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“Where the hell were you?” I cut him off, my rage surprising him.
He runs a nervous hand through his hair. If I wasn’t so upset with him, I’d be floored by just how vulnerable he looks right now. “What?” he asks weakly.
I explode. “The meeting! The investors? The one I stayed up all night to write a presentation for and spent all morning ring-binding documents for? Remember?”
At least he has the grace to look embarrassed. For the first time probably in his entire life, Lucas Adler is utterly speechless, his mouth wobbling about like he’s genuinely struggling to think of what to say.
And then he surprises me back. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I forgot.”
“Forgot?” I ask, but the fire has gone. I can’t be angry at a man who looks so torn-up over it, especially when that man has never shown a real human emotion before, let alone regret.
He shrugs, floundering for words again. From behind him comes a great screech followed by the sound of something shattering on the floor. I crane my neck to try and see into his apartment but he blocks me, moving into my line of sight so all I can see is his chest. It kind of sounds like kids are laughing in there now, but there’s no way Lucas has children. He barely has friends, let alone a wife or family. And if he did have them, I’d know. I know everything.
“Look,” he says. “I think you’d better just come in so I can explain.”
He steps aside. I hesitate — is this crossing a professional boundary? But I also want answers, plus I’m kind of nosy. I’ve never been inside his apartment before, and I want to see what it’s like.
We take a left into the kitchen-slash-living room which is already three times bigger than my entire place. I don’t have a lot of time to take in the décor, though, because I’m immediately assaulted by three small kids who launch themselves at us, all covered in a grim, sticky beige mess.
“Who this?” says the tiniest one, her face streaked with spit.
“It’s Uncle Lucas’s girlfriend,” says the oldest with a cheeky grin.
“It is not,” he scoffs with such disdain I almost want to correct him. Which is ridiculous because there's no way in hell I would never even consider dating a guy like Lucas.
The little girl just gives us a knowing look as if she can see something that we don’t. Lucas looks at her and then at the mess in the kitchen and ushers me into the living room. The entire apartment is decked out in luxurious leather and paintings that probably cost more than my apartment. The sofa looks like it’s made of white velvet, a monochrome rug slipped under it, tasteful white lampshades balanced on the many, many lamps scattered around.
After seeing the mess those children have got into in the kitchen this morning, I highly doubt that Lucas’s white furnishings are going to stay white for much longer.
“What the hell is going on here? Why have you got children?” I hiss as quietly as I can, watching the kids behind him playing in their own chaos.
Lucas pinches the bridge of his nose and shuts his eyes. I wonder if he got any more sleep last night than I did. If anything, I probably had more fun. Not that I would have hated hanging out with kids. I’d put money on it that Lucas isn’t a kids kind of person, but I kind of am.
“It’s my brother,” he says at last. “I mean, they’re my brother’s. I don’t have kids. I wouldn’t want them. I mean…” He gestures at the disaster taking place around us and grimaces. “But he came and begged me to take them because he and his wife have gone off to be heroes in a war zone.”
I’m sensing just a little bit of tension between Lucas and his brother, and I decide not to ask any further questions. Instead, I say, “Maybe we should make sure that the kids aren’t trashing your kitchen any more than they have already.”
He stares at me for a moment then nods. We turn back to the kitchen and see the carnage. The kids have a kitchen cupboard open and they’re playing to see who can fit into it.
“Oh, get out of there!” Lucas snaps.
At once he realizes he’s made a mistake. All three pairs of eyes start filling with tears, and I realize that I’m going to have to do a hell of a lot more damage control than I’d initially thought. And here I was, expecting to just show up and shout at him for a bit before leaving in the righteous knowledge that I was so much better than him.
I make my way into the kitchen. “Hey,” I say, crouching down to face the oldest little girl. “What’s your name?”
She wipes her eyes roughly with a sleeve then says, “I’m Chloe. And this is Noah and Ava. We’re hungry.”
I can’t help but giggle at her own righteous anger — I feel much the same. “And just what was Uncle Lucas trying to do here?”
“Pancakes!” yells Ava. Noah echoes his sister in agreement.
It makes sense now, the flour and the sticky mixture and the bowl. “Well, I think the first thing we should do is tidy up. And while we’re tidying up, why don’t we ask uncle Lucas to order us a really tasty breakfast? If you could have anything in the world for breakfast, what would it be?”
Chloe turns to look at her siblings and they all give each other that kind of psychic sibling brainwave that I’m so, so familiar with. This is exactly the kind of shenanigans me and my sisters would have gotten up to.
Except, I’m pretty sure I could already cook by ten. At thirty-four, it would be pretty shameful if I couldn’t — but it doesn’tsurprise me that Lucas, only a year older than me, has no idea what he’s doing. Slowly, Chloe comes up to me and gestures for me to duck down so she can whisper in my ear.
Quietly for a ten-year-old but still loudly by anyone else’s standards, she whispers, “We really want French toast and pancakes and eggs. Scrambled. That’s our favorite. Oh, and me and Noah really like sausages. But Ava can’t eat sausages. She’s vegetarian.”
