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“What about her?” Sebastian asked, digging into his slice of apple pie as his gaze flickered to the teenage girl in question to find her absently rolling a baseball between her hands.
“You need to step up your game,” Jonathan said with a sad shake of his head.
“You really do,” Cole said, joining them.
“I don’t need your help,” Sebastian said as he watched Mikey smile at something that Braxton said.
“Why’s that?”
Because he already had a plan.
CHAPTER31
“Damn it!” Chloe mouthed with a wince as she carefully, oh, so carefully, shifted, squirmed, and then finally, rolled to the edge of the small bed that her little sister was currently passed out on and after one last look to make sure that Katie was still asleep, she climbed off the bed.
Once her feet hit the floor, Chloe pushed her glasses back up her nose, made sure that Katie hadn’t moved in the last thirty seconds and when she was sure that her little sister wasn’t going to try to follow her, she moved her butt. Really hoping that Cole wasn’t waiting by the back door, Chloe grabbed her shoes and quickly made her way to the hallway, where she stumbled and tripped her way to the stairs as she pulled her shoes on.
Two and a half minutes later, she had a bag full of snacks, her homework, and a throw blanket shoved in her backpack and was rushing out the backdoor, only pausing long enough to lock the door behind her before she was racing through the soft snow covering the backyard and heading for the shed. As soon as she reached the open double doors, Chloe slowly exhaled as she pushed her glasses back up her nose, put her game face on and walked inside.
“Katie asleep?” Cole asked, not bothering to look up from whatever he was doing with the engine as she made her way to the workbench.
“Out like a light,” Chloe murmured absently as she set her bag down on the bench.
“Finally figured out that monster problem?” Cole asked, throwing her a questioning look.
Slowly exhaling, Chloe said, “A few months ago,” deciding that it was probably in her best interest not to mention exactly what getting Katie to go to sleep entailed now.
It had taken some trial and error, but she’d eventually learned to give up all hope that her sister would take pity on her and did whatever it took to get through the day without losing her mind. So, when Katie informed her that she needed to sleep in her Spiderman costume so that she had a better chance of fighting off the monster in the closet, Chloe didn’t bat an eye. She simply made sure that she laid her sister’s costume out every night before bath time along with her wiffle bat and resigned herself to triple-checking every room, closet, and cabinet in the house before they could move onto phase two of their nighttime routine.
“That’s good,” Cole murmured absently as he adjusted something on the engine.
“How was the party?” Chloe asked, still shocked that he didn’t try to use their agreement to make her go. She’d been prepared with an excuse to save them from going and risking Katie saying something that would give them away, but he never asked.
“It was fine,” Cole said as she used the stepping stool to climb up onto the workbench and-
“Damn it,” he said, drawing her attention to find him glaring down at something in the engine.
“What’s wrong?” Chloe asked, swallowing hard as she followed his gaze, praying that he didn’t just find another reason to add more hours on to her debt. She was still trying to figure out how she was going to pay off the radiator.
“I forgot a part at home,” Cole said, sighing heavily as he reached for a rag and wiped his hands clean.
“Do you really need it tonight?” Chloe asked, trying not to panic as her gaze shot to the open doors.
“If you want it to work, I do,” Cole said, taking her by surprise.
“You’re almost done?” she asked as her gaze flickered to the Jeep that he’d been working on every night for the past three months. “Really?”
Nodding, Cole said, “I’ll be right back,” as she and-
“What?” Chloe asked as she quickly moved to climb off the workbench, only to end up groaning when he made his way outside, leaving her trying not to panic as she watched him go. Swallowing hard, Chloe reminded herself that he didn’t know anything and forced herself to focus on the only thing that should matter.
Her plan.
So far, she’d been able to keep their schools from finding out that Uncle Nick left them, but that probably had something to do with the fact that she’d been running interference for years. She forged his signature, intercepted every email they sent, put her phone number down so that when the school called or sent a text that it came directly to her, and did her best to calm Katie’s teachers down whenever she did anything even remotely terrifying. Since he’d left, Chloe had been making sure that their schools had absolutely no reason in the world to contact him. She’d even gone as far as bribing Katie with ice cream to make sure that she was up on time and stayed out of trouble.
For the first time in years, Chloe was able to make it to school on time, pick Katie up right after school, and create some semblance of a routine, giving her time to do everything that she needed to do, from taking care of Katie to writing papers to supplement the social security checks they received every month so that she could pay the bills. And now, thanks to Cole, they were about to have a car to make their lives easier.
They just needed to keep this up for one more year, and then, she could file for custody of Katie. After that…
