“Oh, Dani and Cohen were back before the sun was even up to pick him up. I’m shocked they lasted as long as they did,” Izzy says with a smile.
“I didn’t even have the door all the way open before Cohen was pushing his way in and snatching my boy back,” Axel adds on a grumble from the floor.
“This way,” Molly sings before putting each of her tiny hands on both of Axel’s cheeks and turning his head back toward her. “Do this,” she demands and smacks her lips together. “It’s not big enough,” she mumbles and I laugh when she picks up the lipstick tube.
“Baby, I’m not so sure Mr. Reid will think that is his color.”
My face reddens when I think about the burden she’s been on them. Molly has always been a child that loves easily and loves big, but usually she’s shy around men. She had just turned two when Jack passed away and it’s always been just the occasional babysitter until Dani’s parents started keeping her. Of course, she knows and loves Cohen and Chance, but even that took her months to warm up to them. It shouldn’t be a shock that she instantly connected to Dani’s father, the older she gets the more curious she has become, and she has recently been asking more and more about Jack. My heart squeezes when I think about all the things she’s missed out on.
“Of course it is, right Molly-wolly?” Axel booms. His voice literally vibrates through the room.
“Get ready for it,” Izzy strangely says and I turn to look at her only to have my confusion intensify when she just smirks.
“Where, oh where, is the Princess of Pretty? Oh, Princess! I’m in the need of your magic for I have lost my way! There’s no time to waste! The ball is in minutes, no seconds!”
My jaw drops. Eyes widen. And I have to work to keep the hilarity of this moment from bubbling out.
If I thought Axel boomed earlier I was wrong. Because skipping—skipping on his toes—comes Dani’s older brother, Nate Reid, his voice vibrating through their large living room. All six-foot-something of his muscular frame with a sheet wrapped around his hips as a makeshift dress, and tank top flipped up and folded between his huge pecs to make some sort of weird bra. His make-up is even heavier than his father’s, his green eyes even brighter with the amount of shadow my daughter has painted, in what I can only guess is her best impression of raccoon eyes. His lips look like he was stung by hundreds of bees, the red circle of lipstick going from mid chin to the bottom of his nose. But it’s his hair that makes me lose the fight to keep the laughter in. He has what has to be twenty ponytails pulling his shoulder length hair up in a million different directions.
He skips toward me, stops and my laughter gets to a level of insanity when he gives me a crooked grin and curtsies before spinning on his feet and falling dramatically onto the floor next to Molly—who is smiling a crooked grin of her own at him.
“Princess, please stop trying to make that ugly troll pretty and tell me where I go to get to the ball! I have to meet the prince before midnight!” Nate takes one thick hand and throws it over his forehead in a dramatic fashion that would give the best actors a run for their money.
“Troll!” Axel yells and kicks out his foot to jab his son in the hip. “I’ll show you a troll!”
I watch in fascination as the two very manly men wrestle on the floor, not for one second caring that they’re both dressed for a day of drag.
I’m shaken from my thoughts of the morning madness when the doorbell rings. My brow furrows and I switch gears from the kitchen to go answer the door. The only people that would be coming over would be Dani, Cohen, Chance or maybe Nate—after last night he’s called a few times to make sure I’m okay. Given that I just got off the phone with Dani, I’m sure it isn’t her. Chance would call first and since I know he’s going through some personal stuff after the issues Dani had before Owen was born, I know it isn’t him. Chance only comes over when he needs someone to talk to, and lately he hasn’t been happy when I push for him to go see someone over the depression he’s fallen into.
I pull the door open and stop dead.
Liam.
“Miss me, Megs?”
My jaw drops when he shoulders his way into my house and I turn to snap at him when I catch a whiff of pizza.
“What—”
My words die when he leans down and gives me a hasty kiss.
“Pizza.”
That’s all he says. He holds up the five boxes of pizza in his hands and turns to walk through the house. He knows where the kitchen is; he came with Dani, Cohen and the rest of the crew when Molly had her fifth birthday party a few months ago. He didn’t say much, but I felt his eyes on me every second that he was there.
“You can’t be here,” I snap.
He looks over from where he’s putting the pizzas down on the counter and rolls his eyes. “Baby, I’ve been inside you.”
He did not just say that.