Evie, never one to reveal her secrets, nodded toward the kitchen door. “So, you wanna go get that, or…?”
There was a moment where Simon’s eyes met Harlow’s. Nothing was said, but meaning passed between them regardless. Wonder, fascination, appreciation, amazement, guilt, only interrupted when the delivery driver knocked again. Simon sped from the room, his hair a mess and his t-shirt and boxer-briefs all he was wearing. There was no more fear, no more averted gazes. For a moment, Simon had looked at him, and he’d been whole.
Harlow’s heart throbbed.
He wanted to see him like that again.
“Dad!” Evie whispered, hopping off the counter. “Quick! Simon got out a bowl for scrambled eggs. I’ll get the frying pan ready, and you can get the eggs ready to go, okay? Let’s do it before he gets back.”
While she spoke, she acted on what she said—there was precious little time before Simon would return, and she capitalized on it. Harlow, spirits lifted, did the same. While he hurried to the fridge and grabbed the entire carton of eggs from inside, he asked, “Whose Prime account did you use? Not yours, right?”
“No, Dad.” Evie pulled a clean pan from the broiler drawer and set it on the burner. “Not mine. I used Karla’s, but with my card. I’m not that dumb.”
Harlow cracked the first eggshell of several and poured its contents into the bowl. “Just checking.”
“You’re fine. It’d be a pretty me move to do something like that, right?” Evie snorted. “But not today. I don’t want to blow this. I… I’m really touched that you’d do all this for me. It’s really cool of you.”
“How about we talk about it later?” Another egg hit the bottom of the bowl.
Evie flashed him a thumbs-up, her bun falling to the side of her head. She turned the burner on then stepped back, standing by while it heated. “You got it. But… thanks.”
Even that small reassurance was enough to make Harlow feel like he’d made the right decision. Evie had made a poor choice, but they were back on track now—they’d move on from their past mistakes and come out stronger from it than ever. He vowed it.
By the time Simon returned to the kitchen, clutching a box wider than he was, Harlow was whisking the eggs while Evie supervised the heating pan.
“You planned this,” Simon accused. He set the box on the small kitchen table to the left of the doorway, then brushed off his shirt to keep it from clinging to his narrow frame. “This was a conspiracy. There’s no way that you got them to deliver in, what, ten minutes? I’ve been set up.”
“I may have ordered it last night.” Evie shrugged. “By the way, we’ve taken over making breakfast. If you want, you can go relax for a little bit. We’ve got it covered.”
Simon regarded Harlow, mouth pinched in irritation, like he was the mastermind behind it all. Harlow shook his head. “You’ve got it all wrong—Evie roped me into doing this. If you want to get mad at someone, get mad at her.”
“So you’re not going to let me cook?” Simon asked.
Evie shook her head. “Nope.”
“In my own home?”
“Definitely not,” Harlow confirmed. “Give me another seven minutes and breakfast will be served. Do you want toast?”
Simon rolled his head back, his neck outstretched, and let out an exasperated huff that was far more adorable than it had any right to be. “I’m not even allowed to make toast now?”
“Nope.” Evie stepped away from the stove to give Harlow room to pour the eggs. “I’ll be the, uh, guest-to-the-host who makes all the toast. It’s pretty much an official title—you really don’t want to challenge it. Costly legal fees, courtroom headaches, all kinds of legal jargon… really not worth it.”
Harlow snorted. Evie snorted, too. Simon picked his head up and smiled at them—not the wobbling, intimidated smile he so often wore, but one rooted in simple joy. It suited him, and despite his red, swollen nose and the heavy bruising beneath his eyes, Harlow couldn’t help but think that he was more handsome than he’d ever been before.
“You guys sound the same,” Simon noted. “The… the snort thing.”
“It’s genetic.” Evie quirked an eyebrow at Harlow. “Luckily, everyone seems to think it’s cute. I used to think it was embarrassing as hell.”
“It is cute.” Simon tugged at the bottom of his shirt. He looked between the two of them, something subtle going on behind his eyes that Harlow wasn’t able to figure out. “I like it a lot. You shouldn’t be embarrassed of it.”
While he spoke, his gaze lingered on Harlow, and his gentle smile persisted. The lightning that had previously set Harlow’s heart ablaze jolted it back to life. Each electric thud refocused him on Simon, and his stomach tightened in the same, delightful ways he’d refused to acknowledge before.
Seven years single. Seven years without noticing another man, and now…
“You’re sweet.” Evie found the loaf of sliced bread and fiddled with the twist tie that kept the bag closed. “But, uh, you might wanna keep your sweet compliments to yourself until, you know, I ask you this morning’s Big Tough Question TM.”
“Big Tough Question TM?” Harlow asked. To distract himself from how Simon had made him feel, he poured the egg mixture into the heated pan. It had achieved the perfect temperature—Evie had done him proud.
