Page 86 of Home for the Holidays

Heidi broke from the kiss and pulled her own sweater over her head. Then she climbed onto Iris’s lap. “I should have taken my pants off,” she said with a laugh.

“Don’t worry,” Iris mumbled. “I’ll get them off soon enough—”

“Uh, Mom?”

A knock sounded on the door, and Heidi sprang off of Iris like they were playing a game of Iris’s Lap is Lava. She scrambled to find her sweater and then threw Iris her sweatshirt, a bewildered expression on her face the entire time. “What do you need, Zac?”

The door didn’t open. Instead, he said loudly, “Iris, your parents are here.”

Iris finished rearranging her sweatshirt before she rushed over to the door and yanked it open. “What the hell?”

Zac gave Iris a smile filled with apology. “I called them when you got into the accident.”

“Andwhywould you do that?”

“Because, you asshole, I didn’t know if you were going to wake up,” he explained, his voice a hushed whisper. “I’m sorry for fucking caring.”

She rolled her eyes. “Zac, stop. I love you for caring but my parents?Ugh.”

Great. Now she had to deal with her parents? What the hell were they going to say? She’d only spoken to them once since they had boarded their cruise. And now they were galloping into Vale Park, Indiana, on their white steed to, what? Save the day? She didn’t need saving. She also didn’t need to explain her relationship with Heidi, which was, of course, inevitable. Sure, her mom was accepting. The PFLAG chapter she had started was a wonderful way of showing how supportive she was, but there was still tension. Tension she had never told Zac about. Suddenly she realized what a hypocrite she was. She was so mad at Zac for not sharing all the intricacies of his relationship with his family, yet she had done the exact same thing to hers.

“You love your parents. And they love you. They were worried sick.” Zac grabbed her hands as she frantically pushed them through her hair.

“Stop.” She jerked her chin so she could see around him into Heidi’s mirror. Her tone was a little forceful, but she needed to get her hair up and out of her face, or her mom would be up her ass about it being a mess.

“What is going on? What aren’t you telling me?”

“Zac…” She groaned as she looked at his reflection in the mirror and caught sight of Heidi on the bed. Fuck. Heidi. She turned and rushed over to her. “I am so sorry about this.”

“What are you talking about? You don’t have to be sorry, Iris. It’s okay. I understand all too well being worried sick about you.” Her face softened, and her hands on Iris’s face were the only thing helping to ground her.

“Thank you.”

“Wait a second,” Zac said from across the bedroom. “Are you going to tell me why you’re so upset about them coming here? Something else is going on. I can tell.”

“Listen.” Iris finished fixing her hair, then stopped in front of Zac. “I promise I will tell you, but right now, I need to get down there. Okay?”

“Fine.” Zac groaned. “But you have a lot of explaining to do.”

Iris sighed. “I know.” And then she headed downstairs, wondering the entire time how she was going to explain everything without hearing an earful from her mom about how irresponsible she was.

Her stomach was in knots.

She wanted to vomit.

She needed to vomit.

If she wasn’t careful, shewouldvomit.

What a fucking buzzkill.

CHAPTERTHIRTY-NINE

The resemblance between Iris and her mother was astonishing. There wasn’t a doubt in Heidi’s mind that they shared the same DNA. In fact, if Heidi had seen them together out and about, she would have assumed they were sisters. The only difference was Mary’s pixie cut and the slight amount of gray sprinkled throughout. Otherwise, they were the spitting image of each other.

The weird part? Heidi was kind of glad that she was getting a special glimpse into what Iris would look like in the future. Was that bad? Absolutely. But damn, the last few days had been a fucking whirlwind of emotions. Adding a little bogus time travel wasn’t a crime.

“Mom, I swear, I’m okay,” Iris was saying. “Everything is fine. There was no need—”

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