Chapter 12 #2
“Oh ew,” Sydney said. “You know we could go into that office. Please tell me you haven’t had sex anywhere around here either.” The young woman held up her hands, and my face heated.
Sam leaned forward and handed me my coffee. “Ignore her. She’s just sad because she’s not getting any,” she teased, and Sydney flipped her off.
“Excuse me, I’m not getting any for a reason. I don’t want to date Steve forever. You and Mason though? You guys are totally going to make it.”
“I don’t want to put that much pressure on us. Neither one of us do,” Sam said with the shrug. “But just remember safe sex. I’m not ready to be an auntie,” Sam said solemnly, and I nearly choked on my coffee.
“Do you guys always talk so freely about this?” I asked, then I paused, remembering our dinner conversations around the kitchen island when Mom and Dad hadn’t been around. “You know what, never mind. My siblings are the exact same way.”
“And now you have a million of them,” Sydney put in.
“I do. Well, only eleven.” I paused. “I cannot believe I just said only eleven.”
We dished up our plates, and everything felt so homey, like a family. I wasn’t quite sure what I was supposed to do with that, but here I was, feeling oddly comfortable.
I had no idea how that had happened. “What finals do you have this week? All of them?” I asked.
Sam and Sydney looked at each other in that twin way, and I had wondered if Hudson and Flynn had that.
It was odd to think that there was a set of twins in my family that I hadn’t watched grow up.
In fact, I didn’t really see those two interact often.
They weren’t usually at the same family dinners, and I had to wonder if there was a reason for that, or just distance.
I had so many questions about the family I hadn’t grown up with, and perhaps moving back down to Denver would let that happen. Although I saw Hudson on a regular basis up here now, I was separated from the others. And I wasn’t sure how I felt about that.
“Sadly all of them. Plus we already had to take our major testing for college and everything. It’s just weird to take finals and really hope that you pass because you’re already planning on going to a certain college,” Sydney answered.
“Is there anything you’re having trouble with?” I asked
“A couple of things,” Sam answered but my moan interrupted her next statement.
Weston raised a brow and didn’t say anything, and I blushed. “Sorry. Lance. This is the best French toast I’ve ever had. And please don’t tell my sister Emily that. Because she would probably hit me.”
“I’ll just have to give her the recipe when I meet her,” he said with a wink, and I had to frown because I realized Lance was actually two years older than Emily.
My sister had still been in high school the first time Weston and I had dated.
The twins, babies. Well, ten years old, but that was still so young.
I met Weston’s gaze, and he gave me a soft smile, still quietly eating as he watched his family talk about finals and upcoming projects and what they were going to do once they moved out.
“So are you still going to keep this big house, big brother?” Sydney asked, and I paused as Weston froze.
“Why wouldn’t I? This is home.”
“Yes, but you won’t need it for all of us all the time now. Now you can go and do what you were going to do before. You’re not stuck in Cage Lake if you don’t want to be,” Sydney blurted.
Then she pressed her lips together as Sam elbowed her in the side, and Lance cringed.
Could Weston move? But it wasn’t as if he was on the same track he had been on before.
So many years had passed. And he was right, he loved this town.
It didn’t matter that I was starting to love it too, my home was in Denver.
In the city. But were the connections and ropes that had pulled him back here slowly leaving? And if so, would he stay?
“Oh, we have a question,” Sam blurted.
I blinked out of my thoughts, wondering why my chest ached. “What is it? How can I help?”
“You’re a math whiz, right?”
“I wouldn’t call it that, but yes, I love math.”
“Do you think you can come over tonight and help us study? Our first final is in Calc Three, and I’m a little worried.”
“Sure. I can do that.”
“Girls, Bella does have a life you know.”
“So, Bella likes us,” Sydney said as she preened in her seat. “Sorry, bro, she’s with us tonight.”
“Yeah, bro,” Lance put in. “She’s ours.”
Lance caught the grape that Weston threw, and I just stared at this family that had pulled together in times of adversity and were closer than ever.
And soon the girls and Lance would be fully out of this home, and Weston would be doddering around alone.
Did he want that next step? Did he want that family he hadn’t been able to have?
My thoughts whirled, and I tried not to think too hard about it.
Because this was just temporary. It had to be. We were once again on two different paths, and worrying about it wasn’t going to help anything. Weston reached over and squeezed my knee and winked.
“Stop thinking so hard. You need to use that brain to help the girls pass math. I’m counting on you.”
I let out the breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding and nodded.
“Fine. But I’m a stern taskmaster and I expect color-coded flashcards.”
“We can do that. We love flashcards,” Sam said with a grin.
I quickly ate my breakfast, wondering why I felt as if I was torn between two families. Just like Weston had been before.
And I had to wonder what choice I would make next.
“I truly hope they passed. They studied so hard,” I said as I sat across the table from Weston. “I have all the faith in the world but you know that doubt monster in my brain can be loud.”
“You’re sounding more stressed than I am, and these are my little chicks. Though I really don’t know what we would have done without you for Calc Three. That was way over my head.”
Rachel, our waitress, set our meatloaf and mashed potatoes in front of us, and we nodded our thanks.
“You two just let me know if you need anything. And seriously, you two are the cutest. I’m so glad that you’re finally venturing out into the town more.
We need to get looks at you. I mean, you know we wanted to walk up to Cage Lake to just say hello and be neighborly.
But well, we were also trying to give you privacy.
” She winked as she left, and I just stared open-mouthed at Weston.
“Are they always so open about their gossip?” I asked, my voice low.
“Oh, that wasn’t even that bad. You know how many people have come into my garage to check the air in their tires? Just to try to see a glimpse of you, or ask me what’s going on between us?”
“You’re kidding.”
Weston shrugged. “It’s home. It’s what they do. I bet you if we were down in Denver, your family would be doing the same thing. They just have a little bit of a longer drive.”
“That is true,” I said as I dug into possibly the best meatloaf I’d ever had in my life.
It was still finals week for the girls, but they had wanted peace and quiet to get studying done.
In answer, Weston had taken me out to Cage Free, the local diner that the Cages owned, but it was pretty much left to free rein for the older couple who had first created it.
When they had gotten into financial trouble, Aston and the others had stepped in to buy it, but made sure that whatever needed updated was updated, and that if things needed to be organized, they were there.
It was truly remarkable how much my brothers had put into this town while trying to erase the past deeds that our dad had done.
It wasn’t that he had tried to run the town into the ground, he had just tried to make it in his image.
The only good thing he had ever done was ensure that certain companies and shady builders couldn’t come in and destroy the environment.
And I wasn’t sure if that was out of the goodness of his heart or the fact that he was waiting to do it himself later.
Either way, people were starting to treat me as if I was a Cage, and I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to deal with that.
It wasn’t as if I had built any form of this community.
I hadn’t even been to the resort. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to go, but Hudson and James had that place handled enough that I just hadn’t been out there yet.
“So, how was your meeting today?” Weston asked.
I blinked up at him. “You knew about that?”
He raised a brow. “Yes. I remember that you had an important meeting today. You have an important meeting most days, but you were nervous today when I left the house.”
“Oh. Well, it went well. It was with a company that the Cages are working with. I can’t go into too much detail, but it was a lot of numbers.”
“You’re an accountant. I always assume there’s a lot of numbers.”
“Yes, but I’m not a tax accountant. You would be surprised how many people think I am in this town.”
“Let me guess, people that you don’t even know who happen to know who you are asked for tax advice?”
“Exactly,” I said as I pointed with my fork. “I’d never met Mr. Ed before, and yet he came right up to me and asked if his boots were allowed to be tax deductible. First, I have no idea, second, why would he know who I am?”
“You’re shiny and new in Cage Lake, and yet you’ve been here long enough now that you’re not a tourist. And you’re a Cage. People know who you are.” He winked. “But I saw you first. Sorry.”
“Claiming me, are you?”
He shrugged, taking a drink of his water. I watched his throat work as he swallowed, and the damn man winked at me as he set down his glass. Oh, he knew exactly what he was doing.