“Do you have your phone?”
“Of course I do,” she scoffed, slipping it from one of those magical spots on her person where she’d tucked it away in an outfit free from pockets.
She scanned the QR code and frowned at the image that popped up. “What is this?”
But I just shrugged, still trying to discern the faintest of changes in her. I’d be goddamn checking her out later, mapping every difference until I knew her body better than she did.
Utterly unaware of my intentions, her eyes narrowed as she increased her screen’s brightness and zoomed in on the picture where the damn elf sat that Finn had insisted was a good idea.
It taunted her with a cheery smile and a wave.
She wiggled her head from side to side as she tried to figure out the elf’s location, then stormed off, uncaring that she dislodged my hands.
Because they couldn’t hold her, I shoved them in my pockets and traipsed behind her, a wider smile curving my lips.
Here was me, thinking I still had it inmeto keepheron her toes…
Inessa: 1
Eoghan: 0
SIXTEEN
It tookten minutes for the kids to realize that Inessa wasn’t focused on the movie and that Eoghan was following her around the apartment.
Of course, that meant they had to follow him too.
Eoghan fascinated them. Maybe it was because he made no real effort with them. In that way of ornery kids, and my brothers only produced ornery spawn, that intrigued them all the more.
Why hang around the people who actually wanted you there when you could irritate the one who didn’t?
Kat trundled after her next.Then, ever nosy, Third waddled along, tugging at Kat in a silent demand to be carried.
That kid was her mother’s daughter. Why walk when other people’s arms existed to do the work for her?
Aoife was the first adult to follow, sheer curiosity getting her to abandon the movie ten minutes from the end.
The sly smile on my wife’s face told me she knew exactly what was happening.
Inessa was hard to ignore—she didn’t care if she walked in front of the screen in her haste to find whatever she saw on her phone.
The first time, she ended up dragging out some books from under the TV and shouted, “A-ha!”
“What is it, Aunty Nessie?” Jake asked, peering around her shoulder.
Soft eyes found my youngest brother. “It’s a signed book I wanted.”
Cam, never one to be excluded when Jake was in on something, prodded her. “There’s a QR thingy, Auntie Nessie.”
“Oh! So there is.”
She scanned it, and off she went again.
Another signed book. Orient Express tickets from Istanbul to Venice. Emerald earrings the size of my thumbnails.
With each gift, my brothers—apart from Finn—all grew dramatically grimmer.
“That asshole’s showing us up!”
