“Let’s go, Cassie.” The girl’s grandfather took her hand. “The sooner you get ready for bed, the more time we’ll have for me to read you your favorite story.” He led the little one out of the kitchen.
“You mean Tiny Shiny Bunny?”
Mahoney looked at her. “I thought Barney and his Barnyard Buddies was your favorite?”
“That’s so last week, Buppa. I like Tiny Shiny Bunny now.”
“Okay. Tiny Shiny Bunny it is.”
The duo ascended the stairs.
“Buppa, are Mommy and Antie Fay fighting?”
“No. No. They’re not fighting. They just have something to discuss.” Having always given his daughters the opportunity to resolve their petty differences before he doled out the discipline, Father Mahoney glanced over his shoulder and sent a look he had not conveyed to his children in a decade or two.
Catching the nonverbal message, their recollections taking them back to their childhood days, Devlin and Faith glimpsed one another, each woman thinking something similar. We need to work this out.
“You get your jammies on, Cassie, and I’ll get the book.”
“Do you want to know why I like Tiny Shiny Bunny, Buppa?”
“Why’s that, sweetie?”
“It’s because he’s so...” Cassandra’s voice trailed off as she bounded into her room.
Devlin took the towel from Faith’s hands and tossed it onto the counter. “Come on. Let’s talk.” She left the kitchen and headed for the den, Faith trailing behind her.
In his mind, Ashford heard Faith’s offer from a minute ago. Go. Get out of here. Noah and I can clean up. Planting hands on his hips, eyeing the surrounding mess, the man of the house sighed. That coupon sure had a short expiration date. He picked up the dish towel and flung it at the only other person in the room. “I’ll wash. You dry?”
“Sounds—” Randall snatched the white cloth, “sounds good to me.”
*******
Faith closed the door to the den, spun around, crossed arms over her chest, and threw a hip out to one side.
Assuming the same pose, minus the weight transfer, Devlin squared off with her sister. “You want to know what the hell my problem is,” she hesitated, “why I’m so pissy as you put it? And, thank you for saying that in front of my daughter by the way.”
Faith glanced down at her hiking boots. “It just slipped out. I’m sor—”
“You’ve done this to me my whole life...both me and Dad.”
Faith turned up her palms and hunched shoulders. “I’ve done what?”
“You hook up with a guy, bring him into our family, and get us liking him. Then, when you get tired of boning him, you dump him and move on. And Dad and I are always just supposed to,” Devlin chopped the air in front of her a couple times, “fall in line and cut off all communication with him, too...regardless of the possibility that maybe we actually liked the guy.”
“Well, I never knew I was such a slut.” Faith’s stomach churned while she recalled the men she had ‘dated’ over the years, her inner voice contradicting her words.
Devlin waved a hand. “That’s not what I meant.” Envisioning Randall’s face, she thrust a finger in the direction of the kitchen. “I have to work with him. And you dating him and dumping him is going to cause me a lot of grief sometime down the road.”
“Who says I’m going to dump him? Maybe he’s—”
“The one? Maybe he’s the one? Is that what you were going to say?”
Faith was silent.
“I can’t count the number of times I’ve heard you say that. You always...”
*******
His ear pointed toward the den, toward the voices growing louder, and having heard his name mentioned twice, Randall dragged the dish towel over a mixing bowl. “So,” he wavered, “is everything okay in there? They seem to be getting angrier.”
Ashford pulled the plug from the drain, set the stopper near the backsplash, and looked down while listening to the muffled shouts. He shook his head a beat later. “Naw. They’re still at DEFCON 5. How about a beer on the back deck?”
Randall eyed the den again. If that’s DEFCON 5, I’d hate to be around for—
“We’ve earned the right to throw back a couple cold ones.”
“Uh,” the houseguest faced Ashford, “sure,” before holding up the mixing bowl. “Where’s this go?”
Ashford pointed and opened the refrigerator.
Randall deposited the baking item into an overhead cupboard.
A minute later, Randall followed Ashford through a patio door and glanced around.
The size of two, side-by-side parking spaces, the wooden deck had two fancy metal lawn chairs flanking a padded outdoor couch that lay straight ahead. The seating lined the deck’s perimeter. Three side tables had been strategically positioned to provide horizontal surfaces for people’s drinks. On the other side of the deck’s railing, a white plastic ball and red plastic bat rested on a decent-sized, well-manicured lawn that was surrounded on three sides by ten-foot-high Thuja Green Giant evergreens.
“Wow.” Randall slid shut the door. “This is beautiful back here.” He gawked at the natural ‘fence’ around him. “Those things block out everything,” he listened, “except for the birds.”
Ashford took the seat in the center of the couch, effectively forcing his guest to pick a chair. “Yeah...they grow fast. They were half that size when I started dating Jessica a year ago.” He motioned, “Have a seat,” before twisting the cap off his beer bottle. “I’ve been wanting to have this little chat with you.”
Two feet from the chair stationed on his host’s ten o’clock, his stride hitching a bit, Randall thought back to his conversation with Devlin right after they had rappelled down the mountain...
Randall flicked his eyes toward Devlin before focusing on his task again. “So,” he paused, “are you going to bring that up to your husband in your...after-action report shall we say?”
She glimpsed him. “Bring what up?”
“You know...the sex swing thing...and the incident on the raft.”
She chortled. “Are you crazy? I know I’ve told you Curt’s a good man, but even good men have their limits
