CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Deacon
Ihave no idea what I’m doing. I mean, getting Amelia in the shower was the only way to avoid her being caught naked or nearly so in front of her family, but I have no plan beyond that.
I sprint out of her bedroom and into that room with the always closed door. Harper’s room.
Except I’m not supposed to know about Harper’s room. I’m not supposed to know Harper exists.
Her room is adorable. Most of it is taken up by bookshelves stuffed full of picture books, slim chapter books, and thicker books to be read to her or for when she gets older. I’m guessing Ellery has been a big influence on that.
The rest of the room consists of a bed with a princess comforter, a child-sized armchair, a dollhouse, and stuffed animals and toys covering every available surface. The room is clean, but messy.
Piecing together a reason for being in this room, I swing the door open just as footsteps approach.
An older woman shrieks and presses a hand to her chest, but I really only have eyes for the tiny little girl with Amelia’s eyes and blond curly hair.
She’s staring up at me without an ounce of fear. In fact, she looks fiercely angry. “Why are you in my room?”
I kneel in front of her, my plan for what to say changing. “Hi. I’m Deacon. Is Marmalade your cat?”
She nods, but she doesn’t look any less angry.
“I built the cat gym for him in the sunroom.”
Her face brightens with a smile. “He loves the cat gym. But I can’t pet him when he gets up high.”
Which is probably exactly what Marmalade wants. “Which is why I was thinking you might like to have a cat gym for Marmalade in your room. I was just taking some measurements.”
“Where is Amelia?” the older woman asks. She no longer looks scared. In fact, she looks like she wants to ask me fifty million questions.
“She’s in the shower,” I say, improvising fast. “She got muddy, um, chasing a dog.”
“She chases a lot of dogs,” Harper says. “What kind of gym are you going to put in my room?”
Thankfully, I’ve been spending hours looking at pictures of cat gyms over the past couple of weeks, hoping to come up with ideas that give me an excuse to spend more time with Amelia.
“How about if we build a walkway for him around your ceiling and a comfy bed for him?”
She nods enthusiastically.
“What are you promising my daughter?”
I stand to see Amelia dressed in her uniform, her hair wet and her smile tight. I have to play this exactly right or she’s going to push me completely out of her life.
“I’m just telling her about your idea to expand Marmalade’s gym into her room. I know we haven’t talked about the details yet, and if it’s too much—”
“It’s not too much, Momma,” Harper says. “I want the gym in my room.”
“I’ll have to talk to Deacon about that,” Amelia says. “But we can probably build Marmalade a nice place to play in your room.”
Harper is no dummy. She crosses her arms over her chest and glares up at her mother with an expression that mirrors exactlyone I’ve seen from Amelia. “I want the gym like Deac said. I want the bed and the ceiling walk.”
“It won’t take more than a couple of hours to install,” I say under my breath.
“Okay,” Amelia says. “If Deacon wants to build that in your room, I’m okay with it, but Marmalade can’t be in there while you sleep, okay?”
Harper stomps her foot and pouts. “But his bed will be there.”
