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Rain only ever looked at me with his dead, emotionless eyes or with amusement. I didn’t think he hated me like his daughter did, but I also didn’t think he cared for me much either.
Neutral ground was more than fine with me. I could work with that. I didn’t need the man to like me, I just needed him not to step in my way and cock/coven block me.
I might have even been attracted to the man, but I would never put that thought out into the universe, and I would certainlyneverspeak it out loud. Someone else might hear it, and then I would be screwed.
I couldn’t let Rain get in my way, and I had to be incredibly careful with him. I had never cared so much about another person before outside of my blood family, and the fact that I cared that much about Isobel to know that I was going to be careful with not only Rain but Romero as well said it all.
There was a moving truck parked out front of the cottage, and men were unloading something from the back of it. What the fuck was Romero doing now?
I skirted around them and saw they were getting out a large dining room table with chairs. It was stained dark, looked heavy, and was probably some priceless antique.
I hoped like fuck it wasn’t yet another thing that had been unearthed from someone’s storage unit. It really bothered me now knowing that was where the furniture in my room came from when I wasn’t so sure that they would have given it to Romero if they knew I was going to be the one using them. And that didn’t exactly fill me with joy.
I didn’t even want to know how it made Romero feel. I knew it made Isobel feel like shit, and that was more than enough for me to handle.
It hit her really hard, and her being upset made me want to blow. I had a hard time stopping myself from showing up at Quinton’s house and telling them all to fuck off.
I knew that would only make things worse for everyone else and that was the only thing that stopped me.
I found Romero where I usually did—in the kitchen at the table. There was an empty mug in front of him, and he had a blank look on his face as he stared out the window on the back door.
The mood in the room was heavy, and I didn’t know what to make of it. Isobel had told me he’d seemed perfectly fine when he left her earlier. He didn’t exactly seem fine now though.
“What’s up with the table?” I asked quietly so as not to spook him. I sat down across from him.
He blinked slowly as he focused on me. “I picked it out this afternoon and convinced them to deliver it even though they said it couldn’t be done for weeks. A little magic goes a long way. If we’re going to be having family dinners, then we needed a table for them. I’ve been putting it off, but it was time.”
My shoulders slumped in relief. It wasn’t a family hand-me-down, so I didn’t have to feel bad every time I sat down and ate at it.
He cleared his throat. “What’s for dinner?”
So now he wanted to ask me questions? Dinner was his idea, so you would think he’d know what he wanted to eat.
“We need to have the stuff for whatever I’m making here already because I’m not going to the grocery store,” I told him in all seriousness. I might have let him rope me into this, but that didn’t mean he was going to get away with making me do a bunch of shit that I didn’t want to do.
He smirked at me. “It’s a good thing we’ve already got all of these groceries here. Take a look through the cupboards, and if you’re missing something, I can put in an order for it now. It’s still early enough that they’ll deliver it today.”
In my short time here with him, I had already learned that Romero didn’t like to leave the house unless it was to go somewhere to meet up with people in his family.
Now, I wasn’t calling him lazy or anything like that. He was just selective when it came to anything that required him to put any time and effort into it. He didn’t like driving, he absolutely hated shopping, and I didn’t think he enjoyed people on the whole.
If he could order it online and have it delivered, then he was all over that. I didn’t mind, but it sucked for me when there was no delivery option and he decided to use me to get him what he wanted.
I had already allowed him to control me for dinner, and that was where I was drawing the line for the rest of today.
I checked the cupboards and fridge, listing off everything I knew how to make in my head. We had everything for homemade chili with a salad and breadsticks. It wasn’t fancy, but it would be delicious, filling, and hopefully help to keep the mood light.
If I made something fancy, then I worried it would make the whole dinner feel stiff and stilted, and that wouldn’t make anyone want to come back for another one.
That was the fucked up thing. We hadn’t been given a choice about this dinner, but both Isobel and I wanted it so badly that I knew it would suck for us if this one didn’t go well and we didn’t do another one.
The pressure to not fuck this one up was no joke.
“How much time do I have before everyone is supposed to get here?”
“You have a couple of hours,” he answered.
A loud crash came from the dining room. Romero cursed as he jumped to his feet.
