Page 82 of Steel

I scrub a hand across my mouth to hide my smirk, knowing my girl is about to throw some hustle.

Lyric nods. “Uh-huh. Horror movie trivia.”

Bailee sets her slice of pizza on her plate and stares Lyric down. “Horror is my favorite. How many questions?”

My daughter taps her index finger against her lip as she pretends to think. “Five. No, wait . . . ten!”

“Ten, huh? That’s easy. What do I get when I win?” Bailee boasts.

Lyric glances at me with a mock worried expression. “I think I made it too easy or something. Maybe there should be more questions.”

I nod, playing along. “Might be a good idea.”

Bailee glances between us, biting her lip. “No. No. You know what? Why don’t we just do the original five? If I get them all . . .” She trails off, then smiles, lifts her foot, and wiggles her sock-covered toes. “You give me a pedicure.”

Oh, man. The way my little girl’s smile lights up at that is fucking beautiful. Does Heather not do any of that girly shit with her that now she’s starved for it?

“What if I win?”

Bailee smiles back at her and leans forward to tweak her nose, causing Lyric to blush and drop her head for a few seconds before peering back up at her with twinkling eyes.

“You won’t, but if you do, what would you like? The world is your oyster, my little heart song.”

I watch my daughter melt, causing worry to settle in my gut, but there’s no fucking way I’m going to be able to pull these two apart now. Their bond was instantaneous. And as I glance over at Bailee, I realize my daughter isn’t the only one melting. My Hummingbird has fucking heart eyes too. Seeing it lessens the worry, but it doesn’t completely diminish it. If anything happens, it’s not just going to be one female’s heart that’s going to break, it’ll be two.

“I think you just will have to paint my nailsandmy toes.”

“Dea—”

“Andyou have to listen to Daddy and come back for more horror movie trivia nights.”

Suspicion shines bright in Bailee’s eyes as she gazes between the two of us. “Why do I feel like I’m being played?”

Lyric leans forward as if she’s going to tell Bailee a secret. “I’m just a kid, Bee. I don’t know what that means.”

She’s so full of shit, and from the expression in Lee’s eyes, she knows it too.

A huff of laughter passes Bailee’s lips. “You’re much more than that, girlie, but fine, you have a deal. Five trivia questions each. The winner is whoever gets all of them right. In the event of a tie, there’ll be a tie-breaker question. Who goes first and who asks the questions?”

“Daddy, you want to be the questioner person?”

I sigh heavily and settle more comfortably in my seat. “If I must. What do you say? Should our guest go first?”

My heart flips when she giggles at my wink. “Yup.”

I try to think of one that I’m sure she’ll know. Horror movie trivia is Lyric’s favorite thing to do when we’re hanging around the house. So, even if I’m not as obsessed with the genre as Lyric is, she’s definitely made sure I’m knowledgeable enough to playalong with her and win if we’re teamed up against other people. Bailee loves horror movies too, just not at the level that my girl does, so she shouldn’t have any problem answering these.

“Carrie was played by which actress in the 1967 version of the movie?”

“Oh,” Bailee exclaims, “Sissy Spacek!”

“Good girl,” I praise, shooting her a wink and being rewarded with heat sparking in her eyes for a few short seconds before I turn to my daughter. “Lyra, what’s the name of Michael Myers’s teenage sister who he killed as a child inHalloween?”

She scrunches her nose. “Really, Daddy? Her name is Judith.”

“Just testin’ you both out. Gotta check those reflexes. Ready for the real ones, ladies?” They nod, and my lips twitch at the seriousness on their cute faces. “Lee, you have how many days to live after watchin’ the videotape inThe Ring?”

“Seven days.”

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