Total pages in book: 105
Estimated words: 103061 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 515(@200wpm)___ 412(@250wpm)___ 344(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 103061 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 515(@200wpm)___ 412(@250wpm)___ 344(@300wpm)
Justin laughed. “A swear jar?”
“Yes,” Hallie answered. “That’s what she called it.”
“That’s what who called it?” I asked, irritated.
“Winnie.”
“Who’s Winnie?” Justin asked.
“She’s our new friend that lives next door.” Hallie refolded a few things before placing them in a drawer.
“She gave me a Band-Aid,” said Luna, who clearly didn’t give a shit about keeping anything folded and was shoving things in drawers willy-nilly. “See?”
Justin dutifully examined the knee she displayed. “Very nice.”
“She said her dad was always saying bad words too, so she and her sisters made a swear jar.”
“Fuck that,” I said.
“The F-word is a dollar, Daddy. You might not want to say it anymore.” Hallie’s tone was solemn as she lined up her shoes in the closet exactly the way she liked them.
My brother-in-law laughed again. “That’s nice there are kids next door for you guys to play with. How old is Winnie?”
Luna giggled. “She’s not a kid.”
“She looks like one,” I muttered.
“I don’t know how old she is,” Hallie said thoughtfully. “Maybe a teenager?”
“That could be good,” Justin said, testing the stability of the frame and headboard. “You’d have a babysitter right next door.”
“I think she’s older than that, but not by much.” My knees cracked as I rose to my feet. “Okay, let’s put the mattresses on.”
“I think she’s pretty,” Luna said.
“Oh yeah?” Justin gave me a teasing glance as we hauled one twin mattress over to Hallie’s bed and tossed it on. “Is this true?”
I shrugged and turned around to grab the second one. “I only saw her for a minute.” During which I’d tried not to notice how short her shorts were or glance at the bare skin showing beneath her crop top.
“It’s true,” said Hallie with confidence. “She’s very pretty.”
“And she likes animals,” Luna said, watching us place the mattress on her bed. “Can we get a pet here, Daddy?”
“No.” I looked around for the garbage bags full of their sheets and blankets. Were they still downstairs?
“But why not?” Hallie followed me out of the bedroom and down the steps. “You said the old apartment didn’t allow pets but this one does.”
“How do you know?”
“Because Winnie has a cat. Her name is Piglet. And cats are very clean, I’ve read about it.”
“I told you, Halsy pal, we can’t have a pet because I work twenty-four-hour shifts. There would be nobody here to feed it.” I spied the two bags at the foot of the staircase and handed one to her. “Take this up to your bedroom.”
“Maybe Winnie could feed it when you’re not here,” she said, lugging the bag up the steps.
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because I don’t want a stranger in our house.”
“She’s not a stranger. She’s a friend.”
“We don’t even know her, Hallie.” Frowning, I followed her into the bedroom and dumped out the contents of the bag onto the carpet. “She could be a lunatic. Or a serial killer.”
“But she has princess Band-Aids. And she believes in happily ever after!” shouted Luna.
“Then she’s definitely a lunatic.”
“After you know her better, can you ask her?” Hallie pleaded.
“I’m not getting a cat. There’s nothing to ask.”
“Daddy, can we paint the walls in here pink?” Luna asked, hopping onto her mattress and starting to jump.
“Not pink, purple!” Hallie began bouncing up and down on her bed too.
I held up Luna’s fitted sheet and studied it. “Should I wash this stuff first?”
“Maybe. Smell it,” Justin shrugged.
I sniffed the sheet—it smelled like maple syrup. “Guess I should. Come on, girls. I’ll teach you how to do laundry. Whoever finds the box with the detergent gets a ride in the truck.”
Squealing with excitement, they leapt off their beds and took off running, elbowing each other to get ahead as they raced down the stairs.
A few hours later, the laundry was done, clean sheets were on the beds, and the truck had been returned. I’d let the girls ride in it while Justin followed in my SUV, and they’d chirped like magpies the whole time. My head was fucking pounding.
After dropping my brother-in-law off, we returned to our new home to see the girl from next door on our front porch.
“Winnie’s knocking on our door!” Luna said excitedly from the back seat. “Hurry, Daddy!”
No sooner had I pulled into the garage than the girls unbuckled their seatbelts and bolted for the porch. It was like they’d spotted a celebrity.
I got out of the car slowly, eyeing the door that went right into the kitchen and wishing I could just slip inside without talking to anyone. But I walked around to the front door.
The girl still had those tiny shorts on, and my eyes were immediately drawn to her legs again. And since she faced away from me as she spoke to the girls, I accidentally got a good eyeful of the way the denim hugged her ass before I forced myself to look down at my feet.