“This isn’t a day care,” Belle was saying to Greg, who had two wailing toddlers at his feet.
“I’m a resident. I’m allowed to use the lobby, Belle.”
“You’re disturbing the other residents,” she argued.
“No, they’re not!” Vera said. She and Hyacinth waved at me and toasted drinks that a black-clad server was handing out. “We love seeing hot guys caring for children. We’re thinking about selling tickets.”
“Or at least having this be an annual stop for our photography club,” another woman added.
Belle pursed her mouth.
“I’m trying to sell units in this building, and no one is going to buy one that is infested with screaming ill-behaved children.”
As designed, I thought.
“My sisters just came out of a very traumatic situation,” Greg argued. “I’m trying to help them adjust.”
“You’re trying to scare off buyers,” Belle argued. “Which is against the bylaws.”
I headed past them.
The girls were still mad at me for different reasons, and they ran to their rooms and slammed the doors when we arrived at the condo.
“Are you cooking anything?” I asked Tess.
She blinked at me.
“Am I what?”
Jesus.
“The kids are hungry.”
“I’m your fake girlfriend, not your fake wife. Cook your own shit.”
And with that, her door slammed too.
27
Tess
Icracked eggs into the bowl and yawned. I had resisted the urge to order late-night takeout last night. I should have just ordered food. A snack would have helped me sleep. As it was, I had tossed and turned all night.
I need to find a new job.Beck was bringing up bad memories.
Just when I thought I had gotten over my mother just handing my stepfather the life insurance, the house, and the small inheritance my grandparents had left me, the sour feeling of betrayal would come back.
She had given it all to my stepfather in her will. When I had asked her about it on her sickbed, she had stroked my face and told me it was going to be fine because he had promised to be my dad forever. That had lasted up until the last grief casserole had been dropped off. Then my stepfather had made it very clear that what was mine was no longer mine but his, and I could go jump in a lake.
I beat the eggs in anger until they were frothy. I poured them into the frying pan with the bacon, listening to the satisfying sizzle.
I probably shouldn’t have been so forward with Beck. Annie and Enola were his sisters after all, but I wanted them to have a good life. My life was a disaster. I was living in my boss’s house and counting down the days until my next firing, upon which I would take the first in a long line of temp jobs until I gave up the ghost and holed myself up in an apartment with my stacks of baking supplies, never to be seen again.
I checked the hash browns I had in the oven as Beck came into the kitchen to grab his tea.
“You can have some breakfast,” I said begrudgingly.
“I have to go into the office early,” he replied curtly.
