“It’s a really difficult choice. However...”
* * *
“Uncle Sten, did you have a sleepover at Madison’s?” demanded Coco, who was already at the table with a half-eaten pancake on her plate and syrup on her chin when Madison and Sten entered the downstairs kitchen.
Karin, at the cooktop flipping pancakes, tried to nip that line of questioning in the bud. “Eat your breakfast, sweetheart.”
Coco was not deterred. “ButIwant to have a sleepover with Madison.”
Chuckling, Otto patted the little girl’s shoulder and dabbed at her chin with his napkin as Madison took the chair Sten pulled out for her.
Ben, buttering his pancakes with careful, even strokes, remarked, “Grown-ups don’t have sleepovers with kids.”
“Unless the grown-up is yourfriend,” argued Coco. “And Madison is my friend, aren’t you, Madison?”
“Yes, I am,” Madison replied automatically.
Her blue eyes going big as Cinnabon rolls, Coco amped up the charm factor. “So then, Madison, can we have a sleepover, you and me, at your house, please?”
Madison knew the proper answer to that one. “We’ll have to talk to your mom about that.”
Coco turned those big eyes on her mother. “Mommy, Madison says yes. So can we have a sleepover? Please.”
Karin turned from the cooktop and asked sweetly, “Do you need the answer to that question right now?”
Coco stuck out her bottom lip.
Ben turned to Madison and stage-whispered, “That’s Mom’s big move. When she says that, you can’t say yes, or Mom just says, ‘All right then. The answer is no,’ and you don’t get whatever you’re asking for.”
Coco knew the drill, too. “No, Mommy,” she said with exaggerated politeness. “I don’t need an answer now, but I would ’preciate it if you would think about it.”
“Fair enough.” Karin flipped a couple of golden-brown pancakes onto a plate. “Madison and I will discuss it and we will let you know.”
* * *
That evening, Karin got a rare night to party with friends and Madison, Coco, Sten and Benjamin rolled out sleeping bags on the cottage’s great room floor. They had popcorn and hot chocolate with marshmallows and watched a couple of movies—science fiction for Ben andMulanfor Coco. Later, Sten told them a long ghost story about a demented clown who lived in a cornfield.
It was well after midnight when the kids finally fell asleep.
Sten joined Madison in her sleeping bag. They whispered together like a couple of naughty kids and shared more than one smoking hot kiss. Finally, at a little before one, he returned to his own bag and they settled in for the night. Madison drifted off to sleep with a smile on her face.
She wasn’t sure what woke her. Voices? A car door slamming?
She sat up in her sleeping bag. It was still dark, past three in the morning according to the digital clock on the stove in the kitchen area.
Sten sat up and whispered, “What’s wrong?”
“Don’t know,” she whispered back. “I think I heard something outside.”
“I’ll check.” He got up. She rose, too. “You stay here,” he instructed.
“No way. I’m going.” And there it was again—people talking. Arguing, maybe, coming from the cliff side of the house. She put up a hand for silence. But now all was quiet. “Voices, I think.”
He pointed toward the slider. She followed him on tiptoe, trying not to wake Coco or Ben.
When they reached the glass door, he pushed it open with agonizing slowness and closed it behind them the same way.
It was chilly out—and very dark, too, with the moon no longer visible in the overcast sky. They were both barefoot, in sleep pants and long-sleeved T-shirts. Hopefully, they would solve this little mystery quickly, and not be out in the cold for long.
