I waited for Doc to throw his dart before asking, “What about Reid and my dad?”
“Reid offered to let your dad drive the snowcat,” Doc explained, lining up his final throw. “They went for a ride.”
“And you two let them? My dad wasn’t packing when they left, was he?”
Cooper shrugged. “Martin will be fine. One bullet doesn’t kill you.”
It could in my world. “Not all of us are made of tin and missing a heart, Cooper.”
“I have a heart.”
“They issued it with his badge,” Doc joked and threw his final dart. “Ha! Looks like you lose again, Coop.”
“You suck, Nyce.” He hit Doc with a rare grin. “How about three out of five?”
Doc turned to me. “Do you need our help with anything upstairs?”
“No, but thanks for asking.” I gave him a peck on the cheek. “That’s for more good luck. Now kick Cooper’s whiny ass.”
He grinned over at Cooper. “Will do, Killer.”
I left the two of them to their testosterone-filled ribbing. Upstairs, I grabbed my new coat from the bedroom and headed for the front door. I passed Susan on the way. She had the plates set around the table and was collecting silverware from the china cabinet drawer.
“Violet,” she said as I rushed past. “We need to talk.”
That was never a good thing when it came to her. Talking quickly turned into bickering and that usually ended in yelling. “No time right now, Susan. I’m following Mom’s orders.”
“You’re avoiding me.”
“Don’t think of it as avoiding,” I said over my shoulder. “Think of it as pretending you’re not here.”
Outside, I found Dad and Reid standing beside the snowcat, hands in their coat pockets. The driveway and the road in front of our house were plowed clear for the moment, but the snow was still falling, albeit lighter than the last twenty-four hours.
“Hey, Goldilocks,” Dad said as I approached them. “You remind me of your mom in that color.”
Knowing what I did now about my father’s appreciation for my mom and her yoga, I took that as a compliment and blocked any further thoughts about my parents in compromising positions. “Thanks. Did you plow or Reid?”
“Blake did,” Reid answered. “He got the hang of driving the ‘cat’ pretty quickly.”
My dad grinned like a boy with a new baseball and mitt.
“Good job, Pop,” I said. “Mom wanted me to tell you we have about twenty minutes or so until dinner.” I shaved off some time for my side trips on the way out here. “Have you heard from Quint today?”
“Not since last night.”
“Neither has Mom. I wonder if he’s on his way.”
Reid looked up at the sky. “This storm isn’t supposed to let up completely until late tonight. I’m not sure if the airport is even open.”
I frowned, snuggling into my collar. Damn, it would be fun to see my brother again. We hadn’t talked since Thanksgiving.
“Hey, knucklehead,” Natalie called from the side of the house. “Come over here and check out your daughter’s hard work.”
I left the two big boys with their oversized toy and joined Natalie and Addy.
“Land sakes! You two have been busy.” There was not one snowman, but two with twig arms, penny eyes, and stone smiles. “Where did you find the straw hat, lei, and grass skirt for the little one?”
Addy’s cheeks and nose were pink when she looked up from adjusting the lei. “Nat brought them from her cousin’s house. This snowman is like Grammy, all happy and dancing.”
“Aunt Deborah had the accessories from when she had her big Hawaiian luau,” Natalie said, scooping up a handful of snow. “It was the last family party she had before the divorce.”
Oh, yeah. I remembered my mom’s dress she’d bought for the party. “I love it—a snowman in paradise.” I stepped closer to the bigger one. “I like the green scarf and matching hat. Are those your aunt’s too?” They were pretty fancy for a snowman. I touched the fabric. “Is this cashmere?”
“We borrowed them from Aunt Susan,” Addy answered, adjusting the matching cashmere hat.
I chuckled. “Does she know you borrowed them?”
“Not officially.” Natalie scooped up more snow and packed it onto the snowball she was forming. “It’s going to be a surprise.”
I laughed out loud at how Susan was going to react to her fancy hat and scarf wrapped around a snowman. “I love you, Natalie.”
She blew me an air kiss.
“We wanted to make a snowman of each of the girls here,” Addy said.
“So they could have a girls’ night out after the sun sets,” Natalie added.
“We need to make a snow chicken yet.”
I blinked at my daughter. “A snow what?”
“Your daughter has poultry on the brain.”
“Always.” I glanced down at the snowball she was smoothing out. “Speaking of chickens, I just ran into a certain law dog down in the basement along with my sister, who was batting her eyelashes extra hard at him, if you know what I mean.”
I pulled the sprig of mistletoe from my pants and handed it to Natalie.
She held it up in front of her. “What’s that have to do with chickens?”
“Are you going to do anything about Cooper today or huddle in your safe little henhouse and cluck all night?”
She frowned at the mistletoe. “Why was this in your pants?”
“Don’t change the subject. What are you going to do about your law dog?”
Her lips tightened. “He’s not my law dog. If he wants to dally with your twisted sister, he can have at her.”
I scoffed loud enough to make Addy jump and squeak. “You’re so full of roasted chestnuts.”
“Maybe, but it sounded tough, right?” She jammed the mistletoe sprig in the center of Susan the Snowwoman’s forehead.
“It was totally weak. Are you out here avoiding him?”
“No.” She lowered her voice for my ears only. “If you must know, Nosy Parker, I’m out here cooling down my libido. Did you see how good he looks in that black henley?”
I wrinkled my nose.
