“How would you put it?”
“Blessed with your company?” she offered with mock sweetness.
I laughed, the sound surprising me. She had a way of catching me off guard, making me feel light. “Come on, smartass. Let’s see if you can cook as well as you can ride.”
We walked back toward the cabin, the air growing colder as the sun dipped lower. The cabin was soon warming with the fire I’d built crackling in the great room.
“What are we making, Sir?” Cami asked, following me into the kitchen.
“I was thinking pasta. Something simple but good.” I pulled out ingredients from the fridge—fresh pasta I’d made yesterday, vegetables, cream, parmesan. “You any good in the kitchen?”
“I can follow directions,” she said, moving to wash her hands. “And I make a mean salad.”
“Salad duty it is then.” I set her up with the vegetables and a cutting board while I started water boiling for the pasta.
We worked in comfortable silence for a few minutes, the kind that felt easy rather than awkward. I found myself stealing glances at her and the way she concentrated on dicing tomatoes, the small, satisfied smile when she got the pieces uniform, the unconscious way she hummed along to the music playing softly from the speaker.
“Wine?” I offered, pulling a bottle of red from the rack.
“God, yes, Sir.”
I poured us each a generous glass, and when I handed her one, our fingers brushed. The contact was brief but electric, and from the way her breath caught, she felt it too.
“To conquering fears,” I said, raising my glass.
“To patient teachers,” she countered, clinking her glass against mine.
The wine was smooth and rich, warming me from the inside. I turned back to the stove, adding butter and garlic to the pan, letting the aroma fill the kitchen.
“Can I ask you something, Majesty?” Cami said after a moment.
“Anything.”
“How did you and Lex start working together? I know you met at college, but... how did you know you’d work well together?”
I considered the question while I stirred the garlic. “Honestly? I didn’t at first. Lex is intense, you know? Very controlled, very precise. I’m more... go with the flow. I figured we’d clash.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No. We balanced each other.” I glanced at her. “It’s a good partnership.”
“Is that all it is? A partnership?”
The question was casual, but I heard the curiosity underneath. “What are you really asking, Cami?”
She focused on the peppers she was slicing, not meeting my eyes. “I guess I’m trying to understand the dynamic. You two are so close. So coordinated. It’s more than just business partners.”
“We’re friends,” I said simply. “Best friends, really. We trust each other completely. We have to with this lifestyle.”
“But not...” She trailed off, clearly trying to figure out how to ask what she wanted to know.
“Not romantic,” I finished for her. “No. We’ve never been interested in each other that way. But we have shared partners before of course”
Her head came up at that, eyes wide. “You have?”
“A few times over the years. When it made sense, when everyone wanted it.” I added cream to the pan, watching it swirl with the butter. “Most of them were intense short-term arrangements. The one time that it was serious, she decided that two men were a lot and she broke things off. Well, she asked me to be her partner and leave Lex out. I chose him over her ofcourse. I’d never stab my brother in the back. We haven’t shared anybody since then.”
“And that worked for you?”
