Compromise Me (Book Two of the Kirkland Family)

Compromise Me: Chapter 16

Chapter 16

Sand coated her legs and arms, and a wet patch on her bottom created an almost perfect heart-shape of stuck-on granules. Travis' gaze landed smack dab on that heart as Josie bent over to hollow out a crater in the sandbox with Tristan. "Eureka!" she suddenly shouted with a laugh, and Tristan cried out, "Rock! Yay! Rock!"

She found the rocks. Good. Now, she can get her perfect butt out of the air.

"Daddy! Look! Rock! Shosie found rock!"

Travis lowered himself to the ground...away from the sandy heart and the butt, and said, "Shosie?"

Josie, still on her hands and knees, grinned at him -- from that angle, he could see clear to her bellybutton through the gaping neckline of her wet shirt -- and she explained, "I'm Shosie. 'Josie'...'shoes.' It's cute."

"It's adorable," Travis agreed, handing her a soda. "Princess Shosie...suits you."

She let out a laugh and, thankfully, sat up, brushing sand off her hands, and the shirt fell back into place, hiding her bellybutton and everything to the bellybutton.

"See, Shosie?" Tristan said, shoving a handful of rocks under her nose. "Red rock!"

Shosie set her soda aside and peered thoughtfully into the boy's palm. "That's scoria," she said, picking out a reddish rock the size of Travis' thumb.

Tristan's forehead wrinkled seriously. "What skawr'a?"

Josie turned the rock around so Tristan could see it. "Scoria is a lava rock. It shoots out of a volcano and gets bubbles in it. See those little holes? Those were the bubbles. This is a very cool rock, Tristan. It came from far away."

Tristan took the rock and studied it carefully, his little face screwed up dubiously. "''Olcano?" he asked Shosie. He looked over at the mound of sand. Then he shoved the rock at her and said, "Shoot 'olcano! Shoot skawr'a!"

Travis leaned against a nearby tree trunk, watching all this unfold, gulping the cold drink to alleviate the uneasiness inside him. She made it look so exciting, an ugly red rock lost in the sand. Josie showed Tristan how the rock blasted from a volcano, making extravagant noises and grand gestures. Tristan grinned with glee, grabbed the rest of his rocks and started filling the center of the sand volcano, one rock at a time...thrusting them in Josie's face and asking, "What rock?"

She named almost everyone. Real rock names. Travis would have started calling them Bob and Bill after the third pebble.

"Oh, Travis," Josie said, once the rocks filled the hole. "You've gotta make this little guy a volcano...you know, the whole paper machete mess with the baking soda and vinegar." She scooted to the edge of the box, next to him, out of range of shooting rocks, and popped the tap of her soda can.

"I wouldn't even know where to start," Travis said, trying like hell to keep the grumpy out of his voice. "How do you know so much about rocks?"