Fairytale Come Alive (Ghosts and Reincarnation #4)(21)
Author: Kristen Ashley

Prentice watched his daughter give his son a hilarious, wrinkled-nose “go-to-hell” look.

Prentice watched his son roll his eyes at Sally’s hilarious, wrinkled-nose “go-to-hell” look.

Prentice nearly laughed at their interplay, something he had done very rarely in the last year because they’d very rarely done anything to laugh about or, more accurately, Jason hadn’t.

“Give it time and let those settle in your belly, Sally,” Isabella advised softly as she turned back to the stove. “You don’t want to be overfull for the picnic.”

“Okay,” Sally agreed readily which was also surprisingly.

Prentice watched Isabella walk to the stove, his eyes captivated by her ass swaying beneath the satin then captivated by her long, tan legs moving gracefully through his kitchen.

She turned when she’d made it to the stove and her hands came up to pull her robe tightly closed. “Would you like pancakes, Prentice?”

His eyes snapped to her face.

It was not open and engaging as she looked at his children. It was cool and remote.

“Please,” he replied and walked to the coffee.

The pot was mostly full.

Fiona always made the coffee and his wife made great coffee. Prentice’s coffee, as was his cooking, was crap.

When Fiona was sick and after she was gone, nearly every morning Prentice had to make the coffee except for the mornings his mother, Fiona’s mother, Debs or Morag were there which, at his request, in order to try and get the children back to a different kind of normalcy once Fiona died, his family hadn’t been coming around to help for months.

It had been a long time. He hadn’t woken to a pot of coffee since…

Prentice didn’t finish his thought as that feeling intensified in his gut.

Fucking hell, he thought again.

He poured himself a cup while Isabella slid butter into the hot skillet which melted immediately. He watched while she poured batter on the butter and saw her coffee cup was sitting by the stove, the cup mostly full as the pot had been.

She’d been so busy feeding his children; she hadn’t had time for a cup of coffee.

Fucking hell, he thought yet again.

Sally chattered, Jason ate, Isabella concentrated on his pancake and Sally’s blather and Prentice felt, like last night, that she’d forgotten he was even there.

For reasons unknown to Prentice but likely because he found her new game immensely irritating and he decided instantly he too could play a game, he walked to the side of the stove, close to where Isabella was working. Turning his back to the counter, he rested his h*ps against it and sipped his coffee.

The coffee was f**king heavenly.

Christ.

“Will you give me a manicure before the picnic?” Sally asked Isabella.

Prentice turned to look at her and saw, to his surprise, that Isabella was fidgeting. Moving the handle of the skillet this way and that, she was twirling the spatula in her other hand in an absentminded way. Her eyes, however, were not on the skillet; they were on the counter behind Prentice.

“I can’t, Sally,” she answered the counter. “After breakfast, I’ve got to get to Annie’s to help with the picnic.”

“Can I go?” Sally yelled. “Can I, can I, can I?”

Isabella didn’t respond.

She stepped around him then halted in a jerky way. She tipped her head to the side, surveyed the counter, sighed, then tilted it back and looked at him.

Her face a mask of good manners, she said softly, “I’m sorry, Prentice, do you mind? You’re standing in front of the granola.”

He examined her makeup free face and, even with that detached expression he thought, since she’d been back, she’d never looked lovelier.

Feeling the need to be perverse, instead of moving out of her way, as she clearly wanted him to do, he twisted, grabbed the bowl of granola he was blocking, twisted back and handed it to her.

She took it.

“Thank you,” she said quietly and politely.

She moved to the stove and used a graceful hand to sprinkle granola on the pancake before she set the bowl aside, in the opposite direction to Prentice, and flipped it expertly.

Prentice watched her do this like it was fascinating which, bizarrely, it was.

“Well?” Sally shouted.

Prentice stopped watching Isabella’s hand and looked at his daughter.

“Can I go too?” Jason asked quietly, his eyes on the tiled floor of the kitchen.

Prentice froze at this request from his son who hadn’t been willing to participate in much of anything since his mother died.

Strangely, he felt Isabella freeze at his side too. Slowly, she turned and looked at Jason. Her profile was not polite and detached. It was soft and warm and unbelievably striking.

Again, Prentice felt that weight hit his gut.

Then her head twisted, her features rearranged swiftly back to aloof and she looked up at Prentice enquiringly.

“Sorry kids, you need clean clothes and I need to do laundry,” Prentice answered.

“No you don’t,” Sally proclaimed. “Mrs. Evangahlala and I’ve been doing laundry all morning.”

Prentice’s body turned to stone.

All except his eyes which narrowed and sliced to Isabella.

Instantly, Isabella whirled to the stove and started to fidget with the skillet on the burner.

“We’ve done two loads!” Sally announced triumphantly.

“You’ve been very busy,” Prentice murmured and he watched Isabella’s body get stiff, her hands fisted tightly and she moved to a cupboard. Unfisting her hands with visible effort which Prentice found peculiar and vaguely disturbing, she pulled down a plate, got cutlery, slid the pancake on the plate and handed it all to Prentice.

“The butter and syrup are on the counter,” she informed him softly, tipped her head to the counter and then immediately dismissed him and moved away.

Prentice put his coffee cup down next to Isabella’s, walked to the other counter and, while he prepared his golden, fluffy, delicious-looking pancake, he said to his children, “We’ll all go.”

Sally threw her hands up so fast she nearly teetered off the stool as she shouted, “Hurrah!”

Prentice smiled at his daughter.

He’d hoped that Annie and Dougal’s wedding would bring some happiness to his family, cutting through the undercurrent of despair Jason was always emanating that Prentice, for the life of him, had no idea how to chase away, likely because he couldn’t cut through his own.

It appeared this was working, even for Jason.