“Nothing really. Just an excuse to see you.”
Mack frowned. “You see me all the time.”
“Yes, but not without everyone else in the way. You’re a lot more relaxed when just you and I hang out together. I’m sorry I missed your last few phone calls. Dean and I have been busy planning.”
“As you should be,” Mack said, now feeling a little nervous at the way Cass looked at him. Mentally dissecting him. He felt like the proverbial butterfly pinned to a specimen board for further study. “Don’t listen to Alec. I’m always relaxed.”
“Yeah, when James and Xavier aren’t picking on you.” Alec snorted.
“Please. You’re all just jealous of my ability to live outside Mom and Dad’s shadow.”
Alec frowned. “What does that mean?”
“Nothing.” Mistake to bring that up. “So have you guys set a date yet? I know you have two or three you’ve been deciding between.”
Alec seemed to want to talk about Mack’s previous comment but saw Cass watching and forced a smile. “Either April 30th, when we first met, or August 28th, when Dean proposed.”
“Dean proposed?” Cass asked. “How? Did he get on one knee? Did you expect it?”
She seemed genuinely lost in her enthusiasm over the romance. Another twist to her character he hadn’t seen coming.
Alec smiled, his love clear to see. “I was surprised. I’d been planning to pop the question myself. We’d been together for a year, after a long relationship I’d been in that just fizzled. We took a day trip to hike out at Mt. Rainier. The sky was clear and blue, the weather not too cold or too warm, and surprisingly, there weren’t too many people out. Dean stopped at a point on the trail with a little vantage of wildflowers behind us and proposed. It was a perfect moment I’ll never forget.”
“Wow.” Cass blinked. “That’s beautiful.”
Mack expected her to gush some more, but she turned to poke Mack in the chest. “That’s how you do it.”
He blinked. “Ah, should I be taking notes? Is that what you want?”
“Me?” She laughed. “I meant for whatever poor woman you sucker into saying ‘yes.’ Women like romance.”
“All women?”
“Well, most. I would, and I consider myself pretty low-key when it comes to the hearts and flowers stuff. I think it’s more about intent and what you really feel than a big ring or perfect setting.” She turned to Alec. “Although your proposal really does sound perfect. I mean, if you were into hiking and mountains.”
“You aren’t?” Alec asked.
“Not so much. I love sports and running—in a gym or a trail in the city. Not in the mountains so much.”
“Good to know.” His brother smiled. “Now let’s talk about something that’s extremely important to me right now.”
“What?” Mack asked, cautious. He didn’t like the glint in his brother’s eyes.
“How much dessert do we want, and if we can’t eat it now, how much do we take home with us?”
Relieved, they ordered doughnuts to go and had just left the place when Mack swore he heard a meow.
“Did you hear that?” Cass asked.
Alec had gone to warm up the SUV, so the two of them hunted down the pathetic crying behind the building. In a wet cardboard box, Mack found a pair of gray tabbies that couldn’t have been more than eight weeks old, crying their little hearts out.
Cass’s eyes grew huge as she stared at them. “They’re so small.”
“And all alone in freezing weather.” He glared down at the box. “I hate when people do this.”
“What?”
“Abandon animals.” He reached down and plucked both kittens out of the box. “Can you see if they have any brothers or sisters around? Their mom?”
