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“Just ate three of those,” Sawyer said, never missing an opportunity to annoy his friend.
“You’re buying this?” Birdie said from behind them, which meant he could look at her. She’d moved two feet to stare at Ryder, not him.
“I am,” Ryder said, grinning. “You any good with a paintbrush, Birdie?”
She smiled, and it reached her eyes and lit her up like a Christmas tree. Sawyer scowled. He did not want to be aware of this woman.
“I am!” She bounced on her toes. “My mom too. She’s even better than me.”
“We can handle it,” Sawyer said before he could stop himself, and her smile fell away, and he felt like he’d kicked a puppy.
“I’ll go get the lunch order from next door, J.D. See you, Dukes.” Birdie raised a hand and didn’t look his way. “Call me, Ryder. I want to celebrate with you.”
“Will do,” Ryder said, already turning to face Sawyer as she shut the door. “That was mean, bro.”
“You’re an asshole,” Zoe said.
“Why you gotta be such a shithead?” J.D. said.
He saw her through the window. Head down, walking to the pizza place, and he felt a stabbing pain in his chest that he’d hurt her.
He wondered if he should get to work on that time machine now and head back two weeks to the day before he realized Birdie McAllister was sexy as fuck.
Chapter26
“Can you for once be nice,” J.D. hissed. “I thought you and her got on now, or so she said after the wedding. What the fuck is wrong with you? Too much peopling today?”
Sawyer got an elbow in the ribs from Ryder, and his sister was glaring at him.
“Go apologize, or she’ll spend the rest of the day being super nice because she’s pissed,” J.D. said.
“What? Who does that?” Zoe said, looking horrified. “We haven’t been close in years, but I thought she’d moved on from the people-pleasing phase.”
“No,” Sawyer and J.D. said together.
“The woman has no idea how to be angry,” J.D. added.
“Can’t be healthy, not venting. Her insides must be a twisted mess,” Ryder said before he turned away to inspect more of the kitchen. “You need to go say sorry, Sawyer. That was uncool, and you hurt her, especially considering what’s between you now.”
“What’s between them?” J.D. demanded.
“Nothing,” Sawyer said. “We’re friends is all he meant.”
Ryder turned back with a raised brow but didn’t speak.
Sawyer left because he’d been an asshole and because everyone in here was giving him the stink eye. Walking out of the bakery, he found her just about at the pizza place.
“Birdie.”
She turned, saw him and then walked faster. Sawyer jogged to catch up.
“Wait up.”
“I need to pick up the lunch order.” She kept walking.
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?” She didn’t stop.
