“Just give me five minutes, buddy,” Amber said. “What color frosting do you think would look best on the gingerbread boys?”
“All the colors!” Davey waved his hands wide. “’Specially blue. That’s my favorite.”
“Well, okay, then.” Amber pulled up the white frosting she’d made before, quickly divided it into smaller bowls and found her food coloring. She hummed as she stirred it in, creating a rainbow of frosting colors, with Davey kneeling on a chair beside her, giving advice. All the while, she kept putting in new trays of gingerbread men to bake, assembly line fashion.
Quickly, she got both Davey and Paul set up with frosting and gingerbread boys. “You decorate these however you want to,” she said. “I trust your judgment.”
“That might be a mistake,” Paul said, but he gamely scooped up a lump of pink frosting and spread it over one of the cookies. Davey watched, then did the same with blue frosting.
Amber found some colored sugar and other decorations that she and Hannah had used to make cookies in years past, and she pulled out a bunch of them for the boys to use. Sarge ran around devouring bits of cookie and frosting that fell to the floor.
“We’re decorating cookies in school,” Davey said, his tongue poking out the corner of his mouth as he concentrated on his work. “Miss Kayla said I was good at it. Now I’ll be even better.”
“Miss Kayla is smart,” Amber commented, letting her gaze flicker to Paul’s. She was pretty sure she didn’t have anything to worry about in terms of Kayla, from what Paul had said before, but she couldn’t restrain a slight feeling of jealousy.
“She’s very understanding,” Paul said, raising his eyebrows at Amber. “She can read between the lines. I’ll have to tell you about that sometime.”
“She’s a good reader,” Davey agreed. He squirted a huge glob of yellow frosting onto the head of a gingerbread boy.
Amber had to laugh at the double conversation that was going on, and Paul’s lips twitched, as well.
She loved sharing a joke with him. Loved sharing holiday preparations and memories with him. The air was full of the smell of cookies, along with the pine scent of the little Christmas tree she’d bought. Christmas carols hummed away on the radio.
If only this could go on. Maybe it could go on. But not if secrets stood between them.
Certainty came to her: if she wanted to get closer to Paul and Davey, she needed to tell Paul the truth, and sooner rather than later.
“THANKS FOR COMING.” Mary opened the door to Imogene, who looked almost dressed up in jeans and a flowered, smock-type top, her hair combed. “Meet my new baby, Coco.”
Mary picked up Coco, who was walking toward the door with a mixture of interest and fear. Mary’s initial assessment had been exactly right: Coco was on the timid side.
“Cute.” Imogene glanced at the dog and then walked into the middle of the living room and looked around. “So, is this a social visit or...”
Actually, this was Mary’s last effort. If it didn’t work, she was going to withdraw support from Imogene and, if anything happened, file a harassment claim against her. Something about her conversations with Kirk and Amber, and then taking the step forward to adopt a new puppy, had given her courage. She didn’t like feeling cowed and dependent on Imogene.
But she’d decided to give their relationship one last chance, and to really go for it, be honest and open, try to connect as adults.
She snuggled Coco close for a minute and then put the dog down so she could focus on her stepdaughter. “Listen, we’ve been so at odds since you arrived in town, and I realized I don’t quite understand why. I haven’t taken the time to listen to you. I was hoping we could chat, and you could tell me what made you so angry at me.”
Imogene stared at her, eyebrows rising high. “Don’t act like you don’t know.”
“I know that something terrible happened to both of us. I don’t know why it made you so angry at me.”
Imogene stared at her, mouth hanging open a little, and then spoke. “You killed my father.”
The words were a claw digging at Mary’s chest, but she was glad to have it out in the open. “No, Imogene. A bad man killed your father.”
“Yeah, your ex-husband.”
“Yes, I know.” Mary closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them again. The puppy leaned against her leg and she reached down to scratch it. “I know. That’s what I believe, too, though he was never convicted. Believe me, I wish I’d never married your dad to bring that into his life.”
“Me, too.” Imogene started pacing restlessly around the room, picking up knickknacks and pillows and putting them down. “You never did anything for me except take my dad’s attention away. And get him killed. My life sucked after that.”
“I’m sorry about that.” Mary should probably have offered to take Imogene after Ben had been killed. Imogene’s biological mother was not a nice woman, which was why Ben had had full custody of his daughter. But Mary had been so flattened with grief about her own daughter, and about Ben, that she’d been unable to fathom how to nurture an angry, grieving fifteen-year-old who already hated her.
Imogene finally sat down, flopped back against the back of the sofa and ran her hands through her hair. “You knew what your ex was like and you let him know where you were. Where we were. You had an affair with him, and you invited him to come and take out Dad to get his money.”
Mary blew out a breath. She’d gotten bits and pieces of that story over the years, but had never heard the whole thing put together. “If that’s what you think, then I don’t blame you for hating me. But, Imogene, it’s not true.”
“My mom explained it all to
