Page 389 of Bride of Choice

Jeh-kal stood at the kitchen counter with his back to me, placing another plate, upside down, over Rek’s food, then placing it in one of those fancy warming bins I’d seen at Dorothy’s place before.

Jeh-kal glanced towards me from over his shoulder. “Goot?” he asked.

Nodding, I realized I had three sets of eyes laser focused on me and blushed. Why was puking or almost puking so damn embarrassing to me? Whatever. Fake it ‘til you make it, honey. Isn’t that what I’m always telling myself?

“Jo wants tea?” Jeh-kal asked.

“Tummy tea and toast, no butters,” Rek muttered under his breath as he held up a blue pair of socks with funky cats all over them and a black pair covered in chili peppers that read, “Spicy”.

“What if I wanted butter on my toast?” I asked lightly.

Rek snorted and glanced up. Why did it amuse me so much that he chose the spicy socks? His lips slowly curved upward as if this too amused him greatly. “Jojomine wants butter on toast?”

Blech. Not really. Swallowing the bile rising in my throat at the thought, I shook my head.

Lifting the skirt of my pretty-pretty princess nightgown, Rek leaned in and playfully raked his fangs down my knee.

A sharp burst of raucous giggles pealed out of me as I slapped him away, but it was too late.

Jeh-kal and Celuk froze in place. Celuk paused in filling a cup with the pitcher of water on the table for me and leaned over me, curious as to what Rek had done to produce such results. Jeh-kal too completely abandoned what he was doing in favor of this new discovery.

“You bastard!” I gasped out, gaping down at Rek as he quickly stuffed my foot into a spicy sock. “You swore you’d never tell anyone!”

Putting on my last sock, Rek rolled away from me with a grin. “Rek no say nothing!” His grin was boyish, unrepentant, and I wanted to slap it right off of him and then kiss it back on. This. This was what I’d missed— the fun, playful side of him he’d only ever shown me before— the side of him I’d wished he’d let others see.

“Snitches get stitches!” I barked at him. Grabbing one of the abandoned socks at my feet, I chucked it at him.

Rek laughed and dipped behind the coffee table in front of Jeh-kal’s L-shaped, supersized couch lounger.

“What the hell are you two feeding him?” I huffed and puffed as Celuk set my mug of water in front of me and wrapped his arms around me.

I had a sneaking suspicion Celuk was trying to make sure I didn’t pop up and chase after Rek to brain him with a sock. I hadn’t planned on it but, taking it easy notwithstanding, the idea held merit.

A deep rumble issued from Jeh-kal, who had turned back towards the toast he was working on.

Celuk’s purr cut off, almost as if he’d suddenly choked on his own saliva.

Rek’s face turned a funny shade and his mouth turned into a funny little o just shy of a pucker.

What the hell was I missing?

“Jeh-kal and Celuk not,” Jeh-kal started to rumble.

Whatever he was going to say was cut off by the single courtesy bang on Rek’s front door before Rosa started demanding to be let in and see me or she was going to stand out there screaming at the top of her lungs until she found a way in.

“Weird way to say she missed me but okay,” I muttered, ignoring Celuk stating he’d answer the door as I popped up and rushed the door before he realized what I was doing and snapped out of the funny stupor he was in, to think to try and stop me.

Throwing the door open, I practically threw myself at my cousin.

She was still mid rant. My ear rang from the shouting it got as I clutched her to me. “Oh my god!” I babbled. “I missed you so much! I was so scared I was never going to see you again!”

I was already blubbering, squeezing the fuck out of her.

“Careful!” Rek snapped. “My Jojomine frag-jee-lay!”

Pulling back, swiping at her eyes as she fought to stave off a mad case of the weepies, she glanced from me to him pointedly. “Frag-jee-lay?”

“Baby. Girl,” Celuk rumbled out.

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