“I see your aim hasn’t improved.” He darts away nimbly when I take another swipe at him.
Nate watches us from across the kitchen, eyebrows raised.
“Jesus, Knox, it’s a mess in here.” Parker surveys the disaster on the counter, snatching up a cookie off the cooling rack as soon as he spots them. “Since when do you cook?”
“I’m not the one who stress-bakes.” Nate meets Parker’s eyes, then tilts his head in my general direction.
“Ahhh, I should’ve known.” Parker laughs. “Remember how many brownies she made when we put her paper maché volcano on the roof and filled it with fireworks?”
“That was my science fair project!” I hiss. “I got a zero, because of your little stunt! If any time has ever called for double-fudge brownies, it was that day.”
Nate’s mouth twitches. “What about the time we covered all her bedroom furniture in wrapping paper over the holiday break?”
“It looked like the Christmas Tree Shop threw up on my walls. It took me days to get all the tape off!” I glare at them both. “I needed cookies to recover. And I donated most of them to the church bake sale, anyway.”
Parker grins wider. “Wait, what about—”
“Enough!” I snap. “So, I bake when I’m nervous. It’s not like I do hard drugs, or have crazy monkey sex, or jump out of airplanes.”
“Monkey sex?” Nate asks, voice thick with amusement.
“Sweet P, you gotta come skydiving with me next time. You haven’t lived till you’ve felt the air at 12,000 feet.”
“I hate you both.”
They grin in unison and, for a brief second, it’s like we’re all kids again. Eating cookies and joking around, back in the days when everything was fun and there weren’t things like mobsters or broken hearts or brothers who only visit twice a year.
“You’ve got flour in your hair,” Parker says, leaning forward to tug on a tendril. “But these cookies are damn good, I’ll give you that.”
I roll my eyes as he shoves another into his mouth.
“What?” he asks, unapologetic. “I’m hungry. The plane food sucked ass. Milo’s gotta look into a new catering company for the jet.”
“I wouldn’t know. I don’t use the jet.”
He sighs. “Your loss, sis.”
“Speaking of Daddy dearest… did you tell him you were coming home?”
“Nope.” Parker shrugs. “If I did that, we’d have to have a ‘talk about my future.’ And I already know exactly what he’d say.”
My brows lift.
“That I haveobligationshere with WestTech.” Parker pulls out a barstool and straddles it, elbows on the butcher-block. “That I should stay for good.”
Would that be so terrible?I think but don’t say, hopping up to sit on the counter. My bare legs dangle — I catch Nate staring at them for a brief second before he turns to pour coffee into three black mugs.
“What are you wearing?” Parker asks abruptly, seeming to notice my outfit for the first time. I tug at the hem of Nate’s too-big t-shirt, fighting off a blush.
“Um. I borrowed a shirt from Nate.” I strive for a casual tone. “He’s been holding me captive since the whole kidnapping thing. He says it’s to keep me safe, but I’m pretty sure he’s just trying to annoy me to death.”
“Oh.” Parker’s gaze moves from me to his best friend and back.
“Yeah.” I clear my throat. “I can’t wait till this is all over, and I can get back to my place.”
Nate slides a mug across the counter to Parker, then passes one to me. I take a sip so I’ll stop talking and am surprised to find he’s made it exactly how I like it — dash of cream, no sugar.
How did he know? How does healwaysknow?