Light the Fire (Jackson's Hollow #1)

Chapter 42

Ryker leaned back in his chair by the fire, watching Jo as she talked with Lexi and Aaliyah while they played a vicious game of Uno. She seemed happy, a smirk dashing across her face as she laid down a couple cards that had Aaliyah groaning and pulling cards from the pile.

Dinner had been fantastic; he had eaten three burgers by himself and then finished off a massive scoop of Jo's dump cake along with a slice of the pecan pie Aaliyah had made. He had sat on one side of Jo during dinner while Lexi had claimed her other side. It had been a good dinner and not an interrogate-Jo kind of situation, which was what he half-expected from his dad. Malcolm had asked her a few questions during dinner, mostly about her dad and how he was doing.

Apparently Malcolm and Jacob had known of each other back when they were younger, but Jacob had been a few years younger than Malcolm. He'd never met Jo's mom, Maira, but he had heard about them getting married through the small town grapevine.

Overall, this first meeting seemed to be going well. Now they just had to worry about the next meeting. The one with Duncan.

Ryker flicked his thumb across the arm of the wooden Adirondack chair and glanced over at Brett, who was sitting beside him, keeping an eye on Conner while he roasted a marshmallow over the fire. Talon was playing with a set of old Lincoln logs on the ground, sometimes adding sticks and rocks to his messy masterpiece.

"Are you going to the meeting with Duncan?" Ryker asked.

Brett's forehead broke out in wrinkles. "Let's talk about that later." Reaching over, he grabbed another one of the metal marshmallow sticks from their container by the fire and held it out to Ryker. "Here. Marshmallows first."

Right. Probably not the best thing to talk about with the kids around, not that they would really understand what was going on. Then again, Conner was sharp, and he always knew when something was off, so even if he didn't truly get it, he would realize everything wasn't okay.

Ryker took the stick and let Brett pop a couple marshmallows onto the end. Lazily, he reached out and held the marshmallows over the fire.

"Do we got chocolate?" Conner asked, bobbing his own marshmallow up and down, nearly touching it against the burning hickory chips and old logs at the bottom.

"Go ask Grandpa," Brett said, "And graham crackers too, those are important."

"Are we making s'mores?" Lexi called, the Uno game halting at the possibility of more desserts.

"If we've got everything, yep," Brett said.

"I don't know about graham crackers, but I know Lexi has a secret stash of chocolate," their dad said, moving back from cleaning the grill. "If she's willing to share..."

"I don't know what you're talking about," Lexi said, suddenly very focused on her cards again.

"Well, guess there won't be any s'mores then," Jo said, leaning back on her hands to grin at his sister.

Lexi tensed for a long moment as everyone watched her then gave a dramatic sigh as she threw her cards down.

Damn, his girl was good.

"Fine, I'll get it, but you all owe me at least one Copperfield Road try!" she grumbled, standing up to head to the house.

"Tell Marcus he's got five minutes to get here before there aren't any s'mores left," Malcolm said, chuckling. Aaliyah's dad had some kind of faculty committee meeting and so was coming late to the cookout today.

Aaliyah's fingers flashed across her phone. "There, good daughter deed done." She and Jo went to add marshmallows to some sticks and as soon as Jo got close enough, Ryker stood, wrapping his free arm around her waist and pulling her up against his chest. Instantly, it was like a tension he didn't even know he'd had seeped out of his muscles.