Page 93 of Recipe for Rivals

“What?” I asked, exasperated and surprised by the insane leaps he could make. “That doesn’t even make sense.”

“Sure it does. Why would Ben want to talk to his dad if he has other men poisoning him against me? What are you saying about me to all the hicks out there?”

“Nothing.” Which was almost true. Dusty wasn’t a hick. “Why would I talk about you, Carter, to people I’m not even dating?” This entire conversation had spiraled out of control so quickly, I was losing my place. It felt like someone had tossed me into the center of a tilt-a-whirl at the pier and I had to find the car holding my family, but the floor was moving and everything kept spinning away.

Besides, if that was the first thing he jumped to, it stood to reason he was talking about me to other people.

I wanted to hang up, block his number, and lose myself inWhite Collarreruns. But that wasn’t even a legal option.

“The kids need me,” I said. “Can we try again tomorrow?”

Carter was quiet for a minute. “I don’t like this.”

Inhaling for patience, I waited for him to continue. The man loved to hear himself talk, so it was only a matter of time.

“I don’t like the kids being so far away and having no way to see them regularly. It’s going to strain our relationship.”

Answering the phone regularly would help with that. Carter had only started calling every day after he’d FaceTimed during the tornado warning and Ben hadn’t wanted to speak to him. It was a classic Carter move. Everyone wasn’t worshiping him, so he would pester the kids until balance was restored. I had the sick feeling that as soon as Ben went back to wanting to hear from Carter, things would go back to the way they were pre-tornado night. We’d get him on the phone once a week if we were lucky.

There had to be a better way. It wasn’t fair to send my kids on emotional roller coasters without breaks.

“Honestly,” Carter said. “I didn’t want it to have to come to this, but we might have to discuss location?—”

An ear-splitting scream rent the air, curdling my stomach. I didn’t think. My feet were up and racing to the kids bedroom. I flung the door open, frantically searching—Iknewthe bunk bed was going to cause one of them to break their arm—until I found Alice crumpled on the floor in her hot pink Barbie nightgown,clutching Peaches to her chest while sobs racked her tiny shoulders.

I dropped to my knees. “What happened?”

She shook her head, tears streaming down her reddened cheeks.

“Alice,” I said firmly. “What happened?”

Her little arms peeled away from her body, separating her pink monkey into three pieces—the body in one hand, two arms dangling from the other. Clean slices went through the fuzzy pink appendages. This act of brutality was clearly done with scissors.

“Ben!” Alice wailed, like he had stolen her firstborn child. “He did this!”

Yeah, I had jumped to the very same conclusion. But innocent until proven guilty and all that. “We don’t know for sure until we ask him,” I said gently.

“I did it,” Ben said from the doorway behind me, his arms crossed over his chest and his mouth flipped into a frown.

Oh, that little punk. “Honestly? Why, Ben?”

“She shouldn’t have ruined my Chewie.”

“Agreed, but she didn’t try to ruin it on purpose,” I said, exasperated. “She didn’t know it would melt.”

His frown was unrelenting.

Alice’s sobs keened through the air.

No one was going to get to sleep anytime soon.

Alice started yelling at Ben, and his response was to yell back. The animosity grew in the room until my arms began to itch. Great, add a wave of hives to the mix.

“Okay,” I shouted. “Everyone,enough.” I pointed one hand at each kid. “You both messed up. You both made bad choices. You both owe the other an apology.”

“But Peaches isdead!” Alice screamed. “She’ll never live again!”

An idea hit me. “She’ll live just fine. I can sew.”

---