Chaos series by Kristen Ashley
“Clee-Clee loves ahi and Zade gets chicken satay with peanut sauce any time she’s got her shot, so if you can please High, you’ve got us all covered.”
“Really?” I asked, shocked I’d hit the nail so firmly on the head… and did it with lettuce wraps.
“Really,” she answered.
“Mom! Look!” Cleo cried, walking in, snuggling Poem. “This is Millie’s girl. Poem. Chief ran under the couch but I’ll get him so you can meet him next.”
“Wow!” Deb cried back, moving to her daughter. “She’s so cute.”
“I hope they sleep with us,” Cleo murmured.
They might. If they could make it up on the bed, something they had yet to master.
I didn’t share that with Cleo. I turned to Zadie.
“You want a drink, Zadie?”
She shrugged, not meeting my eyes. “Whatev—” she started, but must have felt her mother’s and father’s attention go to her because she quickly finished, “Sure.”
“I’ll get it,” Logan stated, and looked to his ex. “Deb? Wine?”
“I’ll have a glass with dinner,” she answered, then came back to me. “Now, Millie, what can the girls and I do to help?”
“First you can tell me if you’re picking up that McQueen tomorrow,” I replied. “Then you can julienne cucumbers and the girls can set the bar.”
“McQueen, affirmative,” she told me.
“Right on!” I declared on an excited sister’s-gonna-get-a-fab-bag smile.
Deb, the sister who was going to get a fab bag, smiled back and hers was bigger for obvious reasons. “Now, do you have something to julienne, or am I gonna need to perform miracles with a knife?”
“Gadget drawer to your left,” I told her, delighted the thingamabob I’d bought probably six years ago to do fantastic things with vegetables was going to get its first use.
“Gotcha,” she muttered, and moved to the drawer.
Before I turned back to my lettuce, I looked to Zadie. She had a can of pop in her hand and was standing by her father, who had his head in the fridge. She was also watching her mom.
When she felt my eyes, she looked to me.
I tipped my head to the side and curved my lips up.
She looked away and took a sip of pop.
I sighed.
“Do you have placemats?” Cleo asked.
“Drawer across the way, sweetie,” I answered.
“On it!” she cried, and skipped across the kitchen.
I watched her doing this thinking she was totally freaking cute.
I also watched her doing this thinking that I liked how she seemed to be getting comfortable in my space.
So I watched her doing this feeling happy.
Cleo, good.
Deb, good.
Logan, always good.
Zadie, no change.
Not brilliant.
But I’d take it, work on it…
And hope.
* * *
Lying in bed, tangled up with Logan that night after the girls settled in the guestroom and we gave them time to drift off before we went to bed, I murmured, “I think that went okay.”
He gave me a squeeze. “Know it did. Do not know how you pulled off good-tastin’ lettuce wraps, but you nailed it.”
Being a man, he was talking about food.
I was talking about our modern-day family dinner.
I decided not to point that out.
I should have known better. Logan knew exactly what I was talking about.
He shared this when I heard his head move on the pillow so he could say into the top of my hair, “Tomorrow, you give ’em their cards and we’ll take ’em shoppin’. They’re both gonna like that and even Zadie’s gonna have to melt a little ’cause I know she’s really gonna like that. And I’ll endure the mall ’cause I’ll have three happy girls on my hands.” He gave me another squeeze. “So it’s all gonna be good, beautiful.”
I tipped my head back to catch his eyes in the dark. “If the mall doesn’t work, I’m gonna need more ammunition. Her favorite foods. Her favorite desserts. Television shows. Movies. Boy bands.” I looked to his shadowy chin. “Actually, I need that intel on both girls just because.”
“Babe,” Logan called my attention back to him. When he got it, he carried on, “This is not an exercise in spoilin’ Zadie more than she already is. This is an exercise in breakin’ her of that shit.”
“I know, but—”
“I hear you. I get you. You do need to know that about them. So ask ’em. But I’m lettin’ this bribery scheme of yours go because you wanna do that for them and I want them to see you are how you are. Generous and a woman with a big heart. But from here on in, special occasions only. They gotta get that with me and me bein’ with you, life is just life. Hear?”
I nodded.
He bent in and touched his mouth to mine.
When he pulled away, he grumbled, “Gonna be a long fuckin’ weekend, girls here, which means not bein’ able to do you.”
He was right.
I snuggled into him, rubbing my face in his throat, mumbling, “Mmm.”
“Drop the girls at school, come back, end that shit,” he went on. “Be prepared to hit your office late on Monday, Millie.”
Something to look forward to.
Therefore my repeated, “Mmm,” had a different tone.
Tangled up in me, Logan slid his hand up my spine to entwine his fingers in my hair.
“Love you, baby,” he whispered into the dark.
I lay in his arms, feeling his solid warmth, his strength, the truth of those words wrapped all around me and I wondered how I could be so lucky.