Total pages in book: 107
Estimated words: 100873 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 504(@200wpm)___ 403(@250wpm)___ 336(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 100873 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 504(@200wpm)___ 403(@250wpm)___ 336(@300wpm)
After Ísa hooked up with Sailor, Catie’d had a Bishop-Esera presence at every one of her meets. One time, when Ísa and Sailor couldn’t come because Ísa was wayyyyyy pregnant with Emmaline and about to pop, it was Joseph and Danny who’d driven down to the meet, complete with a giant homemade fluoro-orange banner to cheer her on.
It had been horribly, wonderfully embarrassing. Her friends had teased her for days. And she’d loved every minute of it.
“Put me down, you animal,” she said, but she was laughing.
Grinning, Danny put her on her feet with a care that was kind of annoying for reasons she couldn’t quite put into words. “I have excellent balance,” she muttered.
“I know,” he said easily.
“Ugh.” She pushed at his shoulders before she walked away.
He threw up his hands. “What did I do now?”
“Nothing.” Except be annoyingly even-tempered. It was unnatural. Surely he should have some off days, some days where he was moody and temperamental? That was how people were—they weren’t just cheerful all the time.
Or maybe golden boys were.
“Do we eat or what?”
Screwing up his nose at her, he brought over the muffins, served her one, then got one for himself.
She split hers open with her hands and breathed in the fragrant steam. Her mouth watered. “Okay, fine, you’re a good cook.”
“Gee thanks, princess.” He buttered half his muffin, the heat melting the butter within seconds. Then he took a giant bite. “Mmm.” The sound was low and deep and… interesting.
Again, that twitch low in her belly, a twitch that threatened to spread to the space between her legs. What was happening to her? Dread dried up her mouth. It couldn’t just be proximity. They’d been proximate plenty of times before at various family events.
Family events.
Key word being family.
Never alone.
Just the two of them.
Stuck in an apartment while the snow fell outside.
Shoving a buttered piece of muffin into her mouth in an effort to derail that dangerous line of thought, she found herself moaning in a way that would’ve been embarrassing if it hadn’t brought a delighted light into Danny’s eyes. “Ish good,” she managed around her mouthful.
“Yeah?” He took another bite, chewed, seemed to think about it. “Yeah, I think I have the ratios just right.”
He was so serious about it that she paused, gave him a searching look. “You decided to become a chef or something, Daniel?”
Color on his cheekbones, followed by an eyebrow-lowered look worthy of a mafia don. “Don’t say a word to my family. Swear on that necklace you never take off.”
The necklace in question—a fine gold chain with three small stars hanging off it—had been a gift from Clive a long time ago, back when she’d been a little girl and had still believed in him. Sad that she couldn’t give it up, but hey, dreams were free and it was a good memory of a lovely day.
“Fine, I swear.” She held up her necklace as she made the vow. “Though what’s the big deal? All your family cooks.”
That too was another thing that had surprised her when she’d met Alison and Joseph’s clan. In her family, Ísa was the only one who cooked. The times Catie was with Clive, it was either Martha who prepared the food—or, if Martha was off—it was all prepackaged meals Catie put into the microwave. She’d been doing so since she was at elementary school. With Jacqueline, a chef did everything.
It had astonished her to see Sailor so at home in the kitchen. He’d made her and Ísa pancakes that first time, and while she’d tried not to show it, Catie had been goggle-eyed by the situation. Then she’d met Alison and Joseph and the others and learned that cooking together was a family thing. Which included Catie if she was in the vicinity.
She’d pretended to be aggravated by the tasks given her—like peeling potatoes or chopping carrots—but secretly she’d felt like she’d been dropped into the middle of one of those perfect sitcom families. She hadn’t been able to believe her luck that she was being welcomed by them.
But she had—and she’d also learned to cook. A lot of dishes, she’d learned to cook with Danny. The two of them were so close in age that whoever was doing the teaching would often rope in both of them for the lesson.
“So you can feed yourselves as athletes without relying on anyone else,” Joseph had once said.
Catie was grateful for the lessons, but where she was a functional cook, Danny was brilliant, had always been the better of the two of them. “Danny.”
“You know what I studied at uni,” he muttered, folding his arms across his chest—unknowingly drawing her eyes to the veins that ran over his forearms. “That’s the field I’m meant to be going into after I retire from sport.”
Which wouldn’t be for a decade or more—he was in the prime of his life. As her body had begun to notice far too much for her peace of mind.