Page 109 of Why Cheese?
“Well, that’s… Huh?” Cheddy says.
Roq caresses his thumb to the hollow of my cheek just as he traces his tongue across my lips. I open them greedily, drinking in the hills of southern France and the caves of a lone, lost shepherd.
“Is this new?” Brie asks.
“Took you long enough,” Cam says.
Breaking away, Roq wipes his thumbs across my lips and gives me a quiet smile. “Now.” He coughs, his voice straining. “Who do you want next?”
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
New Beginnings Burrata
“VIOLETTE.”
I smile in the darkness, four men’s kisses lingering on my lips. We hadn’t gotten far—a lost shirt, a pulled zipper—before we all slunk to the floor. Somewhere around me draping my arms over Cheddy and leaning back against Cam, my eyelids grew fifty pounds.
I only closed them for a second to catch my breath.
“Violette, wake up!” A heel slaps against the ground.
“Yes, yes.” I stretch and yawn. Light pierces through the dark. A lot of light. Way too much light for the overhead lamps and the streetlights outside the windows. My eyes shoot open just as a hand launches for me.
I don’t mean to shriek, but the wrathful monster wrenching me to its jaws sets off my fight or flight. Instead of picking either option, my body goes with the tried and true possum maneuver. I slump back like my bones turned to jelly.
“What the hell are you doing?”
Mom?The jagged teeth and cracked gray skin give way to my mother with her mouthguard in and her nightly clay mask on. Though, the raging red eyes remain.
Why is she here? Oh, shit!
I slam my hands to the ground and peel away from her grip. As I go, my palms slip through piles of clothing. “It’s morning,” I gasp, all of my mistakes hitting me at once.
“Yes, it is. Imagine my absolute terror when I woke without my only daughter in her bed. You took ten years from my life, Violette.”
“I’m sorry,” I whimper, doing my best to skitter away while gathering up their clothes.
“What in the hell are you doing sleeping on the floor here and… Are those men’s shirts?”
“They’re…um, rags?” I say and heft up Roq’s faded but well-cared-for embroidered shirt. As I do, a wheel of blue-veined cheese comes tumbling out. “Oh, no!” I lunge forward, catching him just before he hits the floor. “Sorry,” I whisper to the cheese and tuck it under my arm.
“Is that cheese?” My mother sneers with utter disgust. Without looking at her, I race to pick up the rest of them. It’s not easy. Cheddy weighs twenty pounds in this form, though it’d be harder to carry him the other way.
“Were you…?” My mom’s voice shivers as she watches me struggle to pick up Brie and his lost trousers. “Were you sleeping with—”
Shit, she knows about them.
“—cheese?”
“No.” I shake my head.Not when they’re cheese, anyway.
“Did you sneak out in the middle of the night in order to…” My mother gulps. “To dress up cheese?”
“No.” I try to not laugh. That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. How could I even put a shirt on cheese? They don’t have arms. Okay, maybe a cheeky hat or a scarf would work but…
She’s fuming. I try to tamp down my snickering tone as best I can before she explodes. “I…I was here to—to clean! See!” I grab the first shirt I can and start to wipe down the counters. Gold embroidery flashes on a field of scarlet and I wince.Sorry, Cam.
“Shouldn’t the janitors be doing that?”
