Happily Ever After: A Day in the Life of the HEA (Rook and Ronin #3.5) (4 page)

But what am I going to say to Five?
You touch my girl, I’ll break your fingers
?
I’ll grab that shotgun I’m hiding under my bed and
—“Just be home in time for dinner. Your mom is making something special tonight.”

“She says she’s making healthy stuff tonight,” Belle says, wrinkling her nose.

“Healthy stuff?” I have to shake my head at that one.

“Yeah,” Jas pipes in. “She says she needs to go on a diet because her old jeans don’t fit anymore.”

“Diet?” I’m not following. The Bombshell has never looked so good in her life. God, her fucking tits, man. Every time I look at them, I want to fuck her.

“We don’t want healthy food on Christmas Eve, Daddy,” Rory says. And that’s when it all becomes clear. The reason my princess looks so… different in her t-shirt are those… Jesus fuck.

My sweet little princess has turned into my Bombshell.

I stand there dumbstruck as the novelty of the bustling kitchen wears off and Cindy begins to wriggle in my arms again.

I absently find the teething ring in the freezer and hold it out for Cindy until her little hands are able to grasp it and fling her towards her mouth. She starts biting on it eagerly.

“You OK, Dad?” Oliver asks a few minutes later when the kids are all back to their normal kid things and ignoring me.

I let out a long breath of air and lean down to whisper in Ollie’s ear. “I’ll give you twenty bucks and a ride on my motorcycle when we get back home if you tell me everything Five says to Rory while they are out shopping.”

Oliver’s face lights up. “Deal.”

Chapter Five

Rory is dressed and ready and waiting downstairs before me. Hmmm, maybe Kate is right. Do I spend too much time on grooming?

“We’re going to have so much fun today, Five!” Oliver says as he bounds down the steps ahead of me.

“Finally!” Princess says with a giggle. “I’ve been ready for twenty minutes.”

“Where is everyone?”

“They all left. It’s just us. Well, my mom is sleeping and your mom is making cookie dough for the decorating party after the ballet. I think my mom is stressed, Five. My dad said we should get her something special for Christmas while we shop, but she’s not the kind of person who likes expensive trinkets, and that’s all they sell in the Village.”

“Yeah,” I say back, mulling this over. “She does deserve something nice. She always cooks for us. And she throws the best birthday parties. What kind of things does she like? Maybe we can take the limo and go somewhere else?”

Rory’s eye open wide. “The limo?”

“Let’s take the limo. Let’s take the limo,” Oliver starts chanting.

“Will your mom let us?” Rory asks, her hopes high.

Now this is a way to make an impression, am I right? Taking your princess out in a limo for a festive day of Christmas shopping. “Let’s go ask.”

The three of us walk into the kitchen where Ashleigh—I’m allowed to call her Ashleigh in my thoughts—is busily banging baking sheets and grabbing mixing bowls from the cupboards.

“Hey, Mom, can we take the limo shopping? We want to buy Ronnie—”

“Aunt Ronnie,” Ashleigh corrects me, as she searches through a drawer looking for something.

I roll my eyes. “—Aunt Ronnie a special present.”

“Yeah,” Rory chimes in. “And she won’t think some over-priced gift from the Village is special. It says last-minute, Aunt Ash.”

“That’s true,” I say, pointing a finger at Princess. “She works so hard, Mom. She needs a special present.”

Ashleigh stops what she’s doing, immediately suspicious of my intentions. I shoot her my innocent smile, but that only makes her scowl.

“My dad says do it up right, Aunt Ash. I feel we need to expand our horizons to find the perfect gift.”

“Hmmm,” Ashleigh says, thinking this over. “You’re right. She’s sorta down today. And she was up all night with Cindy, so she’s exhausted. Where do you think you’re going to go?”

“There’s an antique store in Copper,” Rory says, her hands pressed together like she’s begging and her little feet jumping up and down a little. “We could find something really cool there, I know it.”

My mom frowns. “Copper Mountain?” She tasks her tongue. “I don’t know.”

“Oh, come on, Ashleigh.” I do that on purpose to make her take us seriously. She trains her eyes on me, ready to pick a fight about what you call adults. But I hold a hand up. “We’re not kids. It’s not snowing. There’s no ice on the roads. It’s a limo, and Richard has been our Vail driver for ten years.”

“He’s not on call today, Five. It’s Christmas Eve. So no. You kids will have to find something nice for her in town.” And then she turns her back and returns her attention to the baking.

We walk back out to the foyer and when we get there, Rory has a royal pout on her face. “We’re never going to find anything good, Five.”

“I know!” Oliver says. “We can get her a new stroller for Cindy.”

I shoot him a look.

“Don’t be stupid, Oliver,” Rory says. “She’s tired of babies. She’s got six kids. She doesn’t want a new stroller. She wants something cool that makes her feel special and pretty. Like some new Frye boots. Or tickets to see Metallica. Or a new leather jacket. Or…” Her words trail off but her eyes light up. “Oh my God, I have the best idea.” But then her face falls again. “But it’s back at my dad’s shop.”

“What is it?” I ask.

“Never mind,” she says, clicking her tongue. “It’s pointless to even talk about it, because we can’t go all the way home.”

“Hmmmm,” I say.

“I know that hmmm,” Oliver says. “It says Five has an evil plan.” He rubs his hands together like a mad scientist.

“What if I can get us to Fort Collins? Do you know exactly where it is?”

Princess crinkles her face at me. “How would we get back to FoCo? It’s two hours away.”

“Well, we don’t technically have to be back here until six for dinner. And it’s only eight-thirty in the morning now. So we have tons of time.”

She smiles a smile that matches Oliver’s mad-scientist palm-rubbing. “Tell me.”

“We can Uber.” I smile as I say it. Uber is the teenager’s gift from God.

“Won’t Ash and Ford get an alert if we use the app?”

“Pffft. What do you think I am? A child? I’ve had my own credit cards since I was eleven.”

My princess hooks her arm into mine and leans her head on my shoulder. “You’re my hero, Five.”

Wow. Life lesson learned. Find a way to give a woman what she wants and you turn into her hero.

“Come on,” I say. “Let’s walk down to the Village and call from there. I bet there are a ton of cars today.”

“Will they take us all the way to Fort Collins?” Rory asks.

“They will if we pay them enough.” That’s one lesson I learned growing up Aston. Money talks.

Chapter Six

“I don’t get why you’re giving me the silent treatment,” I say as we drive Sparrow over to the Vail theatre for the last
Nutcracker
dress rehearsal before the performance tonight.

“Sparrow,” Rook says, an edge to her voice. “Do you want me to hang out with you backstage and do your hair and make-up?”

“Oh, yeah,” she says. I look at my thirteen-year-old daughter in the rearview and smile. She’s so perfect. Her dark hair, her blue eyes. They are the same blue as Rook’s. The same blue as mine. Electric.

But I don’t like the idea of modeling. Rook knows this. I’m the one who should be giving her the silent treatment for telling Sparrow yes before we talked it over. Once, when Sparrow was six and Starling was just a new baby, Antoine took pictures of them. And since they both have bird names, like Rook, Elise thought it would be cool to dress them up in feathers and make them look like birds. Sparrow was holding Starling in her arms, her long dark hair falling over her face as she leaned down to give her new baby sister a kiss.

It was the most beautiful picture I’ve ever seen.

But lots of other people felt the same way. Antoine had it up in his office and every time a client came, they asked about it.

They asked about Sparrow, specifically. Was she available?

Was she fucking available? Antoine’s photographs are more child-friendly these days—he mostly does fashion now. But back then he had a few lingering clients for the erotic stuff.

I saw red.

Normally I’m a pretty easy-going guy. I don’t get worked up and I take it all in stride, knowing that there is a solution for every problem. But I punched that guy in the teeth that day. I almost got arrested. Antoine had to smooth things over so the client didn’t press charges. Antoine ended up doing the shoot for free.

I do not want my daughter’s face plastered all over the world like mine was. I do not want people to look at her and remark on her weight, or her legs, or whether or not she’s graceful or she can hold a pose that reminds people of a cat. It’s no one’s damn business.

Rook knows this. She was there that day.

I huff out a breath.

And yet here I sit getting the silent treatment.

I pull into the Vail theatre and stop at the backstage security guard and flash our pass. He nods at Sparrow, who looks like a dancer, even when she’s not in her costume or leotard.

“Do you want me to come in too, Sparrow?” I ask her, smiling into the rearview mirror.

“We got this,” Rook says, grabbing her purse. Sparrow is already halfway out of the backseat, pulling her bag filled with shoes, make-up and whatever else they use to put on a show behind her.

I grab Rook’s hand before she can make her own escape and pull her close. “Why are you mad at me? I never said a word. I should be the one mad at you.”

She crosses her arms. “Are you mad at me?” she challenges.

“No, but you know I don’t like the idea of her modeling. I hate the thought of people looking at her.”

“You do realize she’s a ballerina, right? You do realize that there will be three hundred people watching her tonight?”

“It’s not the same,” I say, weary of this fight before it even starts. “It’s dancing.”

“It’s the same thing. They want tall, skinny girls to dance, Ronin. They want girls who can work hard and dedicate their lives to the art. It’s the same thing. So I don’t understand why she can’t model for this equestrian catalog.”

“Well, you already told her she could, Rook. So if I say no, then I’m the bad guy.”

“That’s not the point. I want you to be happy for her. She doesn’t want to be a model, Ronin. She doesn’t even want to be a ballerina. She wants to be a veterinarian. But along the way she wants to explore these other things. She loves riding. The job isn’t about the modeling, it’s about the location where they’re doing the shoot. A big horse park down in Parker where she dreams of show jumping one day. And while we’re on that topic, you complain about
that
too.”

“It’s dangerous.”

“Well, why don’t we just forbid Starling from skiing then? That’s dangerous. Hell, let’s just stop them from walking across the street when we get home. They might get hit by a car.”

“There’s risks, and then there’s risks. Starling out on the bunny hill with Ford is—”