Total pages in book: 74
Estimated words: 70546 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 353(@200wpm)___ 282(@250wpm)___ 235(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 70546 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 353(@200wpm)___ 282(@250wpm)___ 235(@300wpm)
I can make the feeding take an extra long time.
But that would mean leaving Nina alone with the bowl-cut baddies, and they could literally say anything, and anything could happen.
I could take her with me and tell them I’m teaching her how to do the chores. But that would imply she’s learning in order to stay, and I don’t want to open up that stubborn jar of pickles. They’d be rotten pickles anyway—botulism pickles.
This feels a lot like a lose-lose situation.
“Fine.” I spin around before sliding open the barn doors. “I’ll sit down with you all for fifteen minutes. Fifteen. You control yourselves, and then you leave. I’ll also take down all the cameras in the house. But don’t even dare think about installing more. We agree to never mention this incident again because it’s far too damaging for our relationship. I try and forgive you both, and you try and respect boundaries. That’s the deal. Take it or leave it.”
My mom elbows my granny right near her Grambutt patch. “We have fifteen minutes. We had better make it good.”
My granny’s answering smile is pure devious evil. “Oh, it’ll be good, honeypants. Don’t you worry. It will be real good.”
Fuck on a boot. What the hell kind of boobytrap have I just sprung now?
CHAPTER 8
Nina
I have to say that when I pictured Thaddius’ grandma and mom, I kind of thought they’d be monsters. Not the kind with hair and horns who live in caves or anything, but like the more dangerous, less cute, and fuzzy people with some seriously monstrous life-ruining ideas. I thought they’d be mean, prissy, stuck up, and very, very strange.
It turns out they’re just as human as the rest of us. Thaddius’ grandma is even kind of cute, and his mom is pretty. They both seem to have a sense of humor, and it’s obvious, even to me, as I stand over at the stove and flip an omelet, that they love Thaddius so much. They’re not monsters at all. Although, his mom asked for broccoli in her omelet, and I think that’s pretty monstrously disgusting.
Alright, so right now, Thaddius thumped into the house, and his mom and grandma walked in after, smelling like sweet-scented perfume and looking expensive and put together. Thaddius, however, looks like a storm cloud about to break open and rain all over everyone’s parade.
“All those cameras are coming down. Now. You might as well tell me where they are.”
Cameras? Something in my gut tells me it’s time to change the subject. “Are you sure about the broccoli?” They gave me their omelet orders after waking me up and scaring me half to death. I instantly bolted upright in bed when I heard female whispers and footsteps that weren’t Thaddius’. They might have scared the life out of me, and I might not have wanted to face my not-so-future mother-in-law and grandma-in-law with a bedhead and sleep in my eyes, my nipples doing something that until the day I die, I’m going to pretend didn’t happen at the smell of man all over the sheets I’d just spent the night in, but I sucked it up and offered to make breakfast.
That’s what one does when one finds interlopers in a house that isn’t one’s own, and the whole thing is batshit bananas, isn’t it?
Wanda—and I’ve heard my mom and aunt complain more than enough about Wanda and Wendy, the two Wonderduck girls, that I am well acquainted with her name—gives me a nice smile. She’s the kind of person who looks best with a smile on, but if she wanted to smile and scowl at the same time, it would look terrifying. You know, the kind of smile that says don’t fuck with me, sweetie, because I will tear you to pieces one shred at a time with my mom skills? I have a feeling she’s a master of that kind of smile, but that she’d only ever use it if someone was messing with her and hers.
“I’m sure. Broccoli makes the world go round. It’s high in awesomeness.”
I’m pretty sure it’s also high in disgustingness, but I won’t tell someone they can’t eat what they like.
“Are there tomatoes?” Elmira Wonderduck asks me. “Grown right here on this farm, steeped in sheep poo and other organic fertilizers?”
“Erm…”
“Yes, there are tomatoes,” Thaddius grinds out. “But the cameras. You’re going to tell me where they are. Now, Granny.”
I now know what a man who is about to lose his patience in the most spectacular fashion looks like. I also know Thaddius is way too hot for someone who just spent the night in the barn with the sheep, sleeping on a pile of hay. There isn’t even a single blade of hay stuck to him. He’s ridiculously handsome. Bedhead looks good on him, and so does the dark stubble dotting his jawline. He looks well rested and like he didn’t mind one bit getting some shut-eye with the animals. He might be standing across the kitchen, but it’s a small farmhouse, and the kitchen isn’t big. By no means should he smell as good as he does.