Chapter 8
Where we love is home—home that our
feet may leave, but not our hearts.
—Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.
The annual Abbott family game night was, in fact, utter chaos and nonstop laughter, most of it due to the antics of Lucas and Landon as well as a steady flow of beer and wine.
“They really do this every year?” Emma asked Grayson as they sat off to the side watching the goings-on.
“Two days after Christmas for as long as I can remember. Aunt Molly says that with ten kids on vacation and not a lot of disposable income back in the day, they had to be creative with how they entertained the troops. Game night became a holiday-week tradition.”
“What’ve we missed?” Charley asked as she came in with Tyler.
“Just Lucas and Landon being morons,” Will said.
“Nothing new there,” Charley said.
“Dad always said if you’re going to do something, be the best at it,” Landon said.
“You took that advice a little too literally,” Hannah said from her perch on the sofa next to Nolan. She was so pregnant she could barely move, or so she said.
“I’m here to defend my Scrabble title,” Ella said, arriving with Gavin.
“No one wants to play with you anymore, honey,” Lincoln said.
“Bunch of chickenshits,” Ella said, scowling.
“It was the ninety-point word that did you in.” Linc pulled a piece of paper from the game box. “Here’s the petition signed by the entire family on game night last year.”
“They actually signed a petition?” Emma asked Grayson.
“Oh yeah. No one can beat her.”
“I’ll play with you, babe,” Gavin said, patting Ella on the bottom.
“I hope we’re still talking Scrabble,” Colton said from the floor where he sat with Max and Caden setting up Monopoly. “And not strip poker.”
“I’m happy to play whatever games your sister dreams up,” Gavin said to moans, groans and flying game pieces.
“Don’t mess up the games!” Linc said. “You’re all a bunch of animals!”
“They always have been,” Molly said.
Wade dabbed at his eyes. “I love when Mom and Dad get sentimental.”
“I’m here to photograph the mayhem,” Izzy Coleman said when she arrived, camera in hand.
“And I’m here to referee,” Grayson’s mother, Hannah, said as she followed her daughter into the family room, zeroing right in on Emma sitting close to Grayson on the love seat.
Emma shifted ever so subtly away from him.
He looked at her, raising a questioning brow.
Should she tell him his mother seemed to disapprove of her for him? He’d deny that. Of course he would, but Emma knew disapproval when she saw it.
“Okay,” Lincoln said, “Ella is the defender of the Scrabble title, which has been banned from game night due to lack of interest from challengers.”
“Bunch of babies,” she said, glowering at the others.
“Hunter is the defending Monopoly champion.”
“Whatever,” Will said.
“He totally cheats,” Lucas said.
“Since he’s on his honeymoon and unable to defend his title, Hannah will act as his proxy,” Lincoln continued.
Hannah flexed her muscles and pretended to crack her knuckles. “He’s had me in training for this moment for months. I’m ready for you losers.”
“It’s not fair,” Landon said. “She’s got two brains to work with this year. That ought to be an automatic disqualification.”
“Stuff it,” Hannah said. “I could kick your ass with half a brain.”
“I see game night is off to a rousing start,” Elmer Stillman said when he came in, his cheeks red from the cold.
“Hannah’s already swearing,” Colton said to his grandfather.
“Business as usual,” Elmer replied.
“I thought this was such a nice family,” Cameron said.
“I know!” Lucy said. “I had no idea.”
“Welcome to your first game night, ladies,” Elmer said. “This is where the truth comes out.”
“Lucas and Landon are the team to beat in both charades and Pictionary,” Lincoln said.
“Did we agree that they aren’t allowed to do any handstands this year?” Colton asked.
“After they took out the Christmas tree last year, Mom made a no-gymnastics-of-any-kind law,” Lincoln said.
“Go near my tree, and I’ll have you killed,” Molly said.
Emma giggled uncontrollably.
“The Colemans are positively tame compared to this crew,” Grayson said.
“I wouldn’t go that far,” Izzy said. She moved around the room taking photos, zeroing in on Max, who held his sleeping infant son in his arms. “Most photogenic father and son I’ve ever shot.”
“You may be a little biased,” Max said, smiling at his cousin.
“Nope, it’s true. The two of you are going to have the ladies beating down your door.”
Max nuzzled Caden’s fuzzy blond hair. “We don’t need ladies. We’ve got each other, right, buddy?”
Emma’s heart broke for Max, who now had sole custody of his one-month-old son after Chloe, the baby’s mother, brought him to Max during Hunter’s wedding, saying she wasn’t ready to be a mother.
The family had rallied around Max, but it was obvious he was still reeling from the enormity of his new responsibilities.
Thankfully, Caden was an easy, sweet baby who enjoyed being passed from one set of loving arms to another.
“Here we go, lunatics.” Lincoln began picking names from a hat to play against the defending champions in each game.
Emma ended up with Grayson facing off against Lucas and Landon as well as Will and Cameron in charades.
“I think this was rigged,” Grayson whispered to her.
“He put us together on purpose?”
“Of course he did. He and Gramps are tireless matchmakers.” He kept his voice low so he wouldn’t be overheard. “When they wanted to give Hannah a nudge in Nolan’s direction, they messed with her car on a day when the entire family was otherwise occupied so she’d have to call him for help.”
“They did not!”
“Oh yes they did. Remember the sex toy conference Colton went to in New York?”
Emma stared at him, agog. “Seriously?”
“It gave him an excuse to see Lucy. And they hired Cameron to build the website, hoping she’d fall for one of Linc’s sons.
Look how that worked out.” He gestured to Will and Cameron, who had their heads together to plot their strategy to defeat the cocky twins.
After she fainted during Hunter’s wedding, the family had found out Cameron was pregnant.
“They’re diabolical.”
“Gramps bought the diner and handed it over to Hunter to manage, forcing him to confront his feelings for Megan.”
“Now they’re on their honeymoon.”
“And the matchmakers are high on their own success,” Grayson said.
“I’m feeling like a deer in headlights all of a sudden,” Emma said.
He barked out a laugh that had everyone looking at them with thinly veiled curiosity. “Don’t make eye contact.”
“Good advice.”
“Oh my God, look.” Grayson held up the clue they’d been given to act out in charades.
Emma laughed when she saw the words deer in headlights. “That’s too funny.” She made a face mimicking the words.
“That’s perfect. You got this one, honey.”
Emma’s insides went haywire when he called her honey and looked at her as if he wanted to drag her out of there for more of what they’d had earlier. She wondered if or when they’d get another chance to be alone together.
Despite a noble effort put forth by Emma and Grayson as well as Will and Cameron, they were no match for the hijinks of Lucas and Landon, who ran away with another charades victory shortly before Hannah triumphed in Monopoly and Gavin quit the Scrabble game he was playing with Ella after she scored a one-hundred-point word.
“Now you see why we all quit her,” Colton said.
“I get it, and I’d like to sign the petition,” Gavin said.
“You sign that petition, and you’ll be living like a monk for a year,” Ella said, glaring at him.
Lincoln held up the petition. “What’s it going to be, Gavin? Are you with us or with her?”
“Ummm, well… The monk’s life doesn’t really appeal to me.” He grinned at Ella. “I guess I’m with her.”
“Pussy,” Lucas said.
Molly shrieked. “Lucas Abbott!”
“Sorry, Mom, but if the shoe fits…”
“It totally fits,” Gavin said, winking at his future brother-in-law.
“I’d like to completely unsubscribe from this family,” Molly said.
“Sorry, love, but that’s not going to be possible,” Lincoln said.
“You reap what you sow, my dear,” Elmer said to his daughter.
“I did not sow them to use words like that in my house!”
“It’s because you let them run wild, Mom,” Hannah said gravely. “We got all the rules, but by the time the babies came along, you were worn out.”
“Ahhh, I love game night,” Colton said from his post, stretched out on the living room floor. “Every year it’s a big fat disaster.”
“Spoken like one of the younger ones who got to run wild,” Will said.
“Not our fault you guys wore them out,” Colton replied.
Landon used his thumb to point to Colton. “What he said.”
“Maybe they’ll get called into work,” Hannah said.
“No such luck, sis,” Landon said. “We’ve got the whole week off.”
“Awesome,” Charley said. “We need a petition against them for charades and Pictionary. Who’s with me?”
All hands went up except for two.
“I feel discriminated against,” Lucas said to his twin.
“Me, too. Screw them. Let’s get drunk.”
“With you, brother.”
“This is when the drinking portion of the evening usually begins in earnest,” Grayson told Emma. “When people start quitting in protest.”
“It’s amazing they all speak to each other the rest of the year.”
“Isn’t it?”
“Does your family do stuff like this, too?”
“Not like they do. It was different for us after my dad left.”
With the others engaged in conversation and friendly arguments, Emma had the privacy to ask, “Do you have any idea where he is?”
“Nope. None of us have heard from him in years.”
“So he tried to keep in touch?”
“At first we got the occasional effort, but we were all so angry with him for what he’d done to us and Mom that he stopped trying after a while.”
“Did you ever find out why he left?”