Some Kind of Perfect (Calloway Sisters #4.5)

by Krista Ritchie

  He shrugs. “I like it better down here.”

  That’s as good a reason as any, I suppose. I sink to the floor.

  He lets out a long groan, focused on the scattered papers.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask.

  “I hate Janie’s math notes,” he complains. “They’re so hard to read.”

  I crane my neck and notice all the doodles in the margins of her notes. Hearts. Stars. Stick figure cats sipping milk and prancing on rooftops. Her messy scrawl contrasts Moffy’s neat handwriting. They’ve been trading notes since they started second grade.

  Jane makes better grades in math and science, but she dislikes the reading portion. According to Moffy, Jane doesn’t like the books they assign. So he helps her with the reading and writing. I thought it’d been going well.

  Yesterday he told us that he can’t wait for third grade. Apparently that’s where all the big kids are. With a summer birthday, we could’ve chosen to start him early instead of late. I don’t regret our decision. He might be the oldest in his class, but he’s also excelling. It’s more than I can say for Lo and me at eight-years-old. Or really…ever.

  School was not our thing.

  “Maybe you should ask Jane to write more legibly,” I suggest.

  He nods. “I’ll try.” He outstretches one of his legs, his textbook slipping off his lap. Moffy doesn’t notice, his green eyes planted on mine. “Did you get the books on the list yet?”

  “Soon.”

  He just gave me his summer reading list this morning. Instead of choosing the required three books, he wants to read every single one. Ten books. I never thought we’d have a child who likes reading outside of graphic novels and the occasional fantasy book.

  Then again, I never thought we’d have a baby that grew up to love Batman.

  Moffy has been full of surprises.

  Just as he takes out a calculator from his backpack, I say, “Hey, Moffy. Do you remember what you asked me this morning?”

  “About sex?” His voice is nonchalant. He starts typing on his calculator.

  “Yeah, sex.” I don’t stammer, which boosts my confidence even more. I sit cross-legged and hold onto my knees. “Do you know what it is?”

  “I think so…it’s how babies are made.”

  “Right.” I go along with this. “And remember how we told you how a baby is made. When a man’s sperm goes inside a woman, it joins with an egg and the baby grows in the woman’s uterus.” I think I may actually buy him a book for visuals. A recent book. Just in case we’ve all evolved.

  Moffy sets down his pencil, brows scrunched in deep contemplation. “Yeah…but how is that sex? I’m just confused. Whitney Rivenfell says two people can do it without making babies. Why would they want to do that?” He shakes his head. “And how exactly does the sperm get inside?”

  Calmly, I answer the second question. It seems the easiest. “Sperm comes out of a penis, and so when the man puts his penis into a woman’s vagina, the sperm releases.” Nailed it. Continuing on, “And as for Whitney’s assessment, two people can have sex without making babies. She’s right about that.”

  “He,” Moffy corrects. “Whitney’s a boy, Mom.”

  First strike, but it had nothing to do with the sex conversation. I’ll take it.

  He keeps talking before I can explain further, “So that’s what you and Dad do?” His face twists. “Does it hurt you? Are you okay?”

  Uhhh…I didn’t think the sex talk would take this detour. “It doesn’t hurt, Moffy…well for some girls, it does their first time. But that’s not really part of what I want to say…” I trail off, lost for a second. I try to recollect my dispersed thoughts, but his compassion for family members pushes this conversation in another direction.

  “So…Janie, Sulli and Luna…” He stares off, confused and concerned about the girls he knows.

  “Sex isn’t something to be scared of, but none of you should be having sex until you’re much older,” I tell him, words rushing towards me all of a sudden.

  Moffy stares off in thought.

  So I just continue, “It can feel good for grown-ups, which is why people do it outside of making babies. When you get older soon, you might even have urges to experiment with yourself…and that’s okay, but it’s something you only do in private.”

  Lo and I played “doctor” when we were nine, and we both had a concept of what sex was—we just wanted to see how it felt.

  Moffy frowns. “How old were you when you started?”

  Don’t freak out. “Having sex?”

  “Yeah.”

  I lost my virginity when I was thirteen. But not to Lo. I’d do anything to keep them from having sex that soon, so I say, “Old.” I worry that he might ask this to someone else. I add, “Personal sex questions like that stay private between couples, so it’s better not to ask other people that one. Does that make sense?”

  “Yeah.” He nods and then asks about Winona and surrogacy again. I explain the whole process so he understands that Rose and Ryke did not have sex, and Winona is biologically Ryke and Daisy’s daughter. I watch clarity sweep his face, and he nods more confidently.

  “Do you know what a condom is?” I ask next.

  “Not really.”

  “It protects your partner.” I think about an STD talk, but maybe I’ll leave that for another time, so I just mention how condoms prevent pregnancies. “It’s like a plastic glove that wraps around the penis so sperm can’t enter a woman. Make sense?”

  He thinks about this for a long second. “I dunno. The whole thing seems painful and gross.”

  “Well it’s a grown-up thing,” I reinforce this notion. “You don’t have to worry about it until you’re much much older, and maybe then it won’t seem so gross.”

  Moffy relaxes more, happy that it’s not something he has to concern himself with right now.

  “Anymore questions?” I wonder.

  “Yeah.” He looks down at his paper. “If Benji has twelve apples and Mary has three-hundred-and-forty-five, how many apples do they have in all?”

  This I can handle. Hell, after today, I can handle anything.

  After I finish helping Moffy with his homework, I step into the hall. It’s barren, empty of Loren Hale. I check the next couple of rooms, only to find him in Luna’s.

  He lies on the carpet with our four-year-old daughter, staring up at the glow-in-the-dark stars on the ceiling and goopy shapes and colors from the lava lamp.

  “And on my planet Thebula, all the waters has glitters. No one can drown,” she tells him, kicking her feet up on her plastic green chair.

  “Glitter?” he asks. “Does that mean you’ll be all glittery when you get out of the pool?”

  “Uh-huh.” She nods. “And brover won’t be able to drown.”

  My heart lurches. She saw a trailer on television where a boy drowned. Some thriller movie coming out for the summer, and now she’s worried about Moffy since he spends most of his time in the pool.

  Lo turns his head towards our daughter. Flyaway pieces of her light brown hair touch her round face. She has a red cape tied around her neck, already bathed and in star-printed PJs.

  Lo brushes a strand of hair off her forehead. “Moffy isn’t going to drown, Luna. He took swim classes so he won’t.”

  “Butbut,” she slurs her words. “What happens if the swim classies fail?”

  “They won’t, you wanna know why?” Lo props himself on his elbow, head on his hand, his eyes on our daughter. Lo never thought he could be gentle, not even with his own kids, but he was wrong. He might not have the softest voice, but his innocence surfaces—innocence that we both lost at a young age. He finds and gives it all to them.

  “Why?” Luna asks.

  “Because Moffy is the best swimmer in the entire neighborhood. He’s so good that I think it’s his secret superpower, but shhh.” He puts his finger to his lips. “You can’t tell him about his superpower or else it might go away. That’s why we call it a…” He
feigns surprise.

  “A what?”

  “A secret!” He tickles Luna. She giggles and rolls from side to side.

  I’m smiling so wide, even as Lo glances at the door for the first time. Seeing me. He nods for me to come further inside. I skip on over, only to rest down on the other side of Luna.

  “Mommy!” she exclaims. “I was telling Daddy about my planet Thebula. I think that’s where I’m from.” She’s adamant that she was not born on Earth. That Lo and I had her on another planet and then she returned to this world on a spaceship, bringing her with us. Her imagination is the highlight of my day.

  “Thebula,” I muse. “It sounds familiar.”

  She inhales a large breath of air. “Really?”

  I nod and she springs to her feet and runs over to her little work desk by a strange looking plant she waters every day.

  “Whatcha doing?” I ask Luna.

  “Drawing it for you!”

  I’m glowing as Lo places his fingers to my chin, slowly drawing my face towards his. He kisses the corner of my lips, both of us lying on the fuzzy rug.

  “When did you leave?” I ask, scooting closer and closer. Until our legs and arms tangle.

  “When you started talking about Benji and Mary and apples.” His amber eyes fill with something soul-deep. “I always believed in you, Lily, but that was…extraordinary.”

  “I didn’t blush. Not once.” Pride swells up, something so foreign that I hold onto it tight.

  “You’re amazing.” He kisses me once more. This time right on the lips—where the sentiment of his words sings through me.

  [ 39 ]

  April 2024

  Calloway Couture Boutique

  Philadelphia

  ROSE COBALT

  I closed the boutique.

  Just for the day. Interior designers left about five minutes ago after canvassing the space and snapping photographs, all for Calloway Couture’s retail expansion into New York City, San Francisco, and Chicago.

  The boutique is quiet, and so I sit behind the cash register and sketch a lace bustier. I spend most of my time creating baby clothes and dresses, but I’ve been drawing some haute couture gowns and thinking about fabrics. They’re incredibly unaffordable for the everyday woman, which is not what Calloway Couture is about, but I’ve felt compelled towards the designs, more inspired to go down this path.

  My five-year plan is to create a fall fashion line of them. I’m constantly busy, even with all my gremlins in school, but a five-year timeframe should be achievable.

  I check the clock. Ben, just two, is in pre-pre-K for another hour and then I have to pick him up from school. I tap my pencil to my sketchbook and skim the racks of clothes, the ottoman cushions, the twinkling chandeliers. This one store will become many. My clothes are being worn by thousands, and I’d return to myself at twenty-three and I’d just say, breathe.

  I worried so much about my fashion line. Would it survive the media fallout? Would my dream last? It took a lot of time, more work than I sometimes thought capable, but Calloway Couture survived with me.

  Outside of my store, paparazzi start sprinting to the curb. Their cameras and bodies angled towards the street. A black limousine parks.

  I instantly know who’s inside.

  Connor Cobalt emerges like the celebrity he probably always envisioned inside his head. Though now he has literal cameras flashing in his face. He acts as though it’s all background to his world, his wavy hair perfect and the sleeves of his button-down rolled up his forearms.

  His confidence is his most alluring accessory, and I find myself pressed against the checkout desk to near him. Honestly, Rose. He’s not as amazing as you.

  I flip my hair off my shoulder.

  Domineering and poised, Connor heads for my store, and cameramen part like the Red Sea. Connor unlocks the door with his set of keys, a small white shopping bag in his hand. He shuts and locks the store behind him.

  The paparazzi can’t catch much through the tinted glass, so they don’t linger for long.

  “You cheated,” I say as he approaches me.

  “So you’ve reminded me seventeen times now.” He places the shopping bag beside the register, a tempting distance. I try not to eye it for long.

  Stay firm, Rose.

  “And yet you still lack remorse.”

  His amusement lifts his lips. “I didn’t personally cheat.”

  “You can’t blame Eliot and Tom. They were on your team. Your entire team cheated.” We played Pictionary last night. Jane, Charlie, and Ben were on my team, and Beckett, Eliot, and Tom were on Connor’s. The two four-year-olds kept flipping the sand-timer over during their rounds to give themselves extra seconds.

  Connor says they thought it was a toy, but children have their motives. They’re devious little things.

  He rests casually against my checkout counter. “We gave your team extra time in the final round, and yet you still lost.”

  I glare and raise my hand at his face. “Your voice just shriveled the last of my eggs. I’m barren and frigid.” I point at the door. “The exit is that way.” I do the thing that annoys him most.

  I ignore him.

  And I resume sketching.

  “I bought you something. I didn’t mean for it to be a peace offering, but it can if it satisfies you.”

  I struggle to bite my tongue. I don’t even last a full thirty-seconds. “You’re terrible at admitting defeat.”

  “Because I’m not capable of feeling defeated.”

  It’s easy to forget that he’s not just a narcissist in a loose sense. I smooth my lips together, my glare investigating his calm, relaxed exterior. “I reject your peace offering.”

  Why is he grinning?

  I rise to my feet. “I said rejection, Richard. I just rejected you.”

  “Rose.”

  I quickly cover his mouth with my hand. “Can you not say my name like you’re fucking the syllable?” I feel his smile beneath my palm. Ugh.

  He clasps my wrist and tears my hand off his face. “I said your name how I always say it. Rose.”

  “You have a death wish.” His strong grip on my wrist stimulates my sensitive nerves that only scream, more, harder, deeper.

  He walks around the checkout counter, so nothing, not even the register, separates us. “How do you plan to kill me?”

  I raise my chin. “With a pickaxe in each eye.” I can’t stand his smile, and yet, I want it to stay. I reach out with my free hand to cover his mouth.

  He seizes my other wrist. God, yes.

  Then he tugs me towards his body, so abruptly that a sharp breath escapes my lips. I keep my piercing glare on his deep blues, his eyes as smooth as water and silk.

  He towers above me, but I lift my head as much as I can and say, “Then I’d set you on fire.”

  His lips hover close to whisper, “Tu l'as déjà fait.”

  You already have.

  Before I think properly, he hoists me up, my legs around his waist, dress riding up to my thighs. His defined muscles cut sharper in his biceps, even through his white button-down. He carries me towards a dressing room, veiled by a black curtain.

  My collarbone juts out, my oxygen tight in my lungs. Connor kisses the bone before noticing the necklace I wear. I feel his breath stagger.

  His liquid gaze looks to me in complete and utter knowing. He catches the diamond pendant, pear-shaped like a water droplet, between his teeth.

  I pulse.

  This necklace is the first piece of jewelry he ever bought me. I was in college. We’d just started officially dating. I kept it in a safe deposit box so I wouldn’t lose it, but I thought about it today and checked it out so I could wear it.

  All of a sudden, my back hits the dressing room wall, the black curtain yanked closed. My legs are still parted around his waist, and he seizes my wrists again, this time with one hand. He elevates them above my head, stretching and pinning them there.

  “I hate you,” I argue in the sh
allowest breath.

  “Tu m’aimes.” You love me.

  He drops the necklace, and his lips find mine. The aggressive, forceful kiss contains aching need and desire. When he nips my lip, his mouth trails to the pit of my ear. “Rose.”

  Good God.

  I melt but tense against him. It’s such an oxymoron. I know he loves those. Our faces are so close, and his free hand starts ripping off my panties.

  “I’m going to claw your face off,” I pant, more breathy than I intend.

  He cups my jaw, then drifts to my throat. Choke me. He squeezes much harder than he’s been able to in the past since I’m not pregnant.

  “You know what I heard you just say, Rose?” He kisses me and then murmurs, “I heard you say that you love my mind, my body…my cock.” Connor removes his hand to slip his two fingers inside of me. In and out. I shudder. He rams his body against mine, and I jolt with pleasure.

  Connor cages me to the wall with his six-foot-four build. My nerves electrify, and I grow so wet that I moan when he grips my hair and pulls. I feel utterly and completely in his possession.

  He kisses me once more, my lips stinging by the force. His hand returns to my wrists, and his fingers between my legs never leave. Against my mouth, he asks, “How much pain?”

  “None,” I whisper.

  He’s not asking how much pain I want. He’s asking if I’m in any.

  I gave birth to Winona four weeks ago, and the rules are six weeks, no sex. My mind is a pool of betrayal. 100% horny and undone. I’m leaning towards breaking all the rules in favor of sex.

  Traitor.

  Rose Calloway Cobalt doesn’t break rules. I follow them.

  Do it, Rose. Let his cock drive so hard inside of you.

  There aren’t any security cameras inside the Calloway Couture dressing rooms. Everything says yes except this one stipulation.

  Fuck it.

  I consent to this with a nod. Horny Rose wins today. Connor barely pauses, unzipping my dress and pulling it off my head. He lets me have control of my hands, only to unbutton his shirt. He unclips my bra, and I’m entirely bare as he steps out of his slacks and pulls off his boxer-briefs, while still tucked up against me.