Chapter 7
CHAPTER SEVEN
Tide Cottage, Freedom
Eden
“I’ll tell you a secret,” Cody whispers, conspiratorially, pushing the large, frosted cake that is topped with blackberries between us on the kitchen counter.
“The recipe isn’t special because of the fruit, layers, or even the cinnamon and cloves.
It’s the coffee that I add in the icing, which gives it the kick.
Of course, now you know the secret, I’ll have to kill you. ”
I blink.
Are family recipes that serious? I shared my mum’s scones with him.
Don’t we have a swap agreement?
Baking is deadlier than I guessed.
I cross my arms. “I asked in our WhatsApp group. You promised to share Mike’s favorite recipe with me last week. You’ve never broken a promise before.”
My heart clenches.
What if he does break a promise? How will I trust him?
Cody’s expression gentles.
He points dramatically at the cake. “Look, I haven’t. You’re the only person apart from my husband who I’ve baked this for. And you’re the only person who I’ve shown how to bake it. You’re as special as the recipe. Let’s have a slice, huh?”
I stand frozen.
My mind is reeling.
Special?
My cheeks flush. I duck my head, but a small, pleased smile tugs at my lips.
Only Cody can make me feel like this, as if he’d have chosen me to be his friend, even if I wasn’t his sister’s boyfriend.
He’s my friend, rather than Shay’s.
No one has chosen me over my brother before.
Cody is several years older than me. He’s so athletic and sun blushed, however, by his time spent surfing that he looks the same age as me.
He’s handsome with neat brunette hair, freckles across the bridge of his nose, and russet eyes. He’s dressed in pastel blue boardshorts and a black t-shirt with TORTURER emblazoned on the front in white.
Cody is Director of Physical Therapy at the Bay Rebels.
Torturer has become his nickname, although I don’t know how much of that is a joke.
Cody is good in that easy way that makes everybody like him.
Everybody apart from his dad.
Cody pushes me hard in my physiotherapy but that’s what I’ve needed.
I’ve been committed to my recovery. And Cody has been equally committed in the way that no stranger would have been.
Cody dances happily around the kitchen, humming to David Bowie’s “Heroes”. He swings his hips as he pulls out a sleek, stainless steel cake knife and two plates.
Shay insists that friends share their music.
I’ve tried several times to share my love of the Arctic Monkeys. After all, Cody loves English singers like Bowie.
Every time, however, the words burn my throat.
What if Cody hates my rock bands?
What if he laughs at them?
What if he rejects them?
I wince at the crack, as Cody drops one of the plates that is covered with the bold lettering A WISE DOCTOR ONCE WROTE followed by a load of illegible scribbles.
It must be Doctor Michael Gaines, Cody’s husband’s, plate.
Michael has a dry, dark humor.
His handwriting is also worse than Shay’s. So, the plate is accurate.
He works in the ER at Freedom Heart hospital. I wonder how often Cody has seen him in the last seven days.
Once? Twice?
Michael works harder than any of us. Cody never complains about being left alone in Tide Cottage.
Cody is a wild spirit, and Michael is the stern but steady influence on him.
I fit with them here more than I do with my own twin.
The kitchen is cozy with exposed beams and wide-planked wooden floors. The walls and open shelves are painted sky blue.
Cody’s surfboards are stacked against the far wall. A tangy brine smell wars with the fruity and spicy scent of the freshly baked cake.
Cody holds out the cake knife to me. “Do you want to do the honors?”
I take the knife like he’s passing on a baton, slicing it into the rich cake. I raise my eyebrow at the neat layers inside, which are mottled with blackberries.
It’s unusual and unexpected.
Pride blooms through me that I baked this with Cody.
Cody leans over, taking a deep sniff. “Hmm, like summer and fall had a freaky baby.”
When I pull a face, Cody laughs.
I push the plate toward Cody. “Eat.”
Then I cut a second, thick slice and drop it onto a plate. I pull it closer.
Cody grins, and his cheeks dimple. “Mike’s not here to catch us. So, let’s eat the cake with our hands. It’s more satisfying than, as Neve would put it, Mike’s old man rules of using a fork.”
He snatches up his slice of cake and stuffs it into his mouth, munching happily.
I hope that he doesn’t choke.
Cake baking is a deadly business.
“It’s good,” Cody mumbles around his mouthful, giving a sticky thumbs up.
I take a smaller bite myself, struggling to hold back the moan at the delicious flavors of tangy blackberries, spicy cinnamon, and the kick of coffee in the icing.
I understand why this recipe would be worth killing for.
Cody looks at me eagerly. “Orgasmic, right?”
I nod, taking another bite.
I settle comfortably on the stool at the counter. Then I glance out of the cottage’s window.
The beach outside is remote with sea stacks that rise from the swelling waves. Sunlight ripples across the sea.
It’s calm here. Robyn visits the cottage as a sanctuary when she needs a break from Shay’s noise or my intensity.
Are we…our pasts…too much for her?
“Hey, no frowning in front of the cake.” Cody shields the cake with his arm. “Are you okay?”
“Fine.”
Cody cocks his head, and his hair falls over his eyes. “I’m your awesome physio and I have these cool skills like knowing when you’re lying to me. Are you in pain? Did I push you too hard today?”
I place the cake carefully back onto my plate, licking my fingers. “You didn’t push me hard enough.”
“We have a plan and we’re sticking to it. Mike and the other consultants would kick my ass if I messed up your recovery by going too fast.”
“Why am I still…?” I break off, frustrated.
“Still getting symptoms…? It’s different for every person.” Cody shuffles closer. “You’re making good progress, but it’s more complicated in your case. You had more injuries, before the one that happened on the ice. We’ll just take it day by day. And what other physio rewards with cake?”
He means because I was already broken long ago.
He’s right.
I may have saved my brother from the Room, but the boy that I’d been died in the darkness next door.
Phoenix was born from the ashes.
But I was never the same.
Cody is watching me with understanding eyes. I hate what it means that he can understand.
My jaw clenches.
Cody stuffs the rest of the cake into his mouth; it puffs out his cheeks, until he looks like a squirrel.
Impressive technique.
I watch him blankly, as he works his way through his massive mouthful with a blissed out expression, finally swallowing.
Then he pats his flat stomach. “Tribute accepted. Hey, do you want to take some of this back for my sis and your bro?”
“And Jude.”
“I hope that Mike isn’t home late again tonight. He’ll fucking melt when I serve this for dessert.”
I stand up, grabbing a cloth.
I start to clean the flour off the counter. “Mike doesn’t melt.”
Ridiculous.
It would be like me melting.
Cody leans back against the counter.
His smile becomes wicked. “Oh, you’d be surprised. Just between us, when we’re alone the stern doctor can be soft and tender. In fact, one serving of this…” He points at the blackberry cake. “…and our roles can even be reversed, if you know what I mean.”
He waggles his eyebrows.
I stare at Cody. Then peer suspiciously at the cake.
Is it that powerful?
Perhaps, I can offer some to Robyn and then offer for her to peg me.
I’ve been wondering what that would feel like, since I overheard Shay and her discussing it last month, while they lay tangled together in bed.
Cody laughs. “Are you plotting making my sis melt?”
“Would my scones work as well?”
Cody looks thoughtful. “It’s not the cake itself.
With Mike, it’s that this is the first thing that I baked for him, when we moved in here together.
I cremated the cake. I was horrified. But Mike still faithfully sat there and ate every slice like it was delicious.
” His smile becomes sadder. “Dad told me so many times that I was bad at everything I tried, even those things that I was good at like surfing. But that moment with the burned cake was when I learned that Mike would tell me I was good even at something I wasn’t yet good at.
So, he encouraged me to try again. I kept baking and cooking, until the voice in my head was Mike’s telling me that I could do it, rather than Dad’s telling me to give up because I was a loser. ”
I ball the cloth in my hand. “Are you sure that you don’t want me to kill your dad?”
Cody shakes his head. “It’s complicated. I don’t need any more violence in my life. It’s why Mike is my rock. I didn’t think that it was possible to feel safe before I met him.”
I know how he feels. His sister offers the same to me.
I nod.
“Anyway,” Cody arches his brow, “I thought that the no killing therapy was going well?”
I shrug. “My therapist resigned.”
I don’t know why. Aren’t you meant to be honest in therapy?
Is there such a thing as too honest?
Cody gives me a long look. “Uh-huh. Well, you can always talk to me.”
Aren’t we talking now?
Cody slides his thumb through the cake’s icing, before sucking it with a sigh. “Food is love.”
This is why Cody is my friend.
He understands these simple things. He voices them in a way that I can’t.
Food was my way of loving my brother, when our biological parents were injecting themselves in squats and leaving us to starve.
Food was my way of making sure that Shay didn’t go hungry, when he couldn’t budget properly through college and kept missing meals.
Food is how I make sure that my lovers aren’t hungry and are taken care of.
I hum in agreement. “Would your sister like it if I made her heart shaped chocolates for Valentine’s Day? I often made them shaped as stars for Shay as his Christmas present.”