He took a sip of his drink, leaning against the counter. “I make this every morning. I’ve never woken either you or Allie.”
“I have a lot on my mind. Must be stress.”
“You’re, like, twelve.”
“I’m sixteen.”
“Same thing.”
That earned him a glower of the worst kind.
“Where’s the coffee?”
“I didn’t make any. I usually get it on my way to the office.”
She groaned. “Listen, we need to get some caffeine going ASAP, before Allie gets up. She’s a beast in the morning.”
This time he did choke on his smoothie. He couldn’t picture Allie anything but cheerful. She was always put together. Even after the fire in her building, the woman had managed a smile at his office. He put down his glass and pulled out a jar of ground coffee. Dani grumbled around, cupboards slamming and lots of huffing and puffing while he made the coffee.
“You really need to get some normal people food in this place.” She swung open the fridge, made a face, and then shut it. “Too much protein, not enough carbs.”
He finished the rest of his smoothie. “It’s a shame this is the first morning our paths have crossed. I love being told how to eat by a sixteen year old.” Dani didn’t actually bother him. He kind of found her antics and theatrics amusing, like if he had a kid sister.
Allie walked into the room looking completely alien, almost like she’d been drop-shipped from a one-hundred-year coma into his kitchen. Her hair was all crazy, and she was rubbing her eyes. She had on a pink robe that gaped open, leaving him with the nicest view he’d ever started his day with. The pink tank or camisole was low cut and clung to delicious curves and a flat stomach. He heard a snarky noise and found Dani smirking at him. She saw him checking out her sister.
He cleared his throat. “Morning, Allie.”
He thought he heard a garbled good morning back, but couldn’t be sure. Dani verbally ambushed her sister about some school gossip and some party that she just “had to go to” that Allie had already said she couldn’t attend. He poured a large mug of coffee for Allie, who was now sitting at the table with her head in her hands while Dani kept on talking.
“Here, sweetheart.”
That got her attention. Allie jerked her head up and sent him a look of gratitude that made him wonder if he should have just brought her coffee all those times he’d asked her out.
“Anyone want a smoothie?”
Dani made a gagging motion. “I’d rather die, Ethan.”
“Thanks, this is what I need,” Allie said, getting up to grab milk from the fridge. Once she poured in a heap, she took a long sip and moaned. He wasn’t going to get caught looking again, no matter how sexy her noises were or how good she looked with her eyes closed.
“Well, I’m outta here. Have a good day, ladies.”
“You’re going already?” Allie was looking at him. She appeared normal now, her hands wrapped around the mug of coffee.
“Yeah. Anything you need?”
She peered at him over the rim of her cup. “Do you have plans tonight?”
“Of course he does.”
He shot Dani a look. “No plans…well, actually I have a dinner meeting but nothing after that.”
“Allie, he’s not going to want to help us.”
He leaned against the counter and studied Allie. She looked beautiful without makeup. Not that she usually wore a lot, but seeing her like this made her seem younger, more vulnerable. “What do you need?”
“I have approximately one hundred gifts that need wrapping, and I was hoping to get it done by the time the tree goes up. But I know you’re crazy busy, and you’re already giving up Saturday night.”
Dani leaned forward in her chair, looking back and forth between them. He pretended not to notice what she was implying. “He is? I haven’t heard of this.”
Allie ignored her, too. “But I’ll make eggnog and bring home some stuff from the bakery.” Like she needed any of that; he wouldn’t have said no.
“I’m in.”
“I’m out,” Dani said, standing.
Allie frowned and pointed to the chair. “Sit down, you’re not out.”
He walked to the door and then paused, remembering his meeting. “I’ll be late, but I’ll be here.”
She nodded. “That’s great. Thanks, Ethan.”
“I need to discuss my weekend plans, people.”
Allie winced. “You’re sure you’re still okay for Saturday? The Christmas tree lot?”
He grimaced. “I think we need to get out of the city and go to one of those…places that sells trees.”
Allie’s face lit up, and she even put her mug down on the table. “Really? I know a great farm.”
“You’re not taking him to Blueberry Hill.”
Allie nodded.
He shrugged. “Whatever you want. Sold.”
“So let me get this straight. Ethan is going to slap a live Christmas tree to the roof of his Porsche?”
“We’ll take the Range Rover.”
Dani sat up at attention. “I had no idea you had two vehicles…this gives me options.”
Allie turned to her. “This information does not change your life at all.”
“You really have trouble getting into the Christmas spirit,” Dani said, slinking down in the chair.
“Anyway, see you tonight,” Ethan said.
“Have a good day. Thanks for the coffee.” He held her gaze for a moment, taking in her gorgeous smile. She was standing in his kitchen, like she belonged there, like she wished him a good day every day, except she wouldn’t be looking at him that way if he didn’t convince her that it wasn’t important the shelter stay in its current location. Now that he had Allie in his house, the last thing he wanted was to lose her. He could have everything if he executed his plan properly.
Dani let out a scream. “Oh gross. Hook just puked on the rug!”
After she finished cleaning the rug, Allie made her way back to the kitchen. Dani was eating some kind of organic cereal from the box, flakes missing her mouth left and right and falling on the floor.
“Make sure you clean up after yourself,” Allie said with a frown.
Dani rolled her eyes. “Ethan has a cleaning lady, Bertha or something. That’s her job.”
It was a wonder how her sister went from rags to riches with such obnoxious velocity. “Don’t forget we’re going to Mom’s this morning.”
Dani groaned and dropped her head onto the table, the cereal box falling and the contents spilling. “Why do you insist on torturing me?”
Allie closed her eyes and counted to ten. “It’s Christmas. We’re going to have a coffee, give her a Christmas present, and then leave.”
“I’m not spending my day off from school hanging out with a woman who never had time for either of us, which is kind of ironic because I thought people who don’t work have lots of time.”
Allie finished off her coffee, not wanting to admit that everything her sister said was true. “She has issues.”
“What did we get her?”
Allie paused. “A Dr. Phil book, a box of chocolates, and a gift card to Whole Foods.”
Dani’s head shot up. “You’re freaking kidding me. Whole Foods? I think that’s a bit of a waste, considering most of her grocery shopping is done at two a.m. at the 7-Eleven down the street. And a Dr. Phil book? She’ll never read it.”
Allie crossed her arms, trying not to get defensive. “I don’t agree, and it’s too late to have an opinion. I paid for all of it. I asked you for input—”
“I would have bought her a one-way ticket to hell.”
Allie rinsed her mug in the sink before loading it into the dishwasher. “Which is precisely why I went shopping on my own.”
“How can you be so okay with this? With her? She’s a crappy mom.”
Allie sighed and leaned against the counter. She focused her gaze on the dark cabinets, the richness of the wood i
n the modern kitchen. It was too early to be dealing with family problems. It seemed like her problems just increased instead of getting solved.
She still hadn’t found a decent apartment for them. It seemed the landlord was still intent on selling the shelter, and she may have to face the fact that it was inevitable. Then on top of all of that, it was time to visit their mom, something she secretly dreaded. Going to visit her was always a disappointment and a reality check. Day-to-day she didn’t think about their mother; she didn’t resent her, she wasn’t angry at her. But when they actually went to visit, all those buried feelings stewed inside until she was filled with this dark energy that dragged her back into an even darker place.
She glanced over at Dani, who looked as though she needed some reassurance. Time to act like the grown-up. “She’s the only one we have, sweetie. I’m not subjecting you to living there, or going there for weekly visits. She’s not a bad person, and she’s had a hard life.”
“So have you. So have I. We’re normal.”
Allie raised an eyebrow, and her sister actually blushed slightly.
“You know what I mean, Allie. She uses her bad past for an excuse. She acts like a kid, and she can never get it together. She puts her boyfriends ahead of us. She doesn’t even love us.”
Allie knew her sister’s frustration. She knew it because she agreed with a lot of what she was saying. The only difference was that she had come to peace with it. There was also the fact that at one time her mother had made the right decision. But Dani had no idea about any of that. “Dani, you’re young and you’re pissed off at her, I get that. You haven’t forgiven her, and it might take a while, but the sooner you let go of that anger toward her, the happier you’ll be. And of course she loves us in her own way.”
Her sister scoffed. “Did you read the Dr. Phil book?”
“All I know is that the more I was mad at Mom, the angrier I became in general. I didn’t teach her a lesson by being angry. I just ended up hurting myself. We’re not going to change her. The odds are not in our favor that she’s going to wake up one morning and have an epiphany, try and turn her life around, and make it up to her girls. It’s not going to happen. So we forgive. We don’t forget, but we forgive. Move on with our lives. We have each other.”
Dani glared at her for a moment and stomped out of the room.
“Go shower! And hurry, I have a bunch of stuff to do later,” Allie said. She couldn’t acknowledge the self-indulgent behavior.
The only response she received was the slamming of the bedroom door. She sat down at the table and dropped her head into her hands. Normally, dealing with Dani just required patience, but when it came to discussions about their mother it also required her to hold on to her emotions. She didn’t know if she was giving the right advice. She didn’t know if these yearly Christmas visits were doing more harm than good. Hell, she didn’t know much at all. She looked like she had it all together. She was qualified to help teens, but sometimes she barely felt qualified to run her own life. What if she was screwing her sister up even more than their mother had?
She glanced at the clock, relieved that it was still early. She had a massive to-do list, and it was her day off. All she needed to do was get through the visit to their mother’s house and then she would spend the evening with Ethan. Which she felt inexplicably giddy about, as though it were a date or something. Of course, it was not.
Two hours later they were standing in the smelly hallway of her mother’s building. They had already decided the smell was a mix of pot and fish.
“I’m not knocking, you knock,” Dani whispered.
“I’m holding coffee and presents, so if you want me to knock, you’re holding all this stuff.”
Her sister scowled, huffed and puffed, and then reluctantly knocked on their mother’s apartment door. Their mother opened the door minutes later, as far as it could open considering the amount of junk, and squealed, pulling them both in for a group hug. “My girls,” she yelled. Allie tried to keep the coffee from falling and refused to make eye contact with Dani, who was currently making gagging faces.
They followed their mother into the small kitchen, trying to weave in between boxes and garbage. “It’s like we’re visiting a future episode of Hoarders,” Dani whispered.
“Shh and sit down,” Allie said to Dani, who was standing in the doorway with more attitude than usual on these visits. Their mother was trying to clear the table from the assortment of magazines, lottery scratch cards, and dirty dishes. A few minutes later she sat down, and Dani reluctantly followed. Allie tried to concentrate on the smooth taste of her coffee, which was from the place Ethan had now gotten her hooked on, and not on the fact that their mother, whom she’d called the week before to arrange the visit, hadn’t bothered cleaning up or getting out of her robe. It made her angry, not for herself, she was over that, but for Dani. She was already regretting forcing her to come here today.
Their mother was staring expectantly at the bag. Allie sighed and slid it forward, forcing a smile on her face. “Merry Christmas, Mom. It’s from Dani and me.”
Their mother smiled like a kid on a sugar high and plucked the red tissue paper from the bag and dug in. Her smile faltered as she read the title of the Dr. Phil book, but the gift card and chocolates were well received. “Whole Foods…sounds fancy.”
“It’s a little bit of a step up from the 7-Eleven,” Dani said. Allie kicked her under the table, but their mother wasn’t even following.
“Thank you so much, girls.”
“It’s all from Allie,” Dani said, slinking back in her chair.
Her mother took a sip of coffee, not the least bit offended. “I wish I had better news for you girls, but this has been a really tight year for me.”
“Here we go,” Dani said, a little too loudly.
“And I wish I could have bought you presents.”
Dani leaned forward. “Let me guess. You gave it all to your douchebag boyfriend, who spent it on the slots?”
Allie shook her head and shut her eyes for a moment, but not before seeing her mother’s face crumple into tears.
“He should have won. And if we had won, I would have given you girls half of it. That’s what I’d love to do for you—wait a second,” her mother said, jumping up. She rifled through a kitchen drawer that couldn’t fully close because it was filled with so much junk. She grabbed something and then spun around to face them, holding it behind her back. Allie groaned inwardly. “I do have something!” She marched over to Dani and placed a pack of Christmas M&Ms on the table in front of her.
Allie placed her elbows on the table and lowered her head into her hands, blocking out her mother’s smiling face, and braced herself for the fallout.
“You have got to be kidding me,” Dani said.
“You don’t like them?”
Allie leaned forward and tried to get the conversation back on track so she didn’t have to dwell on the fact that their mother had just attempted to pass off a forgotten pack of M&Ms as a carefully thought-out gift. “Mom, you know you don’t have money to waste at the casino.”
Her mother sniffled into a threadbare tissue and sat down. “Oh, I’ve learned my lesson, Allie.”
Dani let out a choked squeal.
Her mother stuttered for a moment and then began speaking. “I know this must look bad, but things are really picking up for me. I have a job interview next week, and Bill does, too. And you know I hate to ask for anything, sweetie—”
“Really? You ask Allie for things all the time.”
Allie braced herself for whatever was coming; she didn’t even bother telling Dani to be quiet.
“I just need five hundred dollars to cover rent, and I promise to pay you back.”
Allie shut her eyes for a moment, forcing the sound of her mother’s voice into the back of her mind, along with the sound of Dani’s chair sliding against the linoleum floor. Five hundred dollars. She wanted to yell at her, shake her. She said it like five hundre
d dollars was so easy for her to come by. She wanted to yell and say how dare she ask her for money when she was raising her daughter. She opened her eyes and stared at the gifts she’d bought for her. She slowly looked over at Dani and was sorry she’d dragged her here. It’s not that she’d expected their mother to have made a major life change, but she’d hoped for…something. Something that might give Dani a little bit of peace.
It was time to go. She stood up. Her mother whispered her name, wrapping her hand around her wrist. “Allie remember, remember I helped you. I was there when you needed me most.”
Allie paused, looking down. She hated this. She hated that Dani was watching so closely. She never should have brought her here. Allie squeezed her eyes shut for a moment, trying to not think of the event that her mother spoke of. There were so many things Dani didn’t understand. She opened her eyes, not looking at her sister. “I, uh, I can give you a check,” she whispered.
“What?” Dani yelled. “Mom, you know we were in a fire, right? Like, there’s no extra money?”
Her mother was wringing her hands, her gaze darting around the room. She was looking for a bottle. “I know…and I’m really sorry I couldn’t take you girls in.”
“We wouldn’t have come here anyway.”
“Dani, wait for me by the door,” Allie said, taking her checkbook from her purse.
“You’re a weak, spineless coward, Allie! I can’t believe you!”
Allie clenched her teeth, pausing as she stared in her bag. Her stomach rolled uncomfortably. She forced a deep breath. “Go to the door. Don’t speak to me until we get back to Ethan’s.” Dani stomped off to the front door.
Her mother’s hand grasped hers. “Thank you, Allie.”
Allie stomach started rolling again, and she pried her hand away from her mother’s. She didn’t want to be touched. She took out her pen, wrote the check, and placed it on the table.
“Merry Christmas,” Allie said, then walked out the door. She stood in the hallway for a moment. Dani was waiting in front of the stairwell. She tried her hardest to be the bigger person, the wiser person, because that’s who she’d had to be her entire life. She walked toward her sister, wishing for someone to walk beside her, because she’d always walked alone. Right now it was like everything was falling apart, worse than ever, and she just didn’t feel like trying to be cheerful or wise. She wanted to have her own meltdown. She hated that her mother still had that hold over her, that with just one reminder, she could bring Allie back to the most vulnerable time in her life.
The Billionaire's Christmas Proposal (Billionaire For Christmas #2) Page 5
