Five of Us at Christmas, But They Only Got Four Cookies novel · Chapter 8 of 24

Chapter 8: The Brothers

Emmett went out first.

I followed with Zoey behind me, her fingers locked in the back of my coat.

The gravel yard was lit by one bulb over the shop door.

Bryce stood in the middle of it, breathing hard, with his car door still open and the dome light on.

The two brothers looked at each other across twenty feet of cold.

Bryce was shorter by a head and had their mother's dark hair.

Emmett was bigger in every way, and he did not move.

"Eleven years," Bryce said. "And the first thing you do is take my daughter."

"She took a bus," Emmett said. "I didn't know she was coming."

"She's thirteen!"

"I know how old she is."

"You don't know anything about her."

"I know she spent her birthday money to get here," Emmett said. "That's one thing."

Zoey stepped out from behind me.

"Dad, I came by myself. Nobody took me."

"Get in the car."

"I want to talk to Jo first."

"Zoey."

"Please."

Something in her voice made him stop.

He rubbed his face with both hands.

In the light from the bulb he looked ten years older than he had a week ago, and I felt something go through me that was not pity and not anger either.

"Bryce," I said. "You're going to tell her what you did."

"Jo, not here."

"Here. In front of me, in front of your brother. She's the one who has to live in that house."

"What do you want me to say?"

"The cookies."

He shut his eyes.

"I told the baker to do four," he said at last, to the gravel. "Mom said it would only be for this year. She said Christmas was going to be hard with their mother there, and a stepmother at the table would make it worse. She said you'd understand once it was over."

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