Happily Ever Afton (17 page)

‘Hello, Miss Afton!’ they politely repeated in unison. One of the girls’ freckled-covered noses screwed up. ‘Why do you look and smell so funny, Miss Afton?’ she asked with all the truthful honesty of children, her puzzled bambi-brown eyes curiously examining Afton’s makeup and outfit.

‘Trina – that is
not
polite! Please apologize to Miss Afton,’ Cooper admonished and for the first time that day, Afton felt truly embarrassed and ashamed.

‘It’s okay, Cooper. Nice to meet you both girls.’ She tugged one red pigtail on each. ‘And it was just a not so funny joke I was playing on your Uncle Cooper – you know like when you dress up for Halloween.’

Afton and Cooper’s gazes met again over the girls’ heads as the twins nodded, easily accepting her explanation and began to chatter excitedly in the twin-talk no one else understood about their camp-out later.

‘Come on – let’s go inside.’

Cooper easily strode beside Afton up the walkway to the house with his nieces in his arms. When he stopped for a moment to set down the twins who raced on ahead, she quickly twisted the ring from her finger and dropped it into her purse, not wanting to answer the inevitable questions it would raise from whomever awaited them. He held the door wide and the twins ran through, Afton stopping in awed wonder once they too entered the home.

It’s like the Emerald Palace in here, she thought taking a deep jerky swallow.

Everything sparkling, and magical and bright
!

She looked around her taking in the home’s open, spacious floor plan, the carefully arranged up market furniture, the pricey pale oak flooring and sleekly modern kitchen with granite counters and shiny state-of-the-art stainless steel appliances. Her glance flitted over to the original Jackson Pollock painting hanging beneath carefully angled track lighting.

Afton gulped.

This was an entirely new level of wealth she hadn’t quite comprehended. Yet unlike his spotless almost sterile penthouse this home
was
Cooper – the Cooper she now knew him to be – and every colorful accent pillow, every graceful piece of marble sculpture, every painting on the wall and each and every brick in the rough stone fireplace anchoring one end of the room, seemed to have his name imprinted on it.

It was almost as if with the often rain-drenched climate of Seattle in mind, he had designed the home to capture as much sunlight as possible. Building with a
profusion
of glass so there was an unbroken connection between the interior and nature’s perfect palette of gold sun, green grass and blue sky beyond. The cavernous airy great room they entered was decorated with furniture and rugs in subdued peats, grays and taupe’s that put all the emphasis rightly back on the magnificent view outside the wall of tall sliding windows that allowed natural light to flow freely in. It was easily the most
beautiful
house she had ever seen or been in, Afton thought weakly.

‘
Cooper
!’

A dark-haired, very attractive woman dressed in casual khaki shorts, red tank top and thong sandals cried out with delight. Rising from her chair, she hurried over to greet them at the door. Her expression grew puzzled as she took in Afton’s outfit, but she exchanged a warm hug with her nevertheless.

‘You must be Afton – I’m Dayna – Cooper’s sister and I have to warn you right now – we’re huggers in this family. We’ve heard a
lot
about you!’

She then turned to Cooper, giving him a tight affectionate hug and quick kiss upon his cheek. ‘Thanks for hosting the annual Carrington family Fourth of July gathering this year, Coop,’ she said, ‘we’ve been enjoying eating all your food and drinking up all the good liquor until you got here. Jonathan actually just zipped out to the store to replenish the beer before the fireworks begin later.’

‘Good,’ Cooper said with a grin, dropping a kiss on her cheek, ‘about time you freeloaders gave back for once! Did Mother and Dad make it?’

‘No, they sent their regrets, but they actually decided at the last minute to go on a three week cruise to the Caribbean,’ Dayna replied with a wide smile, her teal-blue eyes sparkling with humor, ‘right now Mother is probably sipping a pina colada on deck while telling the captain how to steer the ship!’

‘My sympathies to the captain,’ Cooper said dryly. He went over to greet Dayna’s husband whom she introduced to Afton as Michael, responsible for the bright red hair and warm brown eyes of his daughters she saw, who was intently watching a baseball game on the huge flat screen TV hanging over the massive fireplace.

Cooper asked over his shoulder, ‘where’s Caitlin and her rug rats?’

‘She’s in the guest room giving the baby a bottle and tucking in Torrie for the night,’ Dayna filled him in. ‘Poor little Victoria thought she was going to be able to hang with her older cousins and camp out outside in the tree house, but it was just too much excitement for her tiny three-year old body and she pooped out about an hour ago.’

Cooper looked over at his two nieces who had pulled out their dolls on the circular woven rug in front of the fireplace and were playing an active game of house. Afton blushed to see that one of the dolls now appeared to be wearing a miniskirt with a multitude of bracelets shoved up one plastic arm, the synthetic hair now styled in dangerous familiar spikes courtesy of some helpful spit supplied by a twin.

‘Are you really going to let them camp outside in the tree house alone?’ Cooper asked his sister quietly so they didn’t overhear.

Dayna chuckled looking over at her daughters with affection, ‘we figure they’ll pass out around midnight then Michael will go get them and bring them back to bed,’ she said
sotto voce.
Cooper and Afton laughed along with her as the twins played blithely on still chattering excitedly about their first night of independence from their parents.

‘I’ll find my flashlight and sleeping bag in my mountain gear and make sure the tree house is ready for occupancy. But first, I’m going to go say hello to Caitlin and look in on my new nephew before he falls asleep after his dinner.’

Cooper glanced across the room asking in a low throaty voice, ‘Afton – will you be all right for a little while?’

‘Sure, I’ll be just fine,’ Afton reassured him with a tentative smile his eyes caressed over before he nodded and left the room.

‘Come have a seat, Afton,’ Dayna sat back down and patted a spot on the soft leather couch next to her. ‘Don’t mind my husband over there; he’s a rabid Seattle Mariners fan so we won’t hear much from him for the next hour or so.’

Michael looked over upon hearing his name and gave Afton a smile and a wave before his attention snapped back to the screen at the sound of the crack of a bat hitting the ball. Dayna handed her a glass of white wine she’d poured out from the bottle on the low ebony-glossed coffee table in front of the couch.

‘So is this your first time at Cooper’s house?’ she asked seeming to pick up on how Afton’s wide eyes darted from one discreetly expensive object to the next.

‘Yes,’ Afton admitted, taking the wine with thanks and downing a needed gulp, ‘it’s…er…pretty spectacular isn’t it?’

Dayna laughed, ‘It
should
be for all the money Cooper spent on it! He’ll probably give you the official tour himself later, but he worked closely with the architect to make sure it was a completely green, energy-efficient house – using mostly locally recycled materials to build it,’ she confided. ‘It was even featured in an architectural magazine about a year ago. I’ll have to send you a copy of the article.’

‘That…that would be gr…great,’ Afton managed.

‘He was up on the roof himself for weeks
installing solar panels and making sure that the gutters direct all the rainwater they collect back into a huge backyard cistern that he uses to irrigate the landscaping and gardens,’ she took a sip of her wine then gave an exaggerated grimace.

‘Cooper is
such
a perfectionist – always has been since he was a little boy – he even did what he called a ‘sun analysis’ to design the interior space with the most used rooms like the great room we’re in now, located south to receive as much natural daylight and ventilation as possible.’

‘My goodness…that really
is
impressive.’

Dayna grinned at Afton’s awed proclamation, a deep dimple echoing the indentation in her brother’s cheek appearing in hers. ‘I told him calling it a ‘green’ house was very appropriate because he blew a bundle of green to build it! But he loves it here so that’s what’s most important.’

Afton silently absorbed this information while sipping at her wine. Uncomfortably aware that Dayna seemed to be watching her intently – as though measuring her reaction to the information she was sharing about her brother.

‘I suspect Cooper gets a little lonely sometimes – being by himself in such a huge house. I guess that’s why he stays most of the time at his place in the city – not so much empty space to wander about in. He’s so great with his nieces…and our new nephew…he really needs a wife and a family of his own though – to really make this house a home.’

Afton stared mute into the bottom of her wine glass and her continued silence may have decided Dayna on a different set of tactics. She set down her wineglass on a round coaster on the coffee table and pulled her long legs up to her chest, wrapping her arms around them in a pose indicating she was ready for some serious girl talk.

‘So tell me, Afton,’ she said with a wry smile and the elevation of a professionally arched black brow. ‘What’s up with the outfit, girlfriend?’

Afton blushed. ‘Well it seemed like a good idea at the time…I was actually trying to teach your brother a lesson.’

‘Oh boy,’ Cooper’s sister rubbed her hands together with gleeful anticipation, ‘this sounds like it’s going to be a
good
story,’ she refilled their wineglasses, raising hers back to her lips, ‘okay I’m ready – go!’

Afton leaned forward, the two dark heads held close together, as she gave her a recap of all that had occurred between them, detailing Cooper’s ongoing deception – only editing out the graphic love scenes to Dayna’s increasingly shocked expression. They talked on and on in low intense voices about the situation as it now stood for long minutes.

When Cooper came back in the room, both Afton and his sister paused the intent conversation they were having to shoot him dirty looks that made him nervous when he passed through on his way to the storage shed to retrieve the sleeping bag.

Just what I need, the womenfolk getting together and exchanging notes
!

He glumly let himself out his back door headed in the rapidly falling dusk to the equipment shed where he stored most of his mountain gear. When he came back inside a short while later after checking again on the sturdiness of the elaborate tree house he had built with leftover wood from his house between two low branches of a towering oak tree, his youngest sister Caitlin and her husband Jonathan were now sitting laughing along with Dayna on the comfortable taupe leather couch.

‘Is the tree house ready for an overnight visit from the twins, Coop?’ Dayna glanced over at him, her recently refilled glass of wine tilted precariously in her hand.

‘Yes, but I’m thinking about putting some privacy tinting on the windows for their next stay,’ Cooper teased, ‘that should make them feel that they are far, far away from their mother’s probing eyes!’

‘Don’t tease,’ she said with a resigned laugh, ‘I already think they’re growing up way too fast! They both told me they want cell phones and lip gloss for their seventh birthdays next month.’

As if on cue, the twins scrambled up from the rug and ran over to Cooper. ‘Is the tree house ready for us to go up in, Uncle Cooper? Is it time for the fireworks yet? Can we go outside now to watch them from there?’ They tumbled around his long legs like frisky puppies, shooting out a never-ending stream of questions.

‘Yes, the tree house is ready, but no – it’s not quite time for fireworks and yes, we can go outside on the terrace as soon as we hear the first fireworks go off,’ he patiently answered each one, smiling down into two upturned heart-shaped faces.

‘Yay, we can’t wait!’ they yelled in unplanned unison.

‘But you have to promise to be
very
careful in the tree house tonight, girls,’ he dropped down to his haunches so he was at eye-level, looking from one to the other as their eyes rounded. ‘They still haven’t caught Seattle’s headless zombie, you know – so if you see anyone without a head peeking in the windows to look for one they can steal just scream out!’

‘Oh Cooper, you are
terrible
,’ admonished Caitlin, frowning across the room at her older brother, ‘don’t go trying to scare them the way you did me all the while we were growing up! I wouldn’t go out to our back yard at night for over a year after hearing your ghost stories!’

But it was already too late for the admonition, as the twins’ cinnamon brown eyes were huge, their mouths hanging open slackly.

‘Headless?’ one twin squeaked.

‘Zombie?’ the other squawked gulping.

Cooper broke out in deep laughter as they suddenly turned and ran to their mother’s lap on the couch for comfort – not quite as brave as they were a few moments ago. He stopped laughing abruptly and looked around the room puzzled.

‘Where’s Afton?’

‘Oh – she…er… said she wanted to freshen up a bit,’ Dayna said offhandedly, while sharing a conspiratorial look with her sister, ‘she should be back down soon.’

Cooper shrugged his shoulders not thinking anything of it. Going into the kitchen, he grabbed a recently restocked imported beer from the refrigerator bringing another two back for his brothers-in-law, knowing his sisters’ tastes ran more to the expensive wine they were drinking retrieved from his custom made, temperature controlled fully-stocked wine cellar.

He was perched on the arm of the sofa near Caitlin laughing at a joke Dayna made about her husband’s lousy betting streak on baseball games, when he glanced over to the doorway. The bottle of beer froze on the way to his lips.