Page 35 of A More Than Mayhem Christmas

Lucy hiccups, and Amanda glares at her, then everyone else. “Why are you all still standing around?” She shoos us away with her hands. “Go, go, go!”

13

Cameron

“Are you sure it’s okay we’re here?” Dylan whispers, hopping off the golf cart as quietly as possible. Thankfully, I was able to corral him out of the cabin through the back door, so he didn’t notice that his beloved truck is still missing.

“Yes,” I whisper back, glaring at Logan behind me who thinksnowis the perfect time to whistle an old-timey tune. He quiets immediately, and I add, making my way up the back steps of the main Preston house, “Just be very, very quiet.”

I unlock the back door and let my friends in first. Logan immediately walks into a chair, and it scrapes along the hardwood floors. Dylan slaps him upside the head while I curse him out. “Do not wake the beast!” I hiss through clenched teeth.

After going through the contents of our pantry and realizing we had fuck all ingredients to actually make a wedding cake, I came up with the brilliant idea of raiding my father-in-law’s kitchen. Since Demander had given me and Dylan (who knows why) the task, I could trust that he’d be stealth. Military training,you know? But then Logan overheard, and he was all, “I wanna come! I wanna come!” and so here we are.

It’s past midnight.

The house is quiet, all lights off, and I use my phone for a source of light. Dylan, aka Grandpa Banks, doesn’t carry a phone when he’s with Riley, but he has a mini flashlight attached to his keychain, so that’s what he’s using. “What are we even looking for?” Dylan asks.

I pull up the basic cake recipe on my phone at the same time Logan opens the fridge and announces, way too loud for my comfort, “Let there be light!”

“Shut the fuck up!” I hiss.

Logan chuckles.

Then the kitchen door opens, and I freeze at the sight in front of me. Sir Tom Preston’s gigantic robe-covered frame takes up the entire space of the doorway. That, alone, is intimidating enough, even without the shotgun he has aimed directly at me.

“Want me to disarm him?” Dylan asks, all cool and calm, as if there isn’t a man holding a gun right in front of him.

“No,” I say at the same time Tom lowers his weapon and flicks on the light.

Tom shakes his head as he says, “What the fuck, son?”

I take stock of the situation and what he must be thinking. Hearing noises downstairs, then opening the door to a dark room only to find three fully grown, yet completely immature, man-children, one of which he let his only daughter marry.

Good times.

Of the three of us, Dylan is the most normal in appearance. I’m still covered in red and yellow ketchup and mustard, courtesy of Jake, and Logan has fragments of eggshells on his forehead. Plus, he’s now helping himself to a plate of leftovers he must’ve found in the fridge.

Class act, we are.

“It’s, uh…” My voice wobbles, and I attempt to clear it. Almost fifteen years of being part of this family and Tom Preston still has the power to unnerve me. Don’t get me wrong. I love the man, but that doesn’t mean I’m less afraid of him. “It’s a long story, sir.”

“Not really,” Dylan tells him. “Jake and Mikayla decided to have an impromptu wedding, and Amanda tasked us with making a cake.”

“A wedding?” Tom asks.

“Yes, sir,” Dylan replies.

“Right now?” Tom again.

“Yes, sir.”

“And you three are making the cake?”

Logan tells him, “Demander demanded the demands.”

“Demander?”

“Amanda the Demander, sir,” I retort.

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