by Lexi Ryan
Carter nods as he pulls a package of chicken breasts from the fridge. “And you like Liam?”
I have to smile at the question in his voice. Given how protective I am of Saanvi, maybe it’s odd for me to love her guy so much. “Once I would’ve thought no one was good enough for my baby sister,” I admit. “But when she started dating Liam, I realized it isn’t about whether he’s good enough—it’s about how happy he makes her. How much better her life is when he’s in it.”
“I like that.” He puts a pan on the stove and drizzles it with oil, letting it warm while he pulls out a cutting board and knife. “I guess I feel the same about my brothers. I want them to be happy, and if the women they marry bring them joy, then I approve.”
“The KonMari method, but for spouses.”
He laughs, and I watch as he butterflies the chicken with the smooth, steady movements of someone who’s done it a hundred times. “I guess so. And your parents? They’re still together, right?”
“LouAnn and Kamal. Yes. They’re both doctors—Mom’s an OBGYN, and Dad’s a general surgeon.”
“Wow. I didn’t know that. Did you feel pressured to go to med school?”
“Not at all. They love what they do, but since they live it, they know the downsides of the career. They wish I’d become an NP and will probably bring it up at least three times while they’re in town, but I’ve become adept at ignoring them.”
The chicken sizzles as Carter places it into the bubbling oil. “NP?”
“Nurse practitioner. I’d have to go back to school, but it would mean more pay. It’s a hard pass for me. I don’t want to get stuck working in an urgent-care clinic. I love the hospital, and there’s not a lot of opportunities for NPs working there.” I cock my head as he grabs an apple out of the basket, washes it, and starts slicing on a clean cutting board. “What are you making?”
He looks up from his work and grins. “You had some Havarti in there. I thought I’d make apple-and-cheese-stuffed chicken.”
“That is . . . impressive.”
“You’re impressed that I can cook?”
“I’m impressed that you know how to make more than frozen pizza,” I say.
“We cook at the station all the time. Nothing fancy, but we can’t eat crap constantly if we want to stay in shape.”
“Still. I’ve never been close to a guy who could hold his own in the kitchen.”
He checks the chicken then pulls the cheese out of the fridge. “Jake would be totally offended if he heard that.”
I wave a hand. “Jake doesn’t count. It’s his job.” And that wasn’t what I meant. I meant I’d never dated a guy who could cook, but since Carter and I are only fake-dating, I don’t want to make this awkward by explaining.
“I can cook,” he says, “though nothing like Jake and Nic.”
“You’re beyond competent, based on what I’m seeing here, and it’s kind of hot.” There’s that beer. Going straight to my head and loosening my tongue.
“Oh, yeah?” He waggles his brows. “I also do my own laundry and put the seat down after I use the restroom.”
A giggle bursts out of me, and it’s so unexpected that I snort. “God, Carter. Do me right now.”
“I thought that might get you.” He grins. “Tell me more about your parents.”
“Okay . . . Mom can be bossy and is very conservative, but she loves her girls. I’ve never doubted that. She hates that I moved away, but I know she’s proud of me. And Dad dotes on her. When I was a teenager, I thought it was annoying. He’d do whatever she wanted. Vacations, home renovations—everything was up to her. But I understand now that it wasn’t because he was a pushover. He truly didn’t care about the details. If Mom’s happy, Dad’s happy.” I hesitate, but I know I need to ask. “What about your dad? I know you lost him a few years ago, and I know the brewery was his business, but I don’t know much else about him.” When his grin falls away, I wish I hadn’t asked. “I’m sorry. We don’t have to—”
“No. It’s fine.” He takes a deep breath. “We lost him six years ago this month. Some days, it feels like it’s been longer than that, and other times it feels like it was yesterday.”
“You really miss him a lot.”
He nods but doesn’t meet my eyes. “Especially lately.”
Since he lost his friend in the fire. “I’m sorry, Carter.”
He pokes at the chicken, and I’m not sure if he even heard me, but after a long pause he finally says, “Dad was my mom’s joy. He’d usually come home when she was working on dinner. The house was always chaotic—five kids, half of us with a friend or two over, and throw in a dog most years—but it was a managed chaos, thanks to Mom. She was always doing five things at once after school—helping us with homework, talking to someone on the phone, making dinner—but no matter what she was doing, she stopped everything when Dad came in the door. I didn’t always appreciate the magnitude of that gesture, but when I spent time at my friends’ houses, I realized a lot of parents start sniping at each other when they’re both home. Mom and Dad certainly had their disagreements, but they saved those for another time.”
“That’s sweet.” I never considered how different our childhoods were. My parents are attentive and loving, but when I was a kid they both worked a lot, and my after-school memories are mostly with one nanny or another. I loved those women like grandmothers or favorite aunts, so I didn’t resent my parents for leaving us in their care.
Carter rubs his chest, and I wonder if he even realizes it. “Most of the time I feel okay with not having him here for me. I mean, I miss him, but I’m fine. Mostly. But I really, really miss Mom having him.”
“I love your mom. She’s definitely one of the kindest people I’ve ever met. But I think she’s doing okay.”
He nods, seeming lost in his thoughts, and busies himself with the chicken, turning it and browning the other side before adding the cheese and apples and covering the pan.
“Tell me something I don’t know about your mom,” I say, more because the silence is breaking my heart than because I think I really need to know more. When it comes to knowing about each other’s families, I definitely have the advantage here.
“She didn’t want me to be a firefighter.”
“Oh.” I’m not sure what I expected, but that wasn’t it.
“She didn’t try to talk me out of it. Mom is nothing if not supportive of our goals and dreams, but she told me that it terrified her and that if she could choose, I’d join the family business or do something—anything—less dangerous.”
“Was that hard? To pursue a spot with the department when you knew she wished you wouldn’t?”
He takes a long pull from his beer before shaking his head. “No. I knew she’d support me no matter what, and I always wanted to do something good too much to let her worries stop me.” His chest shakes with silent laughter and he rolls his eyes. “Ridiculous childhood fantasies.”
“You do, Carter. You’re quite literally a hero every day.”
“Don’t call me that, okay?”
His voice is so low that I can barely hear the request, but something about the intensity behind his words sends a chill through me. I want to push—to ask him why that label bothers him so much. But I also want to wash away the pain I see on his face. It’ll wait. Another time I’ll get him to let me in and understand that wound. Or maybe I won’t. Maybe we both carry old hurts we will never share with anyone. “Okay. I promise.”
Carter
I love watching Teagan enjoy a meal.
It’s nothing new. I’ve done it a thousand times at the bar, at Sunday brunch, at Ethan’s . . . but something about the way she closes her eyes and moans around a bite of something I cooked makes this even better. I find myself wishing I could feed her again and again, wishing we had more time to prepare for this wedding. I’m not worried about our ability to pull it off, but I want an excuse to come over here and cook for her, flirt with her. I want to watch those cheeks flush while
I tease her and impress her with my rudimentary culinary skills. As it stands, tonight is the only one like this we’ll get. Tomorrow, everyone comes to town, and I’ll have to share her with her family. And then Monday, we’re back to friends.
I push all thoughts of Monday from my mind and focus on her now.
We’ve opened our second bomber, and her cheeks are flushed, her posture relaxed. I’m glad I didn’t warn her I was coming over. She answered the door in cotton shorts that don’t cover much more than her panties did Sunday morning. Her wide-neck sweatshirt falls off one shoulder, and I can’t keep my eyes off her exposed cherry-red bra strap. One little strap has my imagination running wild, landing over and over again on her in bed in nothing but a red bra and panties.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” she asks, pushing her plate away. She leans back in her chair and puts a hand on her stomach in a time-honored gesture of satisfaction.
“Like what?”
She sighs. “I’m not sure. You seem . . . maybe regretful? What’s going on in that pretty little head of yours, Carter? Are you worried I’m going to become one of your stalker fangirls and chain you in my basement now that I know you can cook?”
“Well, I wasn’t, but now I am,” I say, and she laughs. “I was thinking that tomorrow’s the big day. Are you worried about this?”
“Not . . . really.”
“That wasn’t very convincing.”
“It’ll be fine. It’s just that I’ve been looking forward to Saanvi’s wedding, and this changes things. I won’t be able to let my guard down because I’ll be worried about slipping up.”
I want to ask why she’s so determined this is necessary, but that would mean asking about Rich, and I promised I wouldn’t. “I think we’ll be fine.”
She rolls her shoulders back, and determination steels her jaw. “Okay, what else do you need to know?”
“I’m not sure.” In some ways I already know her so well, but in other ways I feel like I know nothing. Mostly, I want an excuse to stay—to listen to her laugh and look into her eyes instead of getting in bed and resigning myself to the nightmares that await me. “What’s your favorite color?”
She laughs. “I haven’t been asked that question since I was eight. I don’t think I have one. What’s yours?”
My gaze lands on her bra strap. “Red.” As of sixty minutes ago, but it still counts.
“I guess I like red too. Definitely not pink.” She shudders.
“Why not?”
“It’s the color of my childhood bedroom. Mom had pink everything in there. The furniture, the bedding, the rug, the walls. It reminded me of the medicine she’d give us when we had a stomach bug.” She shrugs. “A little pink is okay, but it’s definitely not my favorite. Saanvi still loves it, though. And it suits her. She’s even girlier than I am. What else?”
“Steak or chicken?”
“Steak. But don’t tell my parents. They don’t know I eat beef.”
“Oh, are they Hindu?”
She puts her arms over her head and stretches, yawning. “No, it’s for health reasons, really.”
I wince. “Sorry. Was that an asshole white-guy assumption?”
“No, it’s fine. Dad’s parents were secular Hindus. Religion wasn’t really that important to them, but then he met my mom, who is a devout Catholic. He knew it was important to her, and he was happy to convert. Some of his childhood habits stuck, though, like the red-meat thing. I had my first hamburger in college and thought I’d died and gone to heaven. What about you? Steak or chicken?”
I stand up and start clearing plates. “Steak every time.”
She grabs my wrist, stopping me before I can pick up her plate. “You cooked. I’ll clean.”
“But I like taking care of you.” I don’t just mean the meal or the cleanup, and when she lifts her eyes to meet mine, I see the heat there. Is she thinking about Saturday night too?
“Only you could turn a discussion about who loads the dishwasher into a come-on line, Carter.” She’s trying to be flippant, but I don’t miss the way her gaze dips to my mouth or the flutter of her pulse at the base of her neck.
“I don’t know what you mean.” I wink and take the plates away before she can protest again.
“Thank you,” she says, even as she grabs the leftover salad from the table and follows me into the kitchen. “I know you prefer coffee to tea and beer to wine. What about hobbies? Any I should know about before I do one hundred introductions?”
“Other than collecting little bits of your hair?”
She throws her head back and laughs. It’s the best fucking sound, rich and full. “I’m so proud of myself for that,” she says.
“You should be. It was golden. And now all those damn ‘Carter the puppy hero’ Facebook fan pages are probably filled with tales of my creepy hair-collecting ways.”
“You really hate everyone making a big deal of that, don’t you?”
I scoff as I load the plates into the dishwasher. “Trust me, you’d hate it too. I’m not shy, but I like my privacy, and when this all blew up, suddenly I had to fight for it. I’m ready for it to be over.”
She’s quiet, and when I look up, she’s frowning at me. “Is that it? Really?”
I know what she means, but I can only shrug. “There are men and women fighting every day in the military, firefighters risking their lives, police officers facing dangerous criminals. Hell, even Molly coming back to Jackson Harbor and facing her jerk of a stepfather showed more bravery than what I did that day. I’d rather we acknowledge actual heroics instead of mislabeling something because we want an excuse to look at a shirtless guy carrying a puppy.”
She’s quiet again. I’m afraid she can see right through me, so I turn to fill the sink with soapy water. I’m not much of a housekeeper, but I’ve always enjoyed the ritual of cleaning up after a meal, and I find my pulse slows and my breathing settles as I scrub the pans.
“So . . . hobbies?” She puts the leftover salad and the bottle of dressing in the fridge and leans against the counter beside the sink. Close enough to touch.
“Working out, remodeling my house, helping Levi restore a random car here and there. Nothing exciting.”
“I didn’t know you were remodeling your house.”
“I like working with my hands and figured when I bought it I’d be able to add some value with minimal investment and lots of elbow grease. I’ve ripped up the old carpet and refinished the hardwood beneath. Right now, I’m working on replacing the trim. I thought I’d be able to strip off the paint, but it’s a mess, so I pulled it all off and started over. When the trim’s done, I’m going to finish off the attic to add another bedroom.”
“I’d love to see it sometime.”
“Sure. I’d love to show you.” I finish rinsing the dishes and place them into the dish drainer. “What about you? Any hobbies other than trying to keep my sister from being a shut-in?”
“I like to run. Sometimes. And I knit.”
I can’t help it. I gape. “You? Knit?”
“What? Why is that so surprising?”
I try to picture it and can’t. “Isn’t that, like, an old-lady hobby?”
“Carter, you just offended hipsters everywhere by your unironic mocking of one of their favorite pastimes.”
I hold out my palms. “I’d never intentionally offend a hipster, but you . . .” I rake my gaze over her. “You’re no hipster.”
“I’m not, but I do love to knit. Knitting and reading are the only ways I can really relax.”
Right, she was reading when I got here. I come from a family of big readers, so I always take that for granted. I don’t understand people who don’t read. It feels like willful ignorance to never try to experience anything from a different point of view. “What do you like to read?” I ask, drying my hands.
“Anything. Mostly fiction, with a hard preference for books with kissing.” She shrugs. “Actually, my unironic enjoyment of Taylor Swift and romance n
ovels may be my best proof that I’m not a hipster.”
That makes me laugh, but then I think about how much my mom loves romance novels and my smile falls away. “I told Mom about what we’re doing.”
Teagan cringes. “And?”
I scrub a hand over my face as I remember my mom’s folded arms. Her arched brow and tight jaw that made me feel like I was sixteen again and being lectured for staying out past curfew. “She’s not a fan of the lie, and she’d rather we get married and make her some grandbabies than pretend to be together.” With a sigh, I shrug. “So it pretty much went as expected.”
“I’m sorry,” she says softly.
“I’m not. I’d rather her be irked at me and know the truth than lie to her.”
She ducks her head, and her shoulders curl in slightly. “Right.”
“Hey.” I take a step to close the distance between us and lift her chin. When her dark eyes meet mine, they’re full of worry. “I know you don’t like having to do this. I might not totally understand it, but I know you well enough to know you wouldn’t lie to your family if you didn’t think it was necessary. You’re handling this in the best way you know how.”
“Thank you, Carter. You’re a good friend.” She scans my face before her gaze settles on my mouth.
“I think I should kiss you right now.” The words are out before I think about it. I want her, and fuck, if I won’t do just about anything to see the hunger in her eyes from Saturday night.
“Yeah?”
I wonder if she knows she leans into me, that her lips part and her pupils dilate. The sight is enough to make me dumb with lust. “Yeah.”
“But we’re alone. And we have rules.”
“But we need to look natural this weekend, right? I think we should practice.”
“Oh.” She swallows. “Okay.”
I barely have to move to touch my mouth to hers, but when I do, she parts her lips and moans. I suck on her bottom lip, and the hand she has tangled in my hair tugs lightly. Lust surges down my spine.