Page 124 of Pack Choice
“I’m a very tidy baker,” I lie, letting Harper yank me into a giant kitchen. The little girl pulls out a chair, stands on its seat and opens a cupboard.
“Let me do that for you,” I say, reaching inside to find icing sugar and a million varieties of different sprinkles.
I help Harper add the sugar and water to a bowl and mix it together.
“Can we make the icing black?” she asks.
“You don’t want to make it pink?”
“No, my favorite color is black. It’s the color that vampires like best.”
“You like vampires?” I ask. I thought little girls were into fairies and unicorns. I’m obviously out of touch.
“Only the nice kind.”
“Right,” I say.
There isn’t any black food coloring in the cupboard but we mix together a load of other colors until it’s as close to black as we’re going to get. Then Harper spoons dollops of the stuff on top of each cookie, drowning each one and pausing every few seconds to lick icing off her sticky fingers.
“I think these are going to taste delicious,” I tell her, my stomach rumbling like crazy.
“We need sprinkles though,” she says pointing to the packets.
“There’s no black.”
“Red?” she asks, “vampires like red too.”
I find a mixture of red and pink sparkles and rip them open for her. To my surprise she doesn’t tip the whole thing over the cookies, she dips her fingers inside and carefully arranges the sprinkles on top of the icing.
“Hearts?” I say, a little skeptically.
“Vampires like hearts too,” she says innocently, “it’s how they can hear their next victim.”
“Oh-kay,” I say, suppressing a smile.
She bites her tongue between her teeth, one front tooth missing as she concentrates. Then stops and looks up at me.
“Have you kissed my daddy?”
I cough, taken back by the sudden change of direction in the conversation.
What am I meant to say? Maybe offering to help with cookies was a mistake. Because I am unprepared. Do I lie? Bend the truth?
“It’s okay if you have.”
“It is?”
“Yes, I think he needs to do more kissing.”
“Really, why’s that?”
“Because he’s lonely.”
“I don’t think that’s true,” I bop her on the nose, “he has you.”
“I already have a boyfriend. I’ve kissed him three times on the lips.”
I glance towards the door. I wonder if Colt knows that.
