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Lately, Bryce had been hyper-focused on ensuring that the third prong of the guardianship trial—the finances and the “otherwise” piece of the decision—might be in her favor. So far, it wasn’t looking amazing. While she adored her nieces, their life together was a mad scramble from the moment Addie startled her awake until well past the time June reluctantly switched off her bedroom lamp.
Bryce’s life was like a bunch of kitchen buzzers going off at once, all the time. How did she figure out what problem took priority?
Like June’s hostility. She’d passed it off as typical teen angst, but what if it was more? Addison’s bed-wetting was almost as disturbing as her refusal to take off her yellow, glittery fairy wings. Bryce had been forced to argue with the teacher and then escalate to the principal, who’d finally agreed to let Addison wear them only because Heather had been such a big part of the school’s PTA before she’d passed. Then there was Cecily. She fought against Bryce washing her clothes, and she stank like a goat. Getting her to shower was a weekly battle.
If only Bentley were here.
Then she’d still be fun Aunt Beamer, and her brother and Heather would be dealing with tween-aged sarcasm grenades, middle-of-the-night sheet changes, and the WWE-style moves required to decontaminate grubby kids.
Shoving useless if-onlys from her mind, Bryce pushed her body faster, as if to outrun it all. She sprinted up the hill toward the brick-red Victorian mansion owned by horror writer Drake Matthews—Patty’s infamous oldest son. A crowd of people mingled outside, posing for pictures next to the gates designed to look like bat wings that surrounded the old house. As Bryce slowed to a walk, she caught snippets of their conversations.
“Can you believe they have ababyliving in there? I mean, it’s sweet he wrote a romance, but it’s not like one book with a ‘happily-ever-after’ ending offsets his reputation as the Knight of Nightmares,” one woman commented.
A guy in a Buffalo Bills sweatshirt nodded, stuffing his hands into his pockets as he peered at the mansion. “Yeah. Did you know Drake Matthews eats his meat raw? Who does that?”
Bryce rolled her eyes, coming to a stop. She hated it when people made snap judgments. She’d seen enough of that while traveling with her dad to last a lifetime.
“I can tell you who.” Bryce used the no-nonsense voice she’d developed to carry over the din of a busy, all-male, five-star kitchen. “Anyone who enjoys the fine delicacy of steak tartare.” She didn’t care if sweat was running down the sides of her face, or that her hair was probably sticking out of her braid like it always did when she ran. She wasn’t about to let a bunch of looky-loos shit all over Patty’s son. “It’s sinfully good. At the restaurant I worked for in Tampa, I’d make a sauce relevée for it that’s so delicious it’d make you forget your momma’s name.”
“Hear! Hear!” came a male voice, along with a slow clap. Bryce couldn’t tell whether it was sarcastic or sincere until the speaker worked his way through the parting crowd, revealing a tall guy wearing a black Under Amour baseball cap with a figure that should be chiseled in granite.
It was her supermarket superhero. Ryker.
His expression was almost a smile, with his lips canted up on one side. Many gawked at his prosthetic leg, clearly revealed under his long athletic shorts as he made his way through the throng to stand in front of the gates.
He stopped clapping, then looked toward the Victorian, squinting an eye.
“You know, if you go around to the back, you’ll see the attic. Some say a little girl haunts the place. But I think it’s a woman—you can sometimes see her shadow in the turret window.”
Ryker hadn’t finished the sentence before the flock of onlookers fled down the sidewalk and around the corner, cell phone cameras pointed at the house as they jostled for position. Soon the area in front of the bat-winged gates was empty except for Ryker and Bryce.
“You really believe those ghost stories?” Bryce asked, opting to forgo the niceties. The guy hadn’t bothered to stop by PattyCakes all week long. Clearly, he wasn’t interested in either her or her soup, and she wasn’t about to make a fool of herself by giving him an opening like she’d done before.
He shook his head.
“I practically grew up there, and the scariest thing I ever saw was a dead mouse in the basement. I wanted to intervene before my brother’s fans decided you were a colossal buzzkill and revolted.”
Bryce blinked, processing this. “Your brother is Drake Matthews?”
“One of them. I can, um, get you an autograph, if you want?”
Bryce snorted. “I have zero interest. No offense. I’m sure Drake’s talented, but I only read cookbooks.” Then her stress-addled brain finally made the last connection and she gasped. “Wait. If Drake’s your brother, then your other brother is Zander, and your mom is my boss, Patty Matthews.”
Ryker shrugged, his hand coming up to rub the back of his neck. “Guilty.”
The ping of his name from the grocery store finally made sense. Patty had mentioned her son Ry a few times, and she’d assumed Ry was short for Ryan. Since there weren’t any recent pictures on the wall of Patty’s café and he never came in—at least not during the forty hours a week she was there—Bryce hadn’t recognized him at the grocery store. “Why aren’t you ever in PattyCakes?”
Ryker’s already stony expression got downright granite-esque. “I don’t get out much.”
Bryce got the feeling there was a lot to unpack in that sentence, but a glance at her watch told her she didn’t have the time to try, even if he’d been in a talking mood. Which, gauging by his monosyllabic answers, he wasn’t. She flashed a polite smile. “I’ve got to run. I need to pick up the girls from dance, but it was nice to officially—”
“Can I join you for a run? Got my fast leg on and everything.” He gestured to his black, spring-like prosthetic. When she hesitated, he lifted his left eyebrow, his tone sardonic. “Don’t worry. I’ll slow my pace so you can keep up.”
Bryce felt her polite smile widen at the challenge, then she shrugged. “Suit yourself.”
She pivoted from the house and began to jog, figuring he might need time to warm up, and she’d already logged at least a mile. But he kept up with her, stride for stride, his breathing unlabored. Silence pressed in on her, threatening to drag her own thoughts back to the forefront of her mind. She grabbed for the easiest conversational filler.
“Is it hard to have your brother be so famous that his readers mob the town?”
