Chapter 20
Chapter Twenty
EDEN
My cell rang at an ungodly hour the following morning.
With a disgruntled moan, I rolled until I reached the other side of my bed and flopped an arm out, keeping my eyes glued shut as I felt around for the offending phone.
“’Lo,” I muttered once I found it and put it to my ear.
“Rise and shine, doll. Breakfast at my place in fifteen.”
Forcing my eyes open against their will, I turned my head and looked at my alarm clock. “Nona? It’s seven thirty on a Sunday. Have you lost your mind?”
“Such is the curse of a mother,” she lamented. “I haven’t been able to sleep past six in the morning since Blythe came squalling into this world.”
“Yeah, but I’m not a mom, so what the hell?”
“Quit your bitchin’ and get over here. I have bacon and freshly brewed coffee. I want the scoop on last night.”
Getting back to sleep was going to be impossible so, with a heavy sigh, I sat up in bed and threw the covers back. “Fine. I’ll be there in a few.”
Disconnecting the call, I climbed out of bed and headed to the bathroom to wash my face, brush my teeth, and throw my hair into a messy knot at the top of my head.
Slipping out of my frilly lavender nightgown, I threw on a pair of navy joggers, a white ribbed tank, and a long, slouchy cardigan with navy stitching, slid my feet into my slippers, and started out the door and across the street.
Nona threw her front door open a moment after I knocked, dressed in her PJs and a thin, knee-length robe.
Her face was free of makeup, and her long shiny hair was pulled up in a style much like my own.
I’d never seen her when she wasn’t done up, and without the makeup, she looked young and fresh faced.
Too young to be the mom of a teen and preteen.
She was beautiful all the time, but even like this, it was clear to see just how big an idiot her ex-husband was for losing her.
“Morning, gorgeous,” she chirped. “Come on in. Breakfast’s almost ready.”
I followed her through the house and into the kitchen. She moved back to the stove top and started pulling the sizzling bacon from the skillet and putting it on a plate lined with paper towels while I headed for the coffeemaker.
“Mugs in the cabinet right above you,” she said, pointing her fork at the cabinet she indicated. “Creamer’s in the fridge. Help yourself.”
I did just that, doctoring my coffee to perfection before pulling up a stool across the island from Nona as she started scrambling some eggs.
“So,” I started, looking around for her kids. “Where are Blythe and Tris?”
She shot me a look and a snort over her shoulder. “You kidding? They’re still in bed. Those two could sleep ’til well past noon if I let them. I’ll get them up in a bit, but I like my quiet time in the mornings. Now get to talkin’. How was the date?”
My face got all soft and dreamy as I sipped my coffee. “It was… incredible.”
A goofy smile stretched across Nona’s face as she plated up the eggs and bacon.
“That’s really awesome, doll, but I’m lookin’ for details.
Don’t keep me in suspense. I haven’t had a date in over fifteen years, and that was with Christian, so it consisted of splitting a basket of cheese fries at the Burger Shop,” she finished on a displeased grumble.
“Well first of all, he loved the dress, if the kiss he laid on me when he picked me up was any indication.”
“Told you,” she teased, winking at me as she slid a plate and fork my way before digging into her own.
“And by the way, The Groves is absolutely amazing.”
“Right?” she agreed. “For their birthdays, me and the kids get dressed up and go there to celebrate every year.”
“Ooh, nice.”
“Anyway, continue,” she ordered with a wave of her fork.
“So we get there, and things are going well. Like really well. Then all of a sudden, this leggy blonde comes storming over to the table and makes a full-blown scene right there in the middle of the restaurant.”
“No way!” she declared through the eggs she’d just shoveled into her mouth.
“Oh yeah.” I went on to tell her about the showdown with Crystal, her calling me ugly, Lincoln going off on her, and poor sweet Bob. By the time I finished filling her in on all of it, she was hunched over her plate, laughing her ass off.
“Oh my god,” she panted, sucking in air as she tried to get control of herself. “I can’t believe you said that to her.”
“Can you blame me?” I asked with a giggle of my own.
“I mean, if she said ‘you have got to be kidding me’ one more time, I was gonna lose my mind. Anyway, after Bob dropped the hammer and ended their date, Lincoln and I were able to get back to ours, and in spite of the drama, it ended great. He brought me home and we made out on my porch for a bit before he left.”
Nona made a face I couldn’t quite get a read on until she spoke. “Gotta say, babe, I’m stoked the date went so well, but I was kinda hoping for a spicier ending to the night.”
“I was too,” I admitted sullenly after taking a chomp from one of the strips of bacon on my plate. “I actually invited him in, but he said no.”
“He what?”
“Yeah,” I grumbled unhappily. “I was pretty surprised and more than a little disappointed. But he said I wasn’t like Crystal or any of the other girls he’s dated in the past. He said it was only our first date, and that he wanted to do this right.”
Nona’s eyes went wide, and her fork paused midair on the way to her mouth. “Wow. That’s actually really sweet. And hot in that sexually frustrated, makes-you-want-him-even-more kind of way.”
I shoved the other half of the bacon strip into my mouth. “Yeah, tell me about it.”
“So what did you say to that?”
Blowing out a breath full of that sexual frustration she’d just mentioned, I answered, “Well, I pointed out that it was technically our second date, considering we’d already had lunch at the diner.”
Nona’s head fell back on a peel of laughter. “Oh, that’s great! Wish I’d been a fly on the wall for that conversation.”
My lips tilted in a grin as I continued with my story. “I’m making him dinner at my place tonight. And I just so happened to remind him that tonight makes date number three. If I don’t get me some tonight, I might just go crazy.”
“Get some of what?”
Nona and I turned at the sound of Tristan’s voice to find him slowly stumbling into the kitchen, his hair in disarray and his pajama pants and tee wrinkled, as he rubbed the sleep out of his eyes.
“Mornin’, sweetie,” Nona greeted her son as he shuffled toward her, still half asleep, and flopped into his mom’s side. It was adorable to see that, even at twelve, he still didn’t hesitate to snuggle against his mom.
“You made bacon?”
Nona leaned in and placed a kiss on his temple since he was already too tall for her to reach the top of his head. It wouldn’t be long before the sweet boy topped Nona. “I did. Grab a plate.”
He moved from her hold and headed for the cabinet. “So what’re you guys talkin’ about?”
“Grown-up stuff, bud,” Nona answered. “Don’t worry about it.”
He looked at us with curiosity. “But what’s Miss Eden want to get some of?”
“I smell bacon,” Blythe interrupted, finally awake and joining the fray. Like her little brother, she was still in her pajamas, but unlike Tristan, hers were of the shorts and tank variety.
“On the stove, honeypot,” Nona told her. “Help yourself.”
Blythe followed behind her brother, both looking like zombies as they loaded their plates with eggs and bacon before coming to sit on the stools on either side of me.
“Mornin’, Miss Eden.”
“Morning, honey,” I replied, smiling down at Blythe as she dug into her food. “You sleep well?”
“Uh-huh,” she muttered, staring blankly at her plate while shoveling food in her mouth.
“Miss Eden joined us for breakfast so she could tell me about her date with Lincoln Sheppard last night.”
At Nona’s declaration, Blythe snapped out of her trance and jerked her wide eyes my way. “You went on a date with Lincoln Sheppard?” she asked in a stunned whisper.
“Yeah. To The Groves.”
“Oh my god! Lincoln Sheppard took you to The Groves? Oh. My. God!” She squealed so loud I flinched and had to lean away.
“Jeez, Blythe. Keep it down, would ya? I think my ears are bleedin’,” Tris grumbled.
She leaned over me to cut her brother a scathing look. “Shut it, pipsqueak. You’re still just a kid, so you don’t get how big a deal this is.”
Turning my head, I bugged my eyes out at Nona and pulled my lips between my teeth at Blythe’s insinuation that she was all grown up.
“Miss Eden,” she continued, pulling my attention her way, “this is, like, huge. Practically every girl in school knows who Lincoln Sheppard is, and they all have a crush on him! He’s totally old, but no one cares.
That’s how hot he is. When I go to school and tell my friends that my mom’s BFF is dating him, and that he took her to The Groves, they’re gonna flip! ”
Swinging back to her, I scrunched my face in a playful frown. “Hey now. He’s not old.”
“He’s, like, forty-two,” Blythe returned seriously. “To teenagers, that’s ancient. But it’s cool, ’cause he’s got a killer body.”
“Eww, gross!” Tristan cried. “Mom, make her stop!”
But Nona was too busy glaring at her daughter with a look that screamed unhappy mama. “And what do you know about killer bodies or otherwise?”
“Please,” Blythe scoffed in that dramatic teenage girl fashion. “I’m fourteen, Mom, not nine.”
Nona’s hands went up in the air to cut her daughter off. “All right, enough of that. I get that you’re all about the high school hierarchy, but you and your friends are too young to be judgin’ the hotness of grown men.”
“Whatever,” she muttered sullenly and went back to eating. “I still think Miss Eden’s like, the coolest for catchin’ his eye.”
“I think they fit together,” Tristen added. “Lincoln’s cool, but Miss Eden’s super pretty. She needs a cool guy like him.”
My god, I loved Nona’s kids. “Aw,” I sang, lifting my arms and hooking the kids around the shoulders so I could pull them into tight hugs. “You guys are the best!”
“I did all right, huh?” Nona asked with a wink. “They aren’t so bad when they’re not bein’ surly and angsty.”
That earned a beaming smile from Tristan and another mumbled “Whatever” from Blythe, but her lips quivered against the smile she was trying her best to hide.
My heart swelled in my chest as I watched Nona and her kids interact.
I knew my friend was worried about what the divorce was doing to her kids, and how they blamed her, but watching them now, I knew she had nothing to worry about.
She was an excellent mother, and they knew that too, whether they always showed it or not.