Niki giggled “Nope not quite. I could tell you my secret, but then I’d have to kill you. And you seem like a cool girl, so that would be a shame.”
“That is true, I am a pretty cool girl. I was going to make a margarita. Since you’re not driving home, do you both want join me in having a drink... or four?”
Liya burst out laughing, “Margaritas on a weekday? Oh yes, we’re going to get along very well indeed.”
Chapter 12
Caleb
So far, so good.
Aunt Debbie hadn’t brought up marriage, babies, how pretty Liya would look in white or what a catch she thought I was, but the night was still young.
Liya looked at ease sat at the table and was laughing at something Uncle Jeremy said.
She looks like she belongs there.
I stiffened in my seat.
Woah. Where did that thought come from?
I knew that I wanted her, but that thought implied something much more intense and permanent. You don’t know anything about her; I reminded myself and mentally tried to take a step back from those profound thoughts.
“So, what brought you both to our fair little town? You must be tired of hearing it by now but, I love your accents. Where are your family from?” Aunt Deb asked taking a sip of her margarita.
Liya smiled “The compliments on our accents I don’t mind at all; however the imitations we’ve heard, mainly from Mitchell who works at the bakery, are not so amusing. Our dad was from London, born and bred. Our mother’s family was from India, but she was born in England too. The reason we decided to move here is all down to Niki, actually.” she paused, looking over at her sister.
“I’d met Aunt Trudy once when she’d come to London. I kept in touch mainly at birthdays and Christmases, but the last time I called her, she mentioned about having to sell the bakery. She tried to play it off as no big deal, but I could tell that she didn’t want to let go of it. I was bored of working at my old bakery in London, so I decided to take a chance.”
Aunt Deb finished the rest of her drink, before asking “How exactly are you related to Trudy?”
“She is our paternal grandfather’s sister. Our grandfather moved over to England in the 50s, met our grandmother and never left.” Niki said with a fond smile.
“Well, that was a lovely thing you did for Trudy, but still it must have been a hard decision to make. You are so sweet.” Aunt Debbie said.
“Liya saying she would come with me made it easier” Niki said smiling over at her sister.
Liya smiled back and took a big bite of her chicken fajita, getting bits of onion and sauce on her face.
She laughed and wiped her mouth with her napkin “Sorry, I never did manage to get the hang of eating like a grown up. This is delicious, Debbie.”
Aunt Debbie smiled happily, “I’m so glad you like it. I was worried that you may be one of those women who survive on carrot sticks and lettuce leaves.”
Liya snorted “The only time I’m eating lettuce leaves is if they’ve been smothered in dressing and preferably has bacon on it.” she said before taking another big bite of her food and I felt my cock stir again.
Fuck. This is getting ridiculous, I sent a silent message to my dick. You need to calm down and stop getting hard at every fucking thing she does. I can’t be walking around with permanent blue balls.
“What did your parents think about you moving all the way over here? My boys just moved across town and I miss them. We met your dad briefly about, oooh it would have been about thirty years ago, cos I’d just moved here. I think he’d come to visit Trudy. He seemed like a lovely man. He’s a doctor, right?”
Liya and Niki both stiffened and exchanged a meaningful glance.
Liya cleared her throat, put her food down and wiped her hands. “Our parents actually passed away about ten years ago. We lost our mum in a car crash. A week later our father had a stroke. But yes, he was a doctor. So was our mother actually.” she said taking Niki’s hand and gently squeezed it.
I felt an aching in my chest at the sadness I saw in her eyes.
Aunt Debbie gasped lightly and brought a hand up to her heart “I’m so sorry to hear that, sweetheart.”
“Thank you, Debbie. It was a long time ago, we miss them every day, but we’re lucky we have each other.” Liya said softly.
“How did you manage? You must have been so young?” Addie asked quietly.
“We didn’t have any other family. I was fourteen, Liya had just turned eighteen. She applied for custody of me, dropped out of college and put off getting her degree to get a job and take care of us, until I was done with school.” Niki said and took a sip of water.
“You girls are certainly a pair of tough cookies.” Uncle Jeremy added warmly.
Liya laughed lightly, though it sounded hollow “It wasn’t always easy but life goes on, right? Anyway that’s how I ended up here with Niki. I wasn’t about to let my crazy baby sister travel all alone to some unfamiliar place and set up shop by herself.”
“What is it that you’re planning on doing while here, sweetheart? Caleb mentioned something about you being a nurse?” Aunt Debbie asked, her eyes bright from unshed tears.
“I’ve got a job at Starling General Hospital. I’m a paediatric nurse; I’ll be starting on the Children’s ward at the hospital on Tuesday.” She replied before taking a big gulp of her margarita.
“So you like kids then sweetheart?” Aunt Debbie said looking slightly happier as the sly glint returned to her eyes.
I sent her a warning look across the table.
“Yes, I like working with children a lot.” Liya’s face lit up. “Being on a children’s ward can be heart breaking at times, but I love it. Adults I don’t always get along with, but I’ve never met a child I don’t like. They have a beautiful way of looking at world and they’re straightforward; I appreciate that and the lack of drama.”
“Do you want kids of your own?” Aunt Debbie asked her, as she placed her elbows on the table and rested her chin on her interlaced fingers.
My eyes widened. Oh God, no. It’s happening.
I wished I was close enough to elbow Aunt Debbie under the table to get her to stop.
“No, I don’t.” Liya said gently but firmly.
Aunt Debbie leant forward and opened her mouth, but was cut off by Addie “More margaritas?” she said topping off their glasses. As she sat down she shook her head at Aunt Debbie and gave her a forceful look.
Aunt Debbie looked like she didn’t want to drop the topic but heeded Addie’s look and sat back in her chair.
“What do you all do?” Liya asked looking between me, Addie and Nate.
“Nate’s a private investigator and Addie works with him doing computery stuff-”
“Computery stuff? Really Caleb? After three years of me working with Nate you still have no idea what I do, do you?” Addie interrupted looked unimpressed.
I tried to listen, but her technical talk always went in one ear and out the other. I maintained that it was not my fault that it all sounded so damn boring.
I ignored her and kept talking “… and I’m a firefighter, babe.”
There was a flash of what looked like desire in her eyes when I mentioned I was a firefighter.
Women requesting to play out that fantasy usually annoyed me, but I realised that if my little Angel liked that I was a firefighter, that was something that I could definitely work with.
Nate who had been sat silently grunted out “How are you finding the town?” I noted the surprised looks on my family’s faces. Nate rarely spoke to anyone if he didn’t have to, I took his attempt at conversation as a sign that he approved of Maliya and her sister.
“It’s very different. But everyone has been so welcoming. People I’ve never met smile and wave at me all the time. It’s going to be weird leaving next year and not having strangers ask me how my day is going.” Liya replied smiling at Nate.
Hold on. What? She’s going where now?
&nbs
p; “Where are you going next year?” I said harshly.
Liya frowned at me. “Back to England. I was supposed to start training to be a doctor at university this year, but I deferred my entrance for a year to come here with Niki.”
Oh hell no. I’ve just found you. You’re not going anywhere.
I wanted to question her about this, but reminded myself that I had just met this woman and she owed me nothing. I’d end up pushing her away by making demands before we’d got to even know each other. I took a deep breath to calm myself down.
Change the topic you ass...
I cleared my throat “So… How’s Trudy doing?”
Really? That’s the best you could come up with? A question about her Grandaunt?
Niki smiled as Liya rolled her eyes. “She seems to be recovering well. She’s quite a character.” Niki said fondly.
“If by character you mean a cranky, insane old woman, who seems determined to drive everyone around her to a state of madness.” Liya said as she finished off the food on her plate.
“Liya!” Niki admonished “She really isn’t that bad.” Liya gave us a look which suggested that she did not agree with her sister’s statement.
Uncle Jeremy chuffed at her expression “I remember Trudy from when I was a younger. She changed after her friend Mary-Anne died. They were close, used to run the bakery together. She took her death badly, she just wasn’t the same after.”
Niki and Liya exchanged confused looks. “She ever mentioned a Mary-Anne to you?” Liya asked Niki. “No.” Niki replied, looking thoughtful.
“Well, the place looks simply amazing since you’ve taken over, Cutie. And the new menu… To. Die. For. I thought the pies and cakes were good before. But now, they’re better than my momma used to make.” Aunt Debbie said to Niki.
Niki blushed prettily and looked down at the table shyly “My sister doesn’t take compliments well. I’ve been telling her since the age of twelve that she’s a baking prodigy, when she made a three tiered birthday cake for our Mama.” Liya said proudly and playfully flicked her sister’s hair.
“Sounds like your youthful culinary experiments turned out a lot better than the ones we had to endure from Jake.” Addie said.
“Who’s Jake?” Niki asked curiously, looking around the table.
“He’s my third boy.” Aunt Deb said happily.
“Third boy? How many of you are there?” Liya’s eyes widened slightly looking at me.
I started to answer but was cut off by Aunt Deb, who stood up and went get the picture of our family portrait that she kept on the shelf.
“Well, we’ve been blessed with five gorgeous boys and a beautiful girl. Nate, he’s the oldest, followed by Caleb.” she started pointing each one of us out in the picture, as if we weren’t sat around the table in front of her.
“Then there’s the first set of twins; Jake, who’s a chef and Josh, who’s a mechanic, he works with Jeremy at the garage. Lastly are Addie and her twin Alex. He couldn’t make it today because of work. He’s the most amazing tattoo artist. Oh, the things he can draw up, you just would not believe.”
I exchanged looks with Nate and Addie, wondering how to stop Aunt Debbie’s rant before it got any longer, when Liya told her “You have such a beautiful family Debbie.”
“Why thank you, sweetheart. I like to think so. But there is definitely room for more people in this picture and I think its missing some little ones too.” Aunt Debbie beamed and winked at Liya as she placed the picture back on the shelf.
“So who’s ready for dessert?”
Oh shit, this dinner is never going to end.
Chapter 13
Maliya
I had to admit, dinner was very entertaining. The Jamesons were a really funny, sweet and down-to-earth family. Jeremy had kept us amused with embarrassing tales about all of the Jameson siblings throughout their youth and Debbie was probably the friendliest, warmest and most loving woman I had ever met in my life.
We were all sat together around their now empty and cleaned dining table, slumped in our chairs, feeling outrageously full and happy.
“Are you sure you girls had enough to eat?” Debbie asked.
“Debbie, I’m about ten seconds away from slipping into a food coma. That meal was so damn good, I feel like I should be making some sort of sacrificial offering as thanks for having eaten it.” I said patting my now slightly protruding belly.
Debbie flushed happily, though she was already slightly red in the face from all the margaritas she had imbibed. I was very impressed, for a little lady she sure could hold her liquor.
I felt Caleb’s eyes on me and when I met his gaze I saw he was watching me with a small smile. I looked at him questioningly, but he just shook his head slightly.
I looked around the table at Caleb’s family and felt envious. I missed my own parents something fierce, I looked over at Niki and she met my gaze, smiling sadly at me, as if she could read my thoughts.
We hadn’t met his other three brothers, who were all busy at work, but were told by Debbie in no uncertain terms, that we would be coming round for dinner again soon to meet everyone else.
Addie, who was on margarita number six, slumped against Nate who was sat next to her. She apparently did not hold her liquor well.
Addie slurred out “You guys are so awesome. We should go out together. Like dancing and drinking. A lot of the girls in town are idiots, but I know nice people, we would have soooo much fun. WE SHOULD GO NOW!” She attempted to stand and failed, falling more into Nate.
I smiled as Nate rolled his eyes and took a sip of Addie’s drink and grimaced. “Jesus. Princess, this is pretty much just tequila.”
“I like tequila…” Addie said dreamily.
“Well you’re not going to like it much tomorrow morning.” Nate said standing and picking up Addie in his arms.
“NATE! Noooo! We’re going to go out dancing!”
Jeremy laughed “Not tonight you’re not, Peanut.”
“You guys suck!” Addie said going limp in Nate’s arms and resting her head on his shoulder.
Debbie looked at Nate and said “Sweetie, just take her up to her room, I’ll be up in a bit to help her change.” Nate nodded and left with a sleepy Addie in her arms. “Bye new besties…” Addie murmured.
“Night, Addie. Come round the bakery tomorrow morning, I’ll give you something to cure your hangover.” Niki said while standing up.
“Mmmmhmmm” she slurred happily.
I stood up to and bent down to pick up my handbag before putting it over my shoulder. I went over to give Debbie a hug.
“This was a great night, thank you so much for dinner, but we really have to go.”
Niki added “We would love to stay longer but I have to be up in about five hours to start baking for the morning. But please come round to the bakery for breakfast.”
“You’ll see us there, cutie” Debbie said kissing her cheek.
Jeremy added “I don’t think I’ll be able to make it for breakfast doll. I’ve got too much on at the garage. But I wouldn’t say no to some of those apple turnovers, if you send ‘em to me through Deb. And I’ll make sure I send someone round to take a look at your car on Friday.”
“Thank you so much Jeremy, you’re the best.” I told him giving him a hug and peck on the cheek.
Caleb left the room and came back soon with keys. “Come on, I’m sending you home.”
“Caleb, we can call a taxi.” I protested.
“There’s no way that’s happening. You can either walk to my car Liya or I’m carrying you there. Your choice.”
Carry me. Please, carry me.
“Fine, you can drive us.” I snapped at him.
Niki walked by Caleb, “You’ll get no argument from me, I told her to call you in the first place.”
“Ah, I see. You must be the sensible sister.” Caleb said throwing his arm casually around her shoulders.
“Indeed I am.” Niki said with a long-suffering sigh.
“Good, I’ll give you my number, so if anything happens, but Miss Stubborn over there refuses to call, you can call me instead. Okay?”
“Sounds like a plan.” Niki, the traitor, said with a serene smile.
I rolled my eyes at both of them and gave Debbie and Jeremy a final hug goodbye, with promises of seeing Debbie at the bakery in the morning.
We got to Caleb’s four-wheel drive and he opened my door and guided me to the front passenger seat, he waited for me to get in and then shut the door for me.
Falling Completely (Starling Falls #1) Page 9
