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“Yeah. You’ve got a pretty hard head, though.” Everything seemed to be back in working order, except for maybe the rational section of his brain, and he nodded slowly as he let go of the want brewing in his gut.
Sloane snorted, but the gesture sounded way more endearing than rude. “Gee, I’ve never heard that before.” She popped to her feet in a shockingly fluid move, offering him a hand. Getting vertical was decidedly less graceful on his part, but he managed well enough.
“Thanks.” Gavin watched her roll up the yoga mat, and the silence between them stretched out like a napping cat. “So, how did things go today? Okay?” he asked, in a lame attempt to fill it.
“If by ‘okay’ you mean ‘Bree ignored me while I came up with a bunch of epic-fail ideas for a book’, then yes. We were very okay, all day long.” Sloane’s easygoing tone erased any heat that her words might’ve carried, as if it were simply her way of sayingsure, we had a great day.
Gavin nodded. He hadn’t figured Bree would be an open book with her, but at least the weekend hadn’t been a disaster. And the tutoring part had gone better than he’d expected, which was an added bonus. At least her grades were safe, for now. Maybe he was getting the hang of taking care of Bree, bit by bit.
“I really appreciate your help, especially with the tutoring,” he said. “But I’m sorry about the book ideas thing.”
Sloane bent to gather the scattered lumps of paper by the arm of the couch. “No problem. Like I said, Bree did most of it herself. I just refereed, really.”
“Well, I’m glad she didn’t give you any trouble. She can be, ah, difficult sometimes.”
“She was okay. Actually, she spent most of today in her room, watching movies as far as I could tell. Oh, that and she tried on a bunch of red lipstick and black eyeliner.” A sly half grin crossed Sloane’s lips, as if wearing a ton of makeup was perfectly normal behavior for a middle schooler.
Panic uncurled in Gavin’s chest. “Are you serious?”
Weren’t girls supposed to be older than Bree before they wore makeup? Like, thirty, maybe? Why would Sloane let her do something like that? Christ, he was ill-prepared for this.
Sloane’s grin faltered before fading completely. “Sorry. I didn’t know you’d feel that strongly about it. We stayed here all day, so it didn’t seem like a big deal. And honestly, the only reason I even saw it was because she came out to grab some water with it on.”
“Bree knows I’d never let her do that,” he muttered. Why did she have to be so defiant all the time? It was like she was trying to make him angry on purpose. Only that was ridiculous.
“Well, that explains her motivation. She had to know I’d tell you,” Sloane said with a nonchalant shrug, as if the explanation made all the sense in the world.
Would he ever understand anyone with an XX chromosome?
“Why on earth would she do something she knows I’ll get angry over, and then go out of her way to get caught?” The logic made no sense at all. How come Sloane seemed to understand it so perfectly?
“She’s just pushing your buttons to see how far she can go.”
Gavin had a bad feeling he was gaping, but that didn’t stop him from asking, “Did she tell you that?”
Sloane’s good-natured belly laugh plucked its way through him with enticing warmth. “Of course not. But I was a teenage girl once, too, you know. When I was fourteen, my mother flat-out insisted I wear these annoying pants underneath the skirt of my school uniform.”
Great. He was never going to get rid of the image of her in those damned knee socks. Gavin cleared his throat. “That seems a little extreme for a fourteen-year-old.”
She popped a shadowy brow, sliding a hand over one denim-encased hip. “Not once she heard from Joey Romano’s mother that the boys had taken to going under the bleachers to look up the girls’ skirts.”
The image in his head caught fire and exploded. “You wanted the boys to look up your skirt?”
Sloane gave up a sassy smile. “Please. I kept my legs crossed like everyone else once we figured it out. And anyway, you’re missing the point. It was totally embarrassing to wear pants under my skirt like a little kid, and I wanted my mother to know I could take care of myself.”
“You were fourteen.” He looked at her dubiously.
She pointed to herself with both index fingers, grinning. “Hello, figured it out, remember?”
Gavin’s curiosity got the best of him and he gave in. “Okay, so how’d your mother find out you didn’t listen to her if all this went down at school?”
“Because rather than leaving home with the pants on and just taking them off once I got there, I left them folded up, right on top of my bed every morning. It was standard teenage boundary testing, and I bet it’s exactly what Bree’s doing. She just wants to prove she’s growing up.”
His gut gave a hard yank at the thought. She didn’t have to grow upthatfast. “Well, it wasn’t a good idea to let her put on all that makeup. You should’ve said something to her.”
Sloane’s laid-back expression shorted out like a faulty fuse, and she set her jaw in a firm line. “We stayed here all day, so nobody saw her except me. It just didn’t seem like such a big deal.”
“Well…” Okay, so she had a point. Still, the idea of makeup on his little sister’s face, especially red lipstick with all its grown-up connotations, made him more than vaguely nauseous. He couldn’t let it happen again.
