I sat down to call Roni immediately.
After I got out of the shower, for real, Roni was sitting on her bed with Mina. I was towel drying my hair as I walked toward the clothes that Mina and Roni had obviously decided I was wearing today.
"So, Chloe…" Mina started, a grin on her face. "My brother came climbing into my room awfully early this morning with quite a large smile on his face."
"Really?" I responded innocently and turned to grab my clothes off my bed.
"Oh, come on, tramp" Roni yelled as she headed to the bathroom. "Spill the details!"
"There are no details." I rolled my eyes. "He showed up last night after the whore in the bathroom left to fuck Max senseless." I laughed as a lotion bottle came flying out of the bathroom toward me. "I actually thought that it was Roni coming back for something and was completely surprised that it was Leo instead." I shrugged.
"And?" Mina prodded.
"And, your brother made himself awfully comfortable in my bed." I gave Mina a stern look.
"And just how comfortable would that be?" Mina raised an eyebrow, clearly fighting a smile.
"Comfortable enough to snore all night," I stuck my tongue out at her. "Nothing happened, he just slept here."
"God, Chloe, when are you going to jump his gorgeous ass?" Roni vented, walking out of the bathroom.
"Hey, I think I jumped him enough earlier yesterday!" I shot back and both of them laughed.
"Oh, just get naked with him already!" Roni chuckled.
"Ewww….that is my brother," Mina crinkled her face, "not to say that I don’t think that he is a fine specimen, but ewwww. Just ewwww."
Roni and I laughed as we got our clothes on. Mina grabbed me by the hand so she could play stylist as Roni sat at her vanity putting on her make-up.
Once we were all dressed, Mina headed over to her house and Roni and I went down to help Judith. Roni and Judith finished up some last minute cooking and preparation and I started packing up the food so it could be taken next door.
There was a knock on the door and I went to answer it while Roni and Judith finished in the kitchen. I pulled open the door.
"Hey, Max." I said smiling. "Happy Thanksgiving!"
"Happy Turkey Day, Chloe!" He said loudly and walked in. I was closing the door when I felt it shove back toward me.
"Are you going to shut the door on me?" his velvety voice came from around the door as he peeked his head around and smiled at me.
"Sorry." I blushed. "I didn’t see you there."
He smiled and touched my cheek.
"I love that." Before I could ask him what he meant, Judith interrupted.
"I am so glad that your mother sent you and Max over to help," she unloaded some boxes into Leo’s arms as Max came out with bags and boxes.
"This smells amazing." Max sniffed loudly. I saw Roni roll her eyes as she walked behind him.
I held the door while they both took the food next door. Kenneth appeared next to me holding my coat out to me. "Thanks, Dad."
"Yep," he answered and I watched him study my face for a minute longer than necessary. I turned and walked out behind Judith.
Walking into the Mackey’s house for a holiday was like walking into a picture from a magazine about holiday decorating. Everything was perfect and had its place.
"Welcome!" Elaine came out from the kitchen looking perfectly put together. "Happy Thanksgiving!" Carol, Max’s mother, followed Elaine.
"Oh, Elaine, the place looks fantastic as always," Judith responded and hugged her. We each took turns hugging and then walked toward the kitchen.
"Kenneth, the men are in the basement with the new TV watching football," Elaine smiled and Kenneth politely excused himself.
"Football? Yes! Thank God for Thanksgiving Day football!" Max cheered and grabbed Roni’s hand pulling her with him.
I sat down next to Mina in the kitchen. I noticed that she seemed a little sad. I bumped her shoulder with mine gently.
"What’s up?" She shook her head. "Come on, you know better than to try that crap. What’s going on?" She stood up and gestured for me to follow her.
Once we got to the living room, we sat together on the couch.
"What is going on? Are you okay?"
"I just, I don’t know. This is going to sound so stupid!" She put her face in her hands.
"Just tell me." I shook her. "It’s killing me that something is wrong."
"I feel left out." She sighed and looked into her lap.
"Huh? I’m confused."
"Well, Roni has Max and they are so happy and, then, there is you and Leo. I just feel left out." She sighed heavily.
"Oh, Mina," I hugged her firmly. "I mean…you know that I am not ‘with’ Leo right? We are friends."
Mina rolled her eyes.
"Friends?" She gave me a funny look.
"You know what I mean. It’s just that we aren’t a ‘couple’." I sighed.
"Jesus Chloe, he would probably take you to Vegas and marry you at this point. Are you that clueless? He is so yours, regardless if you have taken on an official title."
I smiled, but it faded when I saw Mina’s face again.
I hugged her tightly.
"It will come." I pulled her face up to look directly at me. "You are too amazing for it not to come." She smiled at me and we sat hugging for a while.
Robert decided that we should have an early dinner, so we all congregated around the dining room table. Robert sat at one end, Elaine at the other. Judith and Kenneth sat side by side and across from Carol and Ronald Gallagher. Roni sat next to Max. I sat next to Mina and Leo sat across from me.
I looked up at him but he didn’t look at me. We all began dinner and light conversation. Leo still wouldn’t look at me or say anything to me. I wasn’t sure what was going on.
After dinner Roni, Mina and I cleared the table and did the dishes.
"Okay, what is up with you bitches? You are both so quiet." Roni stood, looking at Mina and I with her arms crossed over her chest.
"I’m just lost in my own thoughts, that’s all." I shrugged and looked to Mina.
"I just wish I had someone." Mina shrugged. Roni hugged her and held on to her as she questioned me more.
"So what are you so caught up thinking about?"
"Just that Leo was acting different. It was like he was ignoring me throughout dinner." I shrugged again. "Maybe I’m just reading too much into it."
"Maybe." Roni answered. "Okay, let’s grab some pie and cookies for girl time upstairs." She smiled large and we started grabbing forks and desserts.
We got up to Mina’s room and lay everything out on the floor. "Shit! We forgot the Cool Whip." Roni exclaimed.
"I’ll go get it." I yelled back as I ran down the back stairs to the kitchen.
I pulled the Cool Whip out of the freezer and shut the freezer door with my elbow. I turned around and jumped, dropping the Cool Whip container to the floor.
"Jesus Christ, Leo!" I put my hand on my chest, trying to catch my breath.
He stood there with a scowl on his face.
"What’s wrong?" I asked.
He just looked at me and even though the scowl softened, it was still intense. I leaned down to pick up the Cool Whip but he grabbed my arm.
"What?" I asked again.
"We are friends," he said partially as a question but also as a fact. I nodded. "Is that all I am?" I stood staring at him. His hazel eyes burning into mine, I swallowed loudly. "Is it, Chloe?"
I pulled my arm away gently. He let go, putting both hands against the fridge on either side of my head.
"What do you want me to say, Leo?" His eyes darkened. Was that anger? "I mean, we agreed to be friends, to get to know each other. Am I the only one that remembers?"
His hand smacked the fridge beside my head.
"Damn it, Chloe." I jumped. When he realized I jumped, he put his hand on my face. "I’m sorry." Then he smiled largely. "You’re doing it again."
"What?"<
br />
"Biting that lip."
Just as his lips were about to meet mine, someone cleared their throat. "Ahem!"
Chapter Seventeen
Interruptions and Lingerie
Leo
I quickly turned my head. My father was standing with his eyebrows raised, looking back and forth between Chloe and I.
Thank God it wasn’t Kenneth!
I took my hands from either side of her head, stepping back from her. I looked to Chloe, who was biting her damn lip again.
Ugh! She needs to stop.
Her eyes were locked on my father.
"Leo, do you think that I can talk with you for a moment?" He motioned his head for me to come with him. "Excuse us, Chloe." He smiled.
I grabbed her hand and squeezed it as she looked at me quickly in panic and forced a smile. As I left the kitchen, I glanced back to see her bending over to pick up the Cool Whip she dropped. I battled internally to stop myself from running back and pressing into her lifted ass.
Robert snapped me out of my dirty thoughts.
"What is going on, Leo?" His arms were crossed over his chest.
"Nothing," I shrugged.
He sighed heavily, running his hand through his hair, a habit that I had inherited from him.
"Chloe is close to this family and I don’t want there to be any problems because of something inappropriate–"
"There is nothing inappropriate about this–"
"Oh, I thought it was nothing?" He smirked.
I sighed and dropped my head.
"Look it’s kind of…I guess it’s kind of new."
"How is it ‘kind of new’? How long has it been going on?" He took a seat at the dining room table and motioned for me to sit with him.
"For me or for her?" I chuckled.
He smiled. "I see."
"I don’t know if you do," it was my turn to run my hand through my hair. "Ever since we came back over the summer and I saw her, I’ve seen her differently than when she was the little kid running around with Mina. I thought it was just feeling protective like I am with Mina but I realized that it’s not that simple. It's way more complicated." I sighed. "I tried to just be friends with her, Dad, I really have tried. And, technically, we still are. But, I think I want more."
"Son, I love you, you know that right?"
I nodded.
"You have a pretty ‘unique’ record with women and this isn’t just someone or something you can play around with. She is family, Leo." I nodded again.
Was he really trying to lecture me about who Chloe was? I knew that if I fucked around with this that I would be better off if the gates of hell opened up and swallowed me than to face my family…or hers, for that matter.
"If you are both happy then of course I am happy for you, but take this slow, Leo. It looked pretty intense when I walked in. She is still young." He smiled, stood, walked over and patted me on the back as he went to the kitchen.
I stood up, needing to talk to Chloe, among other things.
Chloe
After picking up the Cool Whip and quickly heading upstairs with it, I threw myself into Mina’s room.
"What the fuck took so long? Did you have to make the Cool Whip yourself?" Roni laughed.
"Leo happened," I said as I pushed the Cool Whip to Roni, whose eyes got big and gleamed. "Don’t get too excited, Robert happened too." I covered my face with my hands.
Mina spit ice cream out everywhere in a spurt.
"What?" she choked out.
"Oh, you heard me," I said through my palms.
"What did Robert do?" Roni asked at the same time Mina asked, "What were you guys doing when he walked in?"
"He had me pinned against the fridge about to kiss me and then Robert brought his presence to our attention." I sighed. "He asked Leo to come and talk to him and I headed back here as fast as possible." I pulled the spoon from the Cool Whip container and shoved it in my mouth.
"Oh. My. God." Mina said bug eyed. Her mouth opened again, but then there was a knock at the door. All of our heads turned.
"If that is your Dad I am going to die," I whispered to Mina who shook her head in agreement.
"Chloe?" I exhaled in relief, it was Leo.
I got up and opened the door to be met with that smile.
"Hey," I said.
"Lip biting," he smirked and I immediately stopped. "That’s better, unless you want Mina and Roni to watch me…"
"Uh, is there a reason you came up here?" I asked, mostly to interrupt what he was about to say.
"Everything is okay. I just wanted to tell you that." He smiled, again.
"Okay, thanks." I stood there, feeling really self-conscious all of a sudden.
Leo leaned his head in the room "Mina, Roni," both of them looked as if they weren’t already listening to the conversation, "I’ll return her in a few minutes."
"Huh, what are…?" He grabbed my arm and pulled me towards him, shutting Mina’s door behind me. "What are you…"
"This," he smiled crookedly and pressed his body into mine against Mina’s door, capturing my lips.
Oh God, he smelled so good; honey, sex, honey, sex…Mmhmm.
I felt him smile against my lips and realized that I had made that noise out loud and into his mouth.
When his tongue entered my mouth, I grabbed him by the back of the neck and pulled him closer to me. His taste was superb.
Forget the Cool Whip, I’d like him on my ice cream; or ice cream on him….Mmhmm. He smiled again. I really need to keep my sounds under control.
He pulled back smiling and I, unknowingly, was biting my lip. His forehead was pressed to mine as his fingers traced my lip.
"Chloe, if you insist on biting your lip like that then you are going to have to be the one to explain to my sister why a few minutes turned into a few days." I pulled my lip out of my mouth and he licked it. My eyelids fluttered. He planted a quick kiss on my mouth and then slowly walked backwards, away from me.
"I’ll miss you." He winked and turned around.
I went back into Mina’s room, closing the door behind me.
After being bombarded with questions from Mina and Roni, we settled back into ‘girl talk’. A few hours later, Roni and I headed over to our room to get ready for bed. I tossed and turned for about twenty minutes before I finally felt sleep start to take over.
A muffled scream woke me from my sleep. I opened my eyes quickly and started to sit up when I saw Roni smacking the shit out of Max while she yelled at him in a hushed voice.
"You fucking idiot!" Smack. "That is not funny," smack, "what if Kenneth would’ve come in here?" Smack.
"Oww, woman! Quit hitting me!" He grabbed her arms and pinned them to her sides as he pushed her back on the bed, laying down with her. "Can I help it if I don’t want to spend one night without you?" I heard Roni grumble and covered my mouth, hiding my laughter.
I rolled over and smacked my head against someone else’s head. "Son of a—" I yelled as Leo groaned and covered my mouth.
"Do you want Kenneth to come in here and shoot me?" He whispered and moved his hand from my mouth.
"How the hell did you get into my bed without me knowing?" I was still rubbing my head.
"Is it my fault that you sleep like the dead? I think not." He moved my hand and kissed my forehead. "That kind of scares me, by the way."
"Scares you?" I questioned as I felt him shift, pulling me over to lie on his chest.
"Yeah, that someone can get into your bed so easily." I smacked his chest and he groaned then laughed. "How’s your head?" he continued to laugh quietly.
"If I had known you were in my bed, I would’ve hit you harder," I grumbled, trying to move away from him. He held tight, not allowing me to move.
"That’s not very nice." He started tickling me.
"Stop," I squealed out. "Unless you want everyone to wake up."
"Keep it down over there!" Max yelled across the room.
"Shut up!" Leo yelled back.
"So, what? You guys are tag teaming now?" I questioned.
"Nah…just partners in crime." He kissed the top of my head and we fell asleep after that.
Max had to return for football so he and Leo left the next day to head back to Seattle. Roni stayed another night before she headed back. Mina and I had a lazy rainy Sunday, watching movies and eating junk food. Monday arrived too quickly and it was time for school again.
The weeks flew by and Christmas was coming upon us quickly. Mina had dragged me along shopping so many times that I was sure that all the stores at the mall had her credit card number memorized. She insisted on stopping at every store there was in the damn place. I had gotten most of my shopping done for Christmas when something dawned on me.
"Mina?"
"Yes, dear?" She responded while digging through another rack of jeans.
"Leo isn’t…um…getting me something for Christmas, is he?" I was embarrassed to ask.
"Of course he will. Why…" Her head shot up to look at me.
"I have the perfect gift, Chloe!" She shouted, grabbed my arm and pulled me into the store that I would have never thought to get Leo a gift. In fact, I was still not thinking about it.
"I don’t think it will fit him." I laughed and she rolled her eyes.
"It’s for you to wear for him." She smiled sweetly.
"Mina, you're out of your mind! No!"
She held it up, shaking the fabric and wiggling her brows.
"No, Mina!"
"Come on, Chloe, it is perfect and you know it!" She smiled widely.
"No." I crossed my arms over my chest in refusal.
"He will absolutely love it and you can’t deny that." She was trying that tactic now.
I sighed.
"Tell me I’m wrong." She shrugged her shoulders.
I was silent.
"That’s what I thought!" She wiggled her brow once. "Now, get it!"
"No, Mina! I certainly am not going to buy that. You can buy it for Oliver!" I threw back at her.
"I already got his present. Unlike some people, not that I’ll mention any names, I remembered." She winked at me.
I scoffed at her. "You are evil woman!"
"I’ve heard that before." she smiled. "So?"
All Grown Up Page 14