“Oh, so now you’re just fucking with me,” she said as she fisted her hands beside her.
“You just throw it out there, don’t you?” Now helovesthe way she smelled. Pfff.
He bit his lip from laughing. “Throw what out?”
“Never mind. Are you going with me or what?”
“Okay, Dec, you can do this. It’s only hormones. She doesn’t really want to stick your eyeballs out with a fork…” he joked as Bree turned red in the face with irritation.
“No. I want to scoop them out of their sockets with a spoon!”
His laughter rolled over her, and she had to admit she was being silly. Well, more precisely: admit to herself. She definitely wouldn’t cop up to being hormonal to Dec. He was having way too much fun messing with her about it.
“Let’s go, Love. After we grab some dinner at your mom’s house, I’m taking you with me to my place.”
“I’ll probably be asleep by the time dessert is served, but sure… I’m game.”
“I’ve read somewhere that the coming weeks are going to improve on nausea and tiredness, Love. Anyway, you wouldn’t miss this for the world. I promise,” he said with a gleam in his eye.
“If you say so,” Bree said, yawning.
“When’s the rest coming? I’m hungry,” Gwenn said.
“They could be here any moment,” Joan said, placing the last plate on the festive table.
Homemade decorations and centerpieces decorated Joan’s Christmas table. She intertwined sprigs of the same red flowers at the table with the enormous tree in the living room.
Joan loved to go all out during the holidays. He’s been to almost every Christmas celebration at the Ryan’s since they moved next doors. Normally, Joan’s decorations made you feel the warmth of the season the moment you walked through the door. How very contradictory to Bree's mother’s attitude today.
Joan still gave them both her famous cold shoulder. While he studied Bree’s mother with her cropped up anger, he suddenly felt sorry for all that Joan had been through that made her this way.
The picture of Rob Walker with his ‘new’ family popped into his head. By the look of things, Rob’s other family wasn’t so new at all… He wasn’t sure, but it seemed like Rob had first two sons with Brenda even before Cait had been born.
“Shots fired!”
Declan jumped from his seat on the couch at Gwenn’s voice. He’d zoned out a bit and now Gwenn was handing him his arse. He worked his thumbs over his controller, but he was too late.
“Yes. I win! Want a rematch?” She quirked her brow and her eyes sparkled.
“Yeah, okay.” Declan smiled at the youngest Ryan girl. He was glad she was back safe and sound. Not only because now he had someone to play video games with so, he could avoid Bree’s mother.
“Mom, it’s Christmas Eve…. Don’t you think it’s time to talk things out? I’ve been losing sleep about what we said.” Bree said. Declan looked over his shoulder and listened in on their conversation, not caring if it was rude.
“There is nothing to talk about, Bree. You made your choice. Declan is here, isn’t he? Even though I’m not happy about the way he talked back to me, I still invited him into my home for a Christmas celebration. So please, I’ve taken a big step here. Don’t expect me to be all cheery. It’s going to take some time to get back to how things were.”
He made a move to get off the couch, but Gwenn’s hand on his shoulder placed him back in his seat.
“Let them have this talk. It’s long overdue,” Gwenn said.
He nodded at Gwenn and watched again over his shoulder to see if Bree needed his help.
“I don’t want to talk about it today… it’s Christmas. Can’t we be civil for one day?” Joan glared over her thick-rimmed glasses to Bree and walked out of the dining area into the hallway. Bree walked over to Declan and he tugged her onto his lap.
“I’m sorry, Love.”
He placed his arm around her waist so he could stroke her belly with his thumb. It was a new thing to do. It hit him he wanted to do this with Bree every day. Stroking her tummy. Watching it grow with his children inside.
She shrugged and said, “I don’t know how to deal with any of this. She’s my mom, and I just want her to be happy for me. For us.”