“We do,” Hunter says.
“Big houses?” Ben’s eyes widen.
Wyatt nods. “We’ve built hotels, resorts, condos, and smaller houses.”
“Are you ever scared it’s going to fall down on your head while you’re building it?” Ben asks, between licks of his ice cream.
Elias chuckles. “No, we’re not. There’s a lot of safety equipment and two safety people who go around checking to make sure everyone on the site is safe.”
We spend the next ten minutes answering Ben and Rose’s questions about building houses before they leave to continue exploring Rios.
As I sit down to my work with the remains of my mint-and-chocolate-chip ice cream cone, I’m conscious that four men are back staring at me with the intensity of four inquisitive meerkats.
“I have never seen anyone eat an ice cream so smugly in my life,” Elias mutters.
“It’s sickening,” Hunter sighs.
“Tell me about it,” Knox adds.
“The least he could do is share,” Wyatt says, a strange note in his voice.
I lift my head to find them all grinning at me. “Shut up. And I’m not sharing. Get your own damn ice cream.”
But Elias is right.
Iamsmug, and Iamhappy, and it’s all because of Rose, who treated me to my favorite ice cream cone for no reason at all, and Ben, who was so damn pleased to see me.
For a guy who did all he could to keep his walls up and everyone out, I feel pretty fucking lucky. I’m not sure I deserve Rose or Ben, but I won’t ever take them for granted.
Pulling up outside the house just after 4:00 p.m., I cut the engine and start to get out when the front door opens. Win slips out, quietly shuts it behind him, and rushes over to get in the passenger seat.
And he just sits there, staring straight ahead.
I raise an eyebrow while gripping the door handle. “Problem?”
He takes a breath and slowly releases it. But he still won’t look at me. “I kissed her. I mean,shetechnically kissed me. I think it was supposed to be a playful thing because of Ben, but it happened. If you feel the need to punch me in the face, I won’t get out of the way.”
I take my palm off the handle, and he flinches away from me. Rubbing my chin, I eye my anxious friend. “I’m gonna need you to condense that and have it make more sense, Win.”
My eyes are tired, and my brain is drowning in information. After Rose and Ben left, I spent the rest of the day staring at plans for so long that I recoiled from the sunlight like a goddamn bat when I walked out of the office. All this paperwork reminds me that I will always prefer to be outside, building something. It’s necessary, but I still fucking hate it. We all do.
“Before the punch to the face?” he asks.
I scowl at him. “There will be no punch in the face. Take a deep breath, then tell me what happened. From the top.”
“Maybe we could go for a drive?”
“No.”
He lets out a resigned sigh, as if unsurprised by my response. “Fair enough.” He sits back in his seat, closes his eyes, and doesn’t say a word.
If I hadn’t come straight from work, maybe I’d be a little more patient. Hell, that isn’t true. I’d snap after I woke up from a nice, long, restful three-hour nap. It just isn’t in my nature to be patient. “Win!”
He jumps, tearing open his eyes and looking at me. Instantly, I feel like shit for snapping at him when I see the mounting confusion in his gaze.
“This morning, I helped Ben make Rose pancakes. Ben wanted to make his mom feel better, and bananas and ginger help with nausea. Cooking is my thing, so I told him I would help.”
Win Gabriel is a good guy.
