Page 80 of Ronen
She made her way to the refrigerator and filled a glass with ice water. “Goddess, it’s too hot in here for this pregnant lady. Back to the dining room I go.”
She gave us a smile and a tilt of her glass as she shuffled past us. “Wait until you see what Grandma and Nana have planned, Ro.”
Well, that was ominous, because when it came to my grandmothers, they could have just about any sort of nonsense up their sleeves.
“Mason, this is my Uncle Finn, cousin Sammi, and my uncle Wade,” I pointed to each of my family members conjugated in the kitchen and introduced them. There were a handful missing, but Mason already knew several of them.
Matty, the traitor, had decided to use his time off for Spring Break to fly to Paris and visit our cousins, Patrick and Remy.
He also had another pair of fated mates in England he wanted to interview, as they had been away on holiday before he had returned home, and missed speaking to them.
Mason turned to look at me, a silly little grin on his face. “Is that true? Am I the first?”
“Ignore anything Rory tells you. But yes,” I sighed. “Only because I refuse to subject most people to these heathens.” Looking around, I asked, “Where’s Nana Maeve? Maybe she can control the lot of you.”
“In the dining room, opening the wine.” Grandma Mary told us, hurrying back over to relieve Sammi from her stirring.
“And that’s where you’ll find us,” I announced, dragging Mason out of the kitchen, down the hall and into the large dining room.
The long table sat twelve, but there were two other tables set up with chairs around them. The buffet already had a table runner on it, decorated with colorful Easter eggs, and all the tables had matching tablecloths.
“Nana,” I walked over to where she was pouring a small glass of wine for herself. “I want to introduce you to Mason Caldwell. He’s my…ah…”
Well, I hadn’t thought of how I wanted to introduce Mason to my family and had skipped over it when I’d done the kitchen introductions. I didn’t want to announce we were fated at a family holiday.
Maybe when we told everyone we were pregnant. In a few weeks. Or months. Sometime soonish.
It appeared the only people who had heard Mason announce to the world we were fated after his fall, surprisingly hadn’t spread the news around town. At least not to my family, since I had yet to receive any phone calls or texts from any of them related to that. My phone had remained shockingly quiet the last few months.
Even my parents, who usually knew everything, hadn’t said a word to me about it.
Nana turned her amused emerald green eyes to us, bringing the wine glass up to her lips to take a sip. “Your…friend?”
Nodding, I said, “Yes, that.”
“Good to formally meet you, Mason,” Nana Maeve told him, nodding to the many, many bottles of wine set out. “Help yourself.”
She winked at him, “Always better to deal with holidays with some red. I think I saw one of the boys bring some beer in too, if you prefer.”
I snorted at her use of “the boys”, knowing she meant my dad and uncles. She and Grandma Mary still referred to them that way, even though “the boys” were in their late sixties.
Like in the kitchen, the French doors in this room were opened to the side lawn. Becca stood in the doorway, one hand on her lower back, her face tilted up to the sun.
“You doing okay, little mama?” I asked her quietly, and she gave me a sweet smile.
“Just very pregnant,” she laughed. “I’m ready to have this baby, but someone says I have at least another month.”
She directed her comment, along with a narrowed glare, in the vicinity of Logan. He in turn just grinned brightly at her and popped a deviled egg in his mouth.
Swallowing, he told her, “I call it like I see it. Don’t blame the messenger. That pup needs a little more time in the warmer.”
“Ronen?” Becca asked, her brown curls bouncing as she tried to look down past her belly. “Can you confirm that I still have feet? Rory says I do, but we all know she can’t be trusted. I haven’t seen them in so long I’m doubting myself. I trust you to tell me the truth.”
Bending at the waist, I made a big show of looking at her feet, announcing, “Two feet accounted for. Are the two different colored shoes a fashion choice?”
“Rory!” she yelled, hands on her hips. “She put my shoes on me.”
“I’m just kidding, I swear!” I told her, holding my hands out in front of me, and laughing. She huffed, swatting at me, but her smile was bright.
