Gray snorted and shook his head. “Good try. I’ll get someone to check in on you.”
“Daddy! I’m not staying in bed.”
“I can see that I need to start writing things in a naughty girl notebook.”
“Nooo!” That sounded terrible.
“I will be as fast as I can,” he told her. “When I get back, we’ll see how you are feeling. But no getting up unless you need the toilet and then straight back to bed. I mean it.”
16
IMMY, JENNER, AND TOBIAS
Christmas Eve
“Gray said just to check on her and to be quiet in case she’s asleep,” Immy said to Cat. “Not to invade the bedroom with a bunch of cookies to decorate.”
“But it’s Christmas Eve and Maeve will be sad if she misses out,” Cat told her, holding a tray of cookies along with a bowl of icing. Immy had her own tray filled with decorations for the cookies.
She might have already eaten some of those decorations and her tummy was feeling a little bit icky. Immy loved anything sweet, but she wasn’t very good at balancing her sugar cravings out with other food. Generally, Tobias kept an eye on what she was eating. But he was in the gym this morning with Abe and Sampson, and Jenner had disappeared into their bedroom, saying that he’d had a burst of inspiration.
So Immy had been left with just Cat and Bernard supervising her. Bernard had frowned at her when she’d eaten that second handful of M&Ms. But that had just meant that she’d snuck the third and fourth mouthfuls behind his back.
Immy wasn’t an amateur at this sort of thing.
“Come on, we need to keep Maeve company,” Cat said as she attempted to open the door. But neither of them had a spare hand.
“Uh-oh,” Immy said. “How are we supposed to get into the bedroom?”
“How about I get the door?” Maeve said.
Immy turned to find Maeve standing in the doorway. She was dressed in a cute Christmas nightie with candy canes all over it.
“Maeve! You’re up!” Immy cried. “Oh no, I don’t think you’re supposed to be out of bed. Gray won’t be happy.”
“Pfft,” Cat said as she breezed into the room and set her tray down on the end of the bed. “What Gray doesn’t know won’t hurt him.”
Maeve nodded. “He’s gone crazy. He’s in OPD mode.”
“OPD mode?” Immy asked as she set her own tray down. And swiped a few more M&Ms.
She couldn’t help it if M&Ms were the elixir of the gods! If she wasn’t supposed to gorge on them then they wouldn’t have made them so darn delicious.
“OPD mode?” Cat asked.
“Overprotective Daddy,” Maeve said as she sat on the bed and crossed her legs. She drew the blankets over her lap. “I’m a bit worried that he’s going to try and make me spend all of Christmas in bed.”
“He can’t do that!” Immy said with a gasp, horrified. She was wearing a Christmas apron over her clothes. The apron even had tiny bells on it that jangled when she moved. She loved it. She was saving her Christmas outfit for later tonight.
She didn’t want to get it dirty.
“Yeah, he can’t do that!” Cat said. “We’ll complain to the SPCL!”
Immy stared at her. “The what?”
“The SPCL,” Cat explained. “Faith told me all about it. She was going to complain to them about Reuben. It’s The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Littles.”
“Oh, well, I don’t think we have to go that far,” Immy said worriedly.
