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“You guys, be nice please,” Belle sighs. The sizzle of cooking meat fills the silence that follows. I can’t help myself.
“So Jace, how are things? Still slinking around the city laying with any woman who’s self respect is lacking enough to appreciate your attention?”
“Hmm, I don’t know. You still dusting the cobwebs off that expired pussy?”
Luke snorts laughter.
“Hey!” Belle snaps, grabbing my hand to stop me from throwing the saucer I picked up at Jace’s smug face. “Stop it! You two are ridiculous. Geez, it’s been 10 years. You’re too old to still be fighting like animals.”
Neal chooses that moment to come down the stairs, his hair clumped and dripping into the small towel hanging around his neck. He looks like he’s walking right out of a shampoo ad.
“What’s going on?” he asks, narrowing his eyes at his brothers. Luke looks as innocent as ever, his baby blues practically drawing the halo for him.
“We’re just having a little fun. Cracking some jokes,” Jace says, shooting me a wink that makes me consider breaking the saucer on his face again. Instead, I turn to Belle.
“Can I talk to you?” I glare at the brothers for a second before turning my back and whispering, “In private?”
Belle’s eyebrows shoot up.
“Sure,” she mumbles, her eyes glazing with questions. “Babe, can you watch the beef? Don’t let it burn.”
She doesn’t follow me out of the room until Neal is stationed in front of the stove enduring whip cracking sounds from his brothers. Ugh, why are they even here?
Belle leads me upstairs to her favorite room in the house. Neal had one of the bedrooms turned into a library for her a few years ago for her birthday. There are at least eight giant floor to ceiling bookshelves lined up with aisles between just like a real library. Every romance novel, fantasy epic, and action adventure story in creation have to be housed on these shelves. There are four circular tables set up with cushioned chairs in various places around and between the bookshelves, but Belle’s favorite place is the reading nook Neal had built into a window seat overlooking the backyard just for her. That’s where she led me.
“Is something wrong? Please tell me you’re not pregnant.” Her drawn brows and anxious tone pull a giggle from me.
“Pregnant? God, no.”
Her face softens in relief. I pick at the seam of the upholstered seat, bouncing my knee.
“Well… I wanted to ask you about Stefan.”
“Huh? You’re mumbling. I can’t hear you.”
“I wanted to ask you about Stefan.”
“Lil, what? Speak up.”
“I wanted to ask you about Stefan!” I practically yell, cheeks flushing heat. Her eyes widen before her face splits in a grin.
“Stefan? Okay.” She giggles. “Why are you acting so nervous?”
“I’m not,” I grumble.
“Well what do you want to know?”
“Just tell me about him. I don’t know. What does he like?”
After teasing me about actually being interested in someone, she details everything she knows about Stefan from the time she first met him, which was when he came to Neal after his ex and former business partner ran away with all of their money, to the way he likes his steak cooked, all the way down to the very last time she saw him which was just a couple of days ago. Apparently, Neal has known Stefan for many years, even before he and Belle met. Stefan and Neal got into real estate around the same time, so when Stefan’s former partner betrayed him, Neal was one of the main people who picked him up. I hang on to her every word, enamored with image after image of him in every setting she describes.
“I think I like him,” I whisper, somehow blushing deeper.
“You’re cute as a button,” Belle giggles cradling my face in her small hands. I knock her hands away, fanning my face.
“He’s a good guy, Lil. Seriously,” she says, sobering.
“I know,” I reply, itching to see him even more now.
