Lovers Like Us (Like Us #2)(72)

I was about to ask if he wanted to join, but Beckett stopped me. He said that Charlie wouldn’t see the invite as an olive branch. I just learned that in Charlie’s mind, me being nice is the equivalent of being pompous, overly heroic, goddamn flashy and ostentatious—like I’m fucking Gaston in Beauty and the Beast.

Beckett said, “Let him do his own thing.”

Fine with me.

I hand out mugs of eggnog to everyone, and I tap Sulli’s shoulder so she pries her face out of the paper.

“Oh, fuck.” She cups the mug. “Thanks.”

I sit beside her. “Vote for whoever looks the best.” Farrow, my mind blurts out in response. I swear my brain is one terrifying step from making shrines of the guy. Which is not cool.

Not cool.

And my mouth wants to upturn, but that I can control. I’m not smiling. I do steal a glance down the hall. The door to the second lounge is still closed.

The front of the bus is quiet without SFO. But Oscar is in earshot and in view from behind the wheel. Eating pizzelles that Thatcher’s brother sent.

“What is considered the best though?” Sulli bites the end of her pen.

Beckett threads a needle. “It’s called hot Santa.”

Jane nods. “The hottest Santa should win.”

“Alright.” Sulli jots a note in a margin, and she goes to sip her eggnog. Pausing, she looks to me. “Alcohol is in mine, right?”

“Yeah.” I can’t be a moral authority on whether she should be sober or not. She hated her first beer, but she wants to try spiked eggnog. So I made her a glass. Oscar’s and mine are the only non-alcoholic drinks.

“Are there categories?” Sulli asks after a tiny sip of eggnog. “Do we rate from one-to-ten? Are there deductions?”

“Valid questions,” Jane says. “Let’s make two categories: runway and how they respond to a short Q&A.”

Oscar cranes his neck to peek at us. “If I don’t win, there’s a conspiracy at play and you’ve all given preferential treatment to your bodyguards.”

“He’s right,” Jane says, “we should try to be unbiased.”

Everyone is looking at me. I make a face. “If I rate Farrow high, it has nothing to do with the fact that we’re together.”

Jane smiles into a sip of eggnog. “I suppose we’ll just have to take your word for it.”

Beckett finishes attaching her antlers and lifts her hood. She kisses his cheeks with a merci, and then she sits beside him, ankles crossed.

“We should tell them about the scoring,” Sulli says and then shouts, “Kits!”

The door down the hall cracks open. “Yeah?!” Akara calls, and she explains the scoring system.

Donnelly sticks his head out, a smirk cresting his mouth. “You should just rate us one-to-ten on who’s the most bangable.”

He’s yanked back into the second lounge. “Paul,” Thatcher chides.

“Damn,” Quinn says out of sight, “he got a Paul.”

The door shuts.

Jane gasps, and I focus on my best friend. She cups her phone in one hand. “Eliot sent me a video of all the cats.” She presses play and angles the screen for us to watch too.

Kittens and cats race around the townhouse. Darting beneath the Victorian loveseat and hopping on the rocking chair. The camera zooms in on a gray cat that prances around the fireplace.

Eliot’s voice booms through the speaker. “Licorice, now do the cat walk. Do the cat walk!” He layered on techno music.

We all laugh, and Jane wipes the corners of her eyes. We watch the camera flip and face Eliot.

Squared jaw, a pretty-boy haircut, and the second tallest Cobalt, he could play Superman in a summer blockbuster, but a devilish grin always inches up his lips. Mischief glimmering behind blue eyes.

You know Eliot Alice Cobalt as the king of drama. Literally, he’s starred in local plays from William Shakespeare to Arthur Miller and Tennessee Williams, and he’s already signed to a theatre company for the next two years. He often films himself and posts humorous soliloquies about a lamp or toothbrush, and he’s not afraid to be uninhabited and wild.

I know him as my passionate eighteen-year-old cousin who thrives in chaos. Who, 9 times out of 10, will light a napkin on fire if I’m at dinner with him. Who loves stories but struggles with reading. Can’t make sense of street signs or restaurant menus. Can barely pick apart a single sentence. Who used to ask Jane, his brothers, and me to read books out loud. Hardbacks pile high in his bedroom, and for fun, he writes plays using a voice-app. He’s dyslexic, and a fucking brilliant, soulful actor who can make an audience cry with a few words.

Fair Warning: even with all the mayhem he brings, I love this guy, and I’ll drive a sword straight in your gut if you fuck with him.

“By the time you receive this,” Eliot says in the video, “I’m at the lake house. It’s Christmas Eve, and you’ve all left me, which means I’m terrifyingly the oldest here. Moffy, if you’re watching, I don’t like this responsibility. Come back, save me,” he says dramatically. “I hate you all, but I love you all. Oh the tragedy.” He grins and lifts a calico kitten to the camera and waves the paw in goodbye. “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.” The video goes black.

Quiet lingers, all of us missing family. Sulli stares off, more downcast and homesick, and Jane and I exchange a damage control look.