From the counter where he was preparing a bottle, Noel whirled around to gape in horror at his son. “Whoa, buddy. Let’s give Mom a little space while she’s holding the baby, okay? Help me make this bottle, will you?”
Lucy O made a whiny grumble, and I’m sure Noel froze and held his breath just as much as I did while we waited for Aspen’s reaction. But she merely started jiggling the infant soothingly and making shh sounds. I exhaled, and Noel encouraged his son to help him with the bottle.
My brother and I were both overly tense at breakfast. I helped get food on the table without talking much, afraid anything I said would upset the moment. But Aspen joining us in the kitchen was just…this was new. I don’t think either Noel or I could trust it as a good thing, though. I kept worrying that Beau bringing up her “sickness” would set her off again, or Lucy O would cry and she’d lose it. But none of that happened.
Noel trying to be too helpful was what actually pissed her off.
“Want me to hold her while you eat?” he offered, already reaching out his arms to take the baby.
Aspen scowled and snapped, “Will you just relax already? I think I can hold my own baby.” And she stood up from her chair and stormed from the room with Lucy O in her arms.
Noel’s shoulders sank. Beau darted glances between me and his dad, and I just sighed.
“What do you need me to do?” I asked quietly.
He glanced meaningfully at his son. I nodded.
We both loved that Aspen was out of her room, but neither of us wanted to overwhelm her with too much at once. And when it came to Beau, he was an all or nothing kind of kid. He’d want to climb all over her, and talk to her, and probably scare her right back into hiding.
So as soon as breakfast was over and the place was cleaned up, I texted my sister.
Sweet. That was just what I wanted to hear, so the kid and I knocked on her front door within the hour.
Ten opened it with an overeager Teagan wiggling in his arms. That split second of seeing the scars on his face hit me with the usual regret before Julianna’s words rang through my head.
Maybe you should see it as a reminder of how much you’re loved.
And that actually helped. Instead of more guilt and shame for causing it, I let the idea that he’d gone through all that because he liked me seep into my bones.
“Bo Bo,” Teagan screamed, jerking me back to the present, right before she launched herself at her cousin as soon as Ten set her on the ground. “Come play with me.”
She grabbed Beau’s hand, and the two scampered off down the hall, almost trampling Caroline who was entering the front room.
“Watch out,” she laughed, darting out of the way so the two ankle-biters could dash by her to their destination. Then she turned to her husband. “I’m going to grab my camera and laptop, and give you a moment to let loose and curse with Colton like I know you really want to, before I snag him away for Vine duty, okay?”
Ten snorted, pretending innocence. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, baby. I don’t feel the need to curse.”
She’d put up a rule that he had to watch his language around Teagan after the two-and-a-half-year-old ripped out an expletive in the middle of the grocery store about a month back. And since potty-mouth was Ten’s native language, he was probably itching to drop a couple f-bombs right about now.
Caroline smiled knowingly. “Yeah right. I’ll let you two to it now.” She lifted up onto her toes to press her lips briefly to his. They both ignored me when I pretended to gag. Ten went as far as to growl hungrily in his throat and wrap an arm around her waist, pulling her closer.
“I know what I do feel the need to do,” he answered against her mouth when she started to pull away and then reached for her when she stepped back.
Laughing, she danced out of his hold and sent him a suggestive smile, mouthing the word later before disappearing from the room.
He watched her go hungrily.
So I jabbed him in the gut. “Stop staring at my sister’s ass, you fucking perv.”
He continued to stare long after she was gone and slapped back at me blindly. “Stop touching me, fuck face. You make my dick limp like no one else.”
I cringed. “That’s sick. You’re such a sick motherfucker. I don’t know what person in their right mind ever thought it was okay to let a sick psycho fucker like you around me when I was little.”
He finally grinned my way. “Someone who thought you needed to grow up awesome, I’d say. Too bad it didn’t stick. You turned out to be a fucking little fucker, for fuck’s sake.”
I rolled my eyes. “What the fuck ever. You wouldn’t recognize awesome if it came up and licked you in the asshole.”