around the balloon pit with Fifi and Izzy, chasing them like Godzilla.

” Briana and Byron chuckled at something Celene had been too preoccupied behind the scenes to witness.

“That’s good, right? I’d be more pissed if Quinn hooked up with someone exactly like you.

Then you’d have no idea whether it’d work out after all. ”

Celene agreed, tasting the bitterness in her coffee. She could’ve played in the balloons with her nieces, too. “It’s more closure.”

“Relationships end. That’s life.” Byron reached for the recliner’s lever and took a noisy minute to get cozier. “Love comes, it goes. You screw up, they screw up, everyone screws. You move on, you die.”

Edna, the first of Byron’s three wives, calmly flipped through a bridal magazine, sipping her drink. Even after all these years, comments like that must’ve stung, if only a little.

Silence followed, broken only by the rustle of a thin page turning. Byron grunted as he burned his tongue on his coffee. Donovan snore-coughed, showing he was still alive.

Celene preferred this. She could clear her mind, close her eyes, and try to unravel the tightly knotted mystery from earlier, over what she’d do next.

Be it a project in her apartment or a change of scenery—that’s it.

She could go on another trip. It’d be solo, of course, though dragging Nadine up a hiking trail would be quite a spectacle.

She’d picked at the mental mystery until the bridal suite’s door beeped, bringing in Shanice, her father’s third wife. And their baby.

“Hey, family,” Shanice whispered, bare face as striking as it was in full glam for the wedding. “Just night fed Theo, and he is up . Anyone mind putting him back to sleep?”

Every other adult in the room—including her snore-drunk brother—held qualifications for child-rearing, but Shanice twirled about-face to Celene, her smile symmetrical and conspiratorial. “Here, doll, hold your brother.”

“I—” But a heavy six-month-old suddenly inhabited Celene’s lap. Sleepily, Briana babbled cutesy words at him without offering to take over.

“I’m still engorged.” Shanice cupped both hands over her breasts in her pajamas, whimpering. “Mind if I pump in the bathroom?”

Byron relaxed, untensing like he’d wanted to grab Theo. “Take all the time you need. I’m awake.”

A former beauty queen, Shanice transitioned out of her CPA job after she married Celene’s dad, now coaching pageant contestants in her spare time. Hauling a massive designer baby bag, Shanice pageant-waved her way to the bathroom, earning a ripple of laughter.

This woman was sweet as pie, but Celene would need some time to get past the mere six-year age difference between herself and her dad’s wife. A first-time mother at forty-two, Shanice’s pregnancy had been a total surprise, but a welcome one.

Theo sucked on his balled-up hand, pooling drool on Celene’s lounge pants.

This child lived solely on breastmilk? Shanice must’ve consumed the most nutritious diet in the state.

Hair curly and Vale black, he blinked up at Celene, mouth hanging loose.

Everyone else “awwed” so emphatically that Celene’s skin prickled.

“Rock him,” Edna directed, simulating with her arms swaying. “Get him to sleep so Shanice can rest with us.”

Edna and Byron Vale were a curious pair.

They divorced when Celene was four, then reconnected a few years later, dating regularly.

By then, Byron already had Celene’s brother, Donovan, with his ex-girlfriend Lonnie, who’d eventually become wife #2.

Their final attempt at romance lasted four semi-uncomfortable years until they decided to call it quits, falling into the coparent groove seamlessly.

Despite their different outlooks on life—and clearly love—they never seemed to hate each other.

Out of her element, Celene built a slow rhythm stable enough to appease Edna. Theo didn’t burst into tears; instead, he laid his head on her chest. Feeling accomplished, Celene sighed, soon frowning when Briana took pictures of them with her phone.

“Spitting image of Byron,” Briana cooed, admiring her snapshots with quick swipes.

Byron grinned like he’d carried Theo for forty-one weeks himself. “Ladies’ man in the making.”

Ugh, fathers and their weird projections. Celene rocked Theo’s weight where she sat, carefully switching the leg he rested on every so often. She placed a hand on his healthy, cushiony thigh. “He’s a sentient teddy bear with Vale eyes.”

She couldn’t believe Byron managed to have a fourth baby before Celene decided whether she wanted children at all.

Her dad got along with anyone and fit in no matter where. Which tracked since he’d done a Gene-y From The Block DNA test, and all continents save Australia and Antarctica were represented in equal measures.

With his thick hair, an angled jaw, and confidence for miles, Byron didn’t lack for action.

And his type? Woman.

First, he’d married Edna, a Brazilian-American mathematician, with whom he had Celene and Elise.

Dating Lonnie, a white mechanic, resulted in Donovan—and eventually another divorce.

Years of on-and-off dating followed, until he moved up the borough and fell instantly for Shanice, a Harlem native and pageant winner whose industrial-grade breast pump could be heard from the bathroom.

“Tell me when you want me to take him,” Byron murmured, scratching at his chest.

Celene’s stiff, unaccustomed-to-infants position would leave her back aching, but she chose to hold on longer. “Maybe when he’s asleep.”

What could she and Theo possibly have in common with this inordinate age gap? Would they ever hang out? Not feel like aunt and nephew? She couldn’t picture herself showing up to his future elementary school like, “I’m his ancient sister.”

As she acknowledged his chubby cheeks and the hand death-gripping her arm were pretty cute, this whole situation embarrassed her. She’d never expect perfect dynamics from the Vales, but this caveat exemplified why she traveled. Her love life ended in quiet chaos; family was loud chaos.

Nevertheless, Theo’s eyes closed as soon as Shanice glided back into the room, collapsing into an armchair. Chancing a sip of her coffee, Celene tuned into the conversation at hand. About the Vales’ summer house in the Poconos.