“I…” she whispered back, breaking off and looking behind her where her brothers were standing next to her dad. “I’ll have to ask.”
Lips twitching at how obvious her ability to do that at this exact moment was, I waited for her to realize it herself. When it did, she blushed and bit down on her lip, almost making me groan.
“Oops, I forgot they were there,” she breathed, and then turned to look at them. “Can someone babysit Elodie for me tomorrow night?”
A face peeked around the corner of the stairs with a big grin on it – Katy’s mom, Katherine. “Your dad and I will do it.”
Katy’s dad, Paul, glared over his shoulder at his wife, and then turned back to glare at me. “Have her back by nine.”
“Paul, she’s an adult,” Katherine snapped, then smiled at the two of us. “We’ll keep Elodie at ours for the night, so long as we bring her teddy she’ll be fine.”
That was something that was true. The only thing Elodie’s mom had ever given her was an ugly purple teddy bear, but she took it everywhere with her and fell asleep cuddling it. I wanted to get her a Steiff or something special, but apparently she had to have this one.
“Nine,” Paul growled, glaring at his wife until she mouthed something to him that I couldn’t read and he turned around with a deep blush on his face. “Fine.”
Katy had the day off tomorrow seeing as how Ren was worried she hadn’t had enough sleep, so I leaned back in and gave her a quick lip touch. It wasn’t even a kiss or anything close to it, just a skim. “I’ll pick you up at six, ok?”
“Ok,” she breathed, and then looked over my shoulder and blushed. “Hey, guys.”
Glancing back at my brothers, I saw them all standing in the exact same positions as hers were still standing behind her, and wearing identical expressions. Christ!
“Later, baby.”
As I turned to walk back to my front door, ideas of where to take her rolling around in my head, I heard her mutter, “What just happened?”EightKatyI’d finally slept. In fact, I’d gone to bed at the same time as Elodie – nine o’clock – and I’d slept all through the night until nine o’clock this morning. She’d always been a good sleeper, so I wasn’t worried that I’d missed her, she just liked to sleep in – something I was supremely grateful for this morning.
Rolling out of bed, I frowned when I noticed that the three jewelry boxes I had on my dresser were at weird angles. My family knew not to come into my room given that they’d grown up with my OCD issues, and I was certain that no one else would have come into it, so why weren’t they in the right place?
Looking around the room, I checked to see if anything else was out of place, and saw the frames that I’d carefully hung on the wall were at angles instead of perfectly flat as well. Fixing them, I walked toward Elodie’s room and noticed that all the frames in the hallway were at strange angles, too. In fact, one of the photos was upside down. I must have been so tired last night that I hadn’t noticed it because it was unlikely I’d have slept through someone doing it. I’d been tired, but I was still a light sleeper, especially when I had my niece with me.
Leaning over the bars that surrounded her bed and kept her safe, I smiled when I saw her sucking her thumb, waiting patiently to be picked up.
“Morning, beautiful ‘Lodie,” I cooed, lifting her off the mattress and up to my chest. “You’re such a good girl for me. Auntie Katy was exhaaausted,” I said dramatically, making her giggle. “We’re gonna put a fresh diaper on your booty, make you smell like a precious baby again, and then have some breakfast, girl, ok?”
“Da!” she nodded and pointed where the diapers were.
“Clever girl, that’s exactly where they are.”
Once she was clean and smelling fresh, we went downstairs and I looked around to see if anything else was out of place. I wasn’t sure what it was, but something was seriously off in my house. Was it like this last night?
Popping her in her highchair, I sliced a raspberry bagel in half and put it in the toaster while I waited for the coffee to finish its magic.
“Aunty Katy’s just going to call Aunty Katherine, baby. I’m right here making breakfast, though,” I reassured her, and reached for the phone that was sitting in its charger.
Hitting the button for the last number dialed, it rang twice and Mom answered.
“Hey, Katykins. How are you and the precious baby this morning?”
“Slept twelve hours, and she was a gem. I’m just making her breakfast,” I told her as I got the creamer out of the fridge along with the juice that she liked. “Hey, Mom, did you notice if anything was out of place in my house last night?”