“How do you take your eggs?” she asked, as I began pulling travel mugs from an overhead cabinet. Which I could barely reach. Being short sucks.
“I take them as an unavoidable ingredient in cakes and brownies. Or fully grown and in the form of nuggets or tenders,” I added with a glance into the backyard, where the rising sun was painting the east cabin with bright streaks of light. So much for getting an early start.
Patricia turned to me with one brow upraised, a strip of bacon dangling over a heated skillet from between her thumb and forefinger. “You don’t like eggs?”
“Not as a main course. Sorry.” The coffee pot gurgled, and I leaned closer to let the scent help wake me up. I’d been fired up and ready to kick serious ass, until the emotionally exhausting drama-fest had drained my energy like pulling the plug from the bottom of a full tub.
Bacon sizzled and grease popped, and I realized I was hungry.
“So, what do you eat for breakfast?”
“Oh, don’t go to any trouble for me. I’ll just grab a few strips of bacon on the way out the door.”
“It’s for future reference.” Patricia was facing the stove, but something in her voice—some softer-than-normal quality—told me that was as close to a “welcome to the family” as I’d ever get.
“I like breakfast meats and breads, mostly. Bagels. Pancakes. Scones.”
Jace’s mother huffed as she cracked another egg over the skillet. “Scones are just fancy biscuits. Do you like biscuits?”
“Yes!” I said, disproportionately pleased to have what felt like good news to give her.
She nodded firmly. “I can do biscuits. Thirty minutes.” With that, she left eggs and bacon sizzling on the stove and headed into the giant, well-stocked pantry.
Melody came downstairs a minute later, her eyes still red from crying. She looked exhausted. “No coffee,” her mother said, carrying a ten-pound bag of flour under one arm and a can of baking powder in the opposite hand. Evidently, she was going to make biscuits from scratch. In thirty minutes. “Caffeine isn’t good for the baby.”
“Turns out there’s caffeine in chocolate too,” I whispered to Melody while her mother dug in a drawer full of metal measuring spoons. “But I won’t tell if you won’t.”
Jace’s sister looked at me as if I were a piece of gum stuck in her hair, and I turned back to the coffee pot as it spat the last of the coffee into its carafe. I decided to have a cup right in front of her.
But guilt got the better of me as I stirred sugar and creamer into my steaming travel mug. “Listen, Melody, I’m so sorry.” I sank onto the bar stool next her. “I should never have said anything about you and Isaac. I had no idea it would set off such a shitstorm.”
“That was kind of bitchy.” She shrugged. “I was almost impressed. But they were all going to find out eventually anyway.” And that was clearly as close to an acceptance of my apology as I was going to get. Like mother, like daughter.
It was a miracle Jace had survived childhood.
“So, you and Isaac are getting married?” I said, and when Melody turned to me with stars in her eyes, I realized I’d just said the magic words.
“Yes, and you have to be my maid of honor. No one else will do it.”
“Oh, I’m sure someone will.”
“No.” Patricia dumped a cup of white flour into a big metal mixing bowl. “They won’t.”
“The other tabbies all think I’m a total bitch,” Melody whispered, as if that information might come as a shock to anyone. “You have to be my maid of honor. I’ll totally return the favor for you, if I’m not hugely pregnant when you and Jace get married.”
When Jace and I got married?
We’d only been together for nine hours, but everyone seemed to take for granted that there was a wedding to plan. “Oh, we’re not… We haven’t really talked about the future yet,” I said.
Melody frowned. “What is there to talk about other than picking a date? But I’ve got dibs on Valentine’s Day, so don’t even think about it.”
I held my hands up in a defensive move. “All yours. Like I said, we’re not really…” Another shrug.
“You’re almost through with school, right?” she said, and I nodded. “And it’s not like you’re getting any younger. You may have to go through five or six pregnancies before you get a girl, and I hear childbirth is really hard for older—”
“Okay, I really just came down for coffee, but thanks for the chat!” I stood so quickly that my barstool tipped over and slammed into the floor. Melody rolled her eyes and made no attempt to help me right it, so I picked up the barstool, then hurried out of the kitchen and up the stairs.
I’d been standing outside Jace’s door for nearly a minute, trying to work up the nerve to knock, when he opened the door on his own. “How’d you know?” I asked, as he stepped back to let me in.