“Hey, my design ideas were spot on.” Meadow slips into a chair next to Noah. “Maybe you are good at cabin renovations?—”
“Of course I’m good at it.” Noah scoffs.
“—but haven’t you had to hire a designer in the past?” Meadow plays with her braid, taking the elastic out and unbraiding the sections.
“Traitor.” Noah says to me, but doesn’t look away from Meadow’s hands.
I might have let it slip to Meadow that Noah is shit at that final step of his cabin renovations, and we often have to pay someone to come finish things off.
“It just so happens I’m looking for a job,” Meadow says.
“No.” Noah shakes his head aggressively.
“What do you mean no? We had fun together, didn’t we?”
“We did not.”
“Why are you such a pain in the ass?”
Callie’s sister doesn’t know that she’s hanging out with a pair of serial killers. Besides personality conflicts, that fact might get in the way of anything happening between Noah and Meadow.
There’s another knock. Callie jumps up and opens the door to Lola.
“Hey!” Callie throws her arms around Lola, then hugs her brother, who appears behind the women. Then Callie grabs Lola’s hand and drags her to the kitchen to open wine. “Come on, Meadow!”
Jake stands awkwardly in the front door for a moment, but I gesture to the table, and he follows and sits in the chair Meadow just vacated. Noah pours him a whiskey without aword, and Callie’s brother accepts it gratefully and throws it back. I head to the kitchen to check the pies, flicking the oven light on. The apple pie looks beautiful. Perfect.
Callie slips next to me and wraps her arms around my waist. Meadow and Lola are chattering away across the kitchen. Next to the apple pie is a mince pie. This one has a gorgeous top crust and decidedly no poison in the filling.
“Fuck, that smells good,” Callie says. It’s true. The smell of the pies mingles with the lasagna baking in the second oven, and it’s an incredible aroma. “Both safe to eat?” she whispers.
“Of course.” I kiss the top of her head. She turns her face up to me, waiting for a kiss on her plump, pink lips. I give the woman what she wants, and she sighs against me.
“I love when you kiss me,” she says.
“And I love kissing you. I do have one problem.”
“What?” Her brow furrows, and she looks into my eyes intensely.
“I’m going to have to come up with another disgusting pie flavor to add my special ingredient to.”
“Mince pie is not disgusting.” Callie laughs and shakes her head.
“Agree to disagree.” I push a chunk of her hair behind her ear. “I was researching recipes, but some of them sound so good I don’t want to ruin them.”
“Like what?”
“Chocolate Haupia pie, which is a chocolate coconut pie from Hawaii.”
“Oh my god, that sounds amazing.” Callie licks her lips, and I’m obsessed with the movement.
“I know. I’m gonna make it sometime. But I think I decided on something called funeral pie.”
“That’s almost too perfect. What’s in it?” She smiles,and I love the open and pure joy on her face. I hope I can continue to make her happy. I hope I can help her create a life here that’s so much better than the one she was considering across the country. I don’t want even one single second of doubt to enter her mind about choosing this.
Choosing me.
Choosing us.
