He grins. "So. Robin. You want to talk about it?"
"No."
"Great. I think you should tell him."
"Tell him what?"
"That you're in love with him."
The garage goes very quiet. Just the tick of the cooling engine and the distant sound of traffic.
"I'm not in love with Robin."
Jason raises an eyebrow. It's devastating. He learned it from Ash, and now this kid is deploying it against me like a weapon.
"I'm not," I repeat, which sounds less convincing the second time.
Jason pushes off the doorframe. "You're wearing the henley."
"What's wrong with the henley?"
"Nothing. It's your date shirt."
"I don't have a date shirt."
"You absolutely do. Black henley, sleeves rolled, the one that makes your arms look—" He makes a gesture that I refuse to interpret. "Robin's going to swallow his tongue."
"I'm going to dinner with the pack."
"Wearing your date shirt."
"Get out of the garage."
He leaves, laughing. I pick the wrench back up and stare at the carburetor some more.
The problem is that Jason's not wrong. Not about the henley — I don't have a date shirt, that's ridiculous — but about the rest of it. About the way Robin's name lands in my chest likea fist. About the way my lion has been tracking Robin since the first time he walked into this bar smelling like sugar and trouble.
He's been around for months, first as Toby's roommate, then as Ash's brother, then as the guy who shows up at the bar at least three nights a week with baked goods and chaos and a smile that doesn't quite reach his eyes when he thinks no one's watching.
I watch. I'm always watching. It's what I do. Knox makes the decisions and I make sure nothing goes wrong. I watch the perimeter, the exits, the threats. And somewhere along the way, Robin stopped being a friendly human in our orbit and became the thing my eyes go to first when I scan a room.
I clean the grease off my hands, close up the garage, and drive to Ash's. Take the truck, not a bike, because I sat in the parking lot for ten minutes telling myself to get it together and that's easier to do in an enclosed vehicle where no one can see you gripping a steering wheel like it personally wronged you.
Robin opens the door wearing an apron that says KISS THE COOK. It shouldn't be indecent. It's just an apron. He's wearing a perfectly normal shirt underneath and perfectly normal jeans and his hair is doing that thing where it falls across his forehead and he keeps pushing it back.
"Vaughn! Perfect timing. I need someone to taste the sauce."
He grabs my hand — just grabs it, like touching me is nothing, like his fingers lacing through mine for the two seconds it takes to pull me to the kitchen doesn't rewire every nerve ending in my body — and drags me inside.
Silas and Ezra are already at the counter drinking beer. Silas nods at me. Ezra gives me a look that says he noticed I'mwearing the henley, and I give him one back that says I'll end him.
"Here." Robin holds up a wooden spoon. "Tell me if it needs more heat."
He brings it to my mouth. His other hand cups underneath to catch drips, and his eyes are on my lips, and this is the most obscene thing that's ever happened to me in a kitchen and I once walked in on Knox in shifted form eating a raw steak off the counter.
I taste it. Rich, complex, layered — cumin and smoked paprika and something deeper, warmer, that I can't identify. "It's good."
"Just good?" He steps closer. The vanilla-and-cinnamon smell of him hits me underneath the cooking smells, his own scent, the one my lion catalogues and files underimportant. "I need more feedback than that."