A Creed in Stone Creek - Linda Lael Miller [94]
Which was sometimes annoying.
“Are you planning on spending the night with him?” Ashley asked.
Melissa turned and made a big deal of cupping her hands loosely over Katie’s little pink ears. “What a thing to say in front of a child,” she said.
Ashley rolled her twinkly blue eyes. “Katie is two,” she reminded her sister. “And anyway, you’re just trying to stall.”
Melissa uncovered Katie’s ears, sighed. “I don’t know,” she said.
More twinkling. Happiness looked wonderful on Ashley, just as it did on Olivia and Meg. “You don’t know if you’re stalling?” she teased.
“I don’t know if I’m going to—” Melissa glanced down at Katie, who was holding Ashley’s long, golden braid in both hands and gazing at it in wonder, and lowered her voice, “sleep with him.”
“What’s the holdup?” Ashley asked.
Melissa plunked her hands on her hips and mimicked, “‘What’s the holdup?’ Easy for you to ask, Ashley O’Ballivan McKenzie, when you have the whole rest of your life laid out like a path between two rose gardens!”
“Stalling,” Ashley repeated, singing the word.
Katie giggled and sang her own version.
Melissa stumbled over her answer. “It’s just—well—we hadn’t known each other very long when—”
“Maybe,” Ashley reasoned, “it’s a matter of knowing each other well enough, instead of long enough.”
Melissa arched an eyebrow, her hands still resting on her hips. Which felt slightly wider under her knuckles, though that was probably an illusion brought on by concern over consumption of her sister’s incomparable lasagna. “Whose side are you on, anyway?” she asked.
“There are sides?” Ashley countered, raising her own eyebrows. “Who knew?”
Melissa let out a big breath and sat down beside her sister on the bed. “I’m trying to be sensible, here,” she said.
“Love isn’t sensible,” Ashley informed her.
“Who said anything about love?” Melissa countered. “This is a case of lust. If I were in love with Steven Creed, don’t you think I would have noticed?”
“Not necessarily,” Ashley chimed. “For such a smart woman, you can be pretty obtuse when it comes to men.”
“Obtuse?” She took a slow, deliberate breath, in a bid for patience. “Just because you’re married now, Ash, you’re suddenly an expert on men?”
“I’m an expert on one particular man,” Ashley responded, a little smugly. “That’s all I need to be.”
Melissa studied her twin in silence for a long moment. Then her shoulders slumped slightly. “Don’t you ever get scared?” she asked, very softly.
Ashley took her hand, squeezed lightly. A slight furrow appeared in her forehead. “Scared?”
“Caring so much,” Melissa murmured. “It’s, well—it’s dangerous.”
Ashley’s entire countenance softened, along with her face. “Oh, honey,” she said. “Is this about the breakup with Dan? That’s why you think it’s dangerous to care too much? I know you were hurt, but honestly, what are the odds of something like that happening twice in one person’s lifetime?”
Melissa sighed again. “Have you checked the divorce statistics lately?” she asked. Her stab at humor fell flat.
“Statistics are statistics,” Ashley said. “And people are people. Every couple is different, Mel. It’s all about finding someone who wants the same things out of life and has similar values, and then both partners trying like hell to make it work. There aren’t any guarantees, obviously—not for any of us.”
“So you never get scared. Never worry that something could happen to Jack or, God forbid, Katie or the baby?”
“Of course I worry sometimes,” Ashley replied. “I’m only human, and I have some of the same abandonment issues as you do, because of Mom leaving and Dad dying so young. But I try never to dwell on all the things that could go wrong. Melissa, so many things go right, every single day, for everybody, but nobody notices that.”
Melissa leaned closer and let the side of her head rest against the side of Ashley’s. “You’re amazing,” she said.
“Yes,” Ashley replied, with comical primness, “I am, rather, aren’t I?”
They were quiet for a while, content just to be side by side.
Then, perhaps because she’d missed Ashley so much while she