Each of them were wrapped around an incredibly beautiful woman.
Discomfort roiled from Cash.
From the right side of the room, a high-pitched squeal broke the silence, and a little girl with blond hair done in two pigtail braids jumped off an oversized couch. “Are these my brand-new friends?”
She came dashing across the room, her precious face split in a smile.
A young boy who appeared to be about a year older than her jumped up from where he was playing on the floor with another little boy who couldn’t be more than two.
“They gotta be!” the older one who had to be Nolan said.
The little girl bounced in front of us, waving her hands overhead. “Hi, hi, hi! I’m Maci! Did you want to meet me? My mommy said you were real excited to come play at my house. Guess what! We’re gonna have a picnic, and I got a whole lotta games, so we’re gonna have the most fun you ever had.”
“Iwikefun!” Eva raised her hand like she was volunteering. She kicked her feet in Cash’s hold. “I want down, My Giant!”
Cash set her down beside Colin.
“I think you came to the right place because that’s what we got around here,” Nolan said. His adorable face was stretched in a wide grin, his warm blond hair longer on top.
“Are you my new friend Nolan?” Colin asked him, dancing back and forth on his feet.
The boy puffed out his chest. “Yep! That’s me. And you gotta be Colin.”
“That’s my name, all right. We kinda match because we got a bunch of the same letters in our names. Do you know how to spell it? Because I do. C-O-L-I-N and N-O-L-A-N. So, I bet we’re really supposed to be friends.”
Nolan cracked up. “I didn’t even think of that! My Daddy-O said I’m really smart, and I guess you’re really smart, too, so I guess we’re definitely supposed to probably be best friends.”
“You want to be my new best friend?” Maci beamed up at Addy. “But we all gotta be best friends because we love each other so much. We can’t be leaving no one out.”
“We never forget the ones in our hearts,” Addy agreed. My heart squeezed tight at her words. The truth that I forever tried to instill into my children. She lifted the bead set. “And look, I brought something for us to make.”
Maci’s eyes lit up. “You got a bead set?! Do I get to make a necklace?”
“Or a bracelet. Whatever you want. Mr. Cash got it for me, so it’s extra special, but we’ve got to do it on the table so the little kids don’t get any of the beads. We have to be careful so they don’t eat any.”
The younger boy popped up from the floor and came tottering our way. White hair framed his cherub face. “I is Finn!”
“Yep, this is Finn, and he’s our family, so he’s our best friend, too.” Maci slung her arm over his shoulder and tugged him so close to her chest that it squished his little lips together.
“That’s right, ’cause family is who you love most.” Nolan peeped it like fact.
His statement pierced me in the chest. The wisdom from a little boy who couldn’t be more than six or seven.
My gaze was drawn up to the eyes that still watched us in shock as the children made their introductions. Meeting the disorder of gazes.
Curiosity, surprise, and speculation.
Before a piercing screech suddenly broke the tension. “Oh my gosh, how in the world is this real life?”
A woman with the blackest hair and even darker eyes peeled herself from the burly mountain of a man who stood at her side. She rounded the island.
My eyes widened when I saw she was wearing the highest stiletto heels, black leather shorts, and a lacy white tank.
She was gorgeous to the extreme. Her eyes lined in thick makeup and her lips painted red. Her hair was woven in one thick, long braid and adorned with little white flowers.
Self-consciously, I shifted on my flip-flops. Apparently, I’d underdressed for this little soiree.
I didn’t have time to elbow Cash in the side for not warning me that I should have worn something nicer since the woman strutted in my direction. Before I could make sense of what was happening, she took me by the hand and pulled me forward so she could inspect me.
