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“Dinner’s ready,” Nat says. “Let’s eat.”~Levi~
“Feed her.”
Joy, my brother Jace’s wife, gently places a tiny kitten in my hands then gives me a little bottle of milk.
“Uh, Joy, I’m not really—”
“If you want breakfast, you’ll feed her,” she says as she walks away and whisks the eggs.
It’s the morning after my day out with Starla. I haven’t seen Jace in a couple of weeks thanks to both of our schedules, and I’m happy to spend time with him and Joy, catching up.
I brush my thumb along the top of the kitten’s head and offer her the nipple, which she latches on to right away.
“Do you ever feed her?”
“Every two hours,” Joy confirms. “You should adopt her once she’s ready to go home.”
“No.” I shake my head adamantly. “No pets for me.”
“I’ll talk you into it eventually.” Joy’s voice is confident. She may be right, but I’ll continue putting up a fight.
Mostly because it’s fun.
“So, what have you been up to?” Joy asks, her voice way too nonchalant for me to believe she doesn’t already know what I’ve been doing.
“Who have you talked to?”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Bullshit.”
She laughs, and I stare at Jace, who just shrugs and takes another sip of his coffee, watching his wife with the proverbial heart eyes.
“There might be a rumor floating through the family that you’re dating Starla.”
“And you’re looking for confirmation?”
“Yes.” She stirs the eggs in the pan and smiles over at me. “So, what have you been up to?”
“Nothing.” I laugh when she scowls.
“Watching you two banter is exhausting,” Jace says.
“It’s your fault, dude. You started bringing her around fifteen years ago, and she’s been a pain in my ass ever since.”
“Hey,” Joy demands. “You love me, and you know it.”
“I can love you and still find you to be a pain in my ass.” The kitten is making a mess of the milk, so I set the bottle down and use a paper towel to clean her up. “Is she done?”
Joy shrugs because she knows my pain in the ass statement is true, and once she has our plates loaded with eggs and bacon, she sets them in front of us, then takes the kitten from me and tucks her into a warm blanket.
“She’s done. And I have toast coming.” Joy says.
“This is way more than I expected when I said I was coming over.”
“You’ve got to eat,” she replies. “And, if you’re not dating Starla, which as you pointed out is none of my business, I have a new doctor at my clinic I’d like to introduce you to. MaryLou. She’s super smart and funny. Right, Jace?”
“Sure,” he says, shoving eggs in his pie-hole.
“Whose side are you on?” I ask him, earning an eye roll.
“I have sex with her,” he reminds me. “Whose side do you think I’m on?”
“Anyway, MaryLou is super sweet, and I think you’d hit it off.” I glare at my sister-in-law and, in my head, run through all the ways I could kill her and make it look like an accident before she follows up with, “I just want you to be happy, Levi. I love you.”
Okay, there will be no killing today.
“Are you going to control your woman?” I ask my brother.
“Nope.”
I sigh and take a bite of toast. “I’ve been seeing Starla.”
“I knew it!” Joy pumps her fist in victory. “Tell me everything. Not just your cop version of the events, which is never enough. Everything, Crawford.”
“You’re truly a pain in my ass.”
“Go on. Spill it.”
I look helplessly at Jace, but he just shrugs.
“It’s not the job giving me the grey hair, it’s my nosy-ass sisters-in-law.”
Joy just watches me expectantly, and finally, I cave.
“It’s really pretty normal dating stuff.”
“Like?”
“I took her out to dinner, to the Pop Culture Museum, the Market. You know, the usual.”
“Without being mobbed?”
“Lia helped.” I tell them about Lia giving Starla a disguise. “It was fun to take her out where she could relax and enjoy herself.”
“That’s so awesome,” Joy says. “She seems really nice.”
“She is.”
“So that’s it?”
“That’s it.” I shove more food into my mouth and chew, holding Joy’s gaze with my own in a stare-down of wits.
“I don’t believe you.”
“What else do you want to know?”
“Are you sleeping with her?”
“Jesus, Joy.”
“I told you, I want to know everything.”
“No,” I blurt, surprised at myself. “No, I’m not sleeping with her. Not for now.”
Jace and Joy both blink at me in surprise.
“Really?” Jace asks first. “Wow.”
“What does that mean?”
“Just wow,” he says. “From what you told me, the chemistry is crazy hot, so I just figured—”
“Wait,” Joy says, holding up a hand. “He told you the chemistry is hot? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because some things are private,” I say at last and then feel like shit when her eyes have hurt in them. “And because she fucked me up in the head before, and I didn’t know how to deal with it. I just needed to talk it out with Jace.”
