Series: Webs We Weave Series by Krista Ritchie
Total pages in book: 147
Estimated words: 145038 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 725(@200wpm)___ 580(@250wpm)___ 483(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 145038 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 725(@200wpm)___ 580(@250wpm)___ 483(@300wpm)
But if I had my way, we wouldn’t involve them in the Koning job. We’d figure out how to do it on our own. It’d be harder, riskier, but I believe in us. The six of us. We don’t need them. We never needed them. Yet, for how persuasive I can be, I’ve never been able to convince my siblings and the triplets of this.
Phoebe sips wine, then sets down the glass. “You three will probably be happy about this news.”
“Good news?” My mom rouses with elation. Elizabeth reaches over and squeezes her hand.
“We’re all for some good news, bug,” Elizabeth says with a warm smile.
Phoebe takes a deep, readying breath. “I’m not actually dating Jake Waterford,” she says. “It’s all fake. I’m really, truly dating…” Her gaze veers to me. “Rocky.” It’s a head rush.
A cold shower on a hot summer day. The feeling of being so openly hers is one I’m not going to take for granted, because I know it’s unlikely to happen again anytime soon.
“Phoebe,” I say, like her name belongs to me just as much as mine belongs to her.
“That’s it?” My dad cuts the moment with a serrated knife. “We already knew that.”
I narrow my eyes. “We just got together. Recently.”
“It hasn’t been long,” Phoebe confirms as Elizabeth rises from her chair and comes over to wrap her daughter in a hug.
“Everett just means we knew it would happen,” Elizabeth says brightly. “You two are meant to be.”
“Fated,” my mom agrees into a sip of wine.
My muscles are tight, flexed bands, and I know my dad. He meant exactly what he said. He’s always believed Phoebe and I have been fooling around with each other in secret.
Elizabeth returns to her chair. “Are you on the pill?”
“Am I on the pill?” Phoebe grimaces, and my stomach nosedives into the pits of hell. Any talk of future progeny and babies reminds me that our parents want a little shill at their disposal, and Phoebe and I are the vessels to provide that.
Elizabeth smiles like it’s an innocent yet amusing question. I’m aware her prying into Phoebe’s love life is a normal facet of their mother-daughter relationship. Hell, we’d both been given the “safe sex” talk long before we ever had sex. Pretty sure my mom and Elizabeth sat us down together in the same room.
Looking back on it—why us? Why not Phoebe and Hailey?
We all have our roles, I hear my mom say in my head, which just turns my body from glacier water to molten lava.
“What does Phoebe being on the pill matter?” I snap.
Elizabeth dips her sashimi into soy sauce. “Last time I talked with her, she didn’t like the pill. I don’t want you two to have an accident, unless you’re thinking about having kids.”
“Bullshit,” I say. “You’d love a little kid.” I look between her and my parents. “You all would.”
“Of course, it’d make jobs easier,” my mom says, “but that’s not our decision, Bray.” Her face fractures in hurt like I’m putting words into her mouth.
“It’s not that I don’t like the pill,” Phoebe says gently, like she’s easing back into the tension I’m spawning. “It’s the process in which I have to get the birth control that I don’t like. We’ve moved around too much.”
It’s a situation that complicates things for her and my sister. One I’ve tried to even help over the years. It involves pseudonyms and scamming new pharmacies, which heightens the potential risk of being caught. In the end, it’s easier (and ironically safer) just to use condoms—but if either of them wanted to go a different route, I know Nova, Oliver, and I would toy with the danger to help.
“But we’re not moving around right now,” I add. “We’re staying in Victoria, and we’ve heard your pleas and warnings a thousand times over. It doesn’t matter. We found a job here we’re going to start.”
“What job?” My father is intrigued, and I begin the long process of explaining our complicated ties to Jake Koning Waterford. From the beginning. For the most part, they quietly listen with few interjections. It’s only when I bring up Carter’s involvement in…everything that their reactions turn from contemplative to annoyed.
“We’re made?” Elizabeth’s brows furrow in horror.
“It’s just Jake,” Phoebe says. “He’s the only one who knows our identities.”
“He’s harmless,” I add.
“Harmless?” My mother’s eyes stake me. “Do you even know what the Waterford family is like? We were in town for less than twenty-four hours, and I can tell you that Claudia’s sons are heinous. She’s despicable in her blind love of them.”
“Jake isn’t like the rest of his family.” I defend him so quick, it’s like I’m on autopilot.
Phoebe chimes in, “He can be a little uptight and prickly about following rules, but it’s endearing.”
Jesus. I roll my eyes.
She shoots me a hot look. “It is endearing.”