“Thank you, Chlo, you always were my favorite,” Joel teases, wrapping an arm around Abigail’s shoulders and squeezing. She groans and rolls her eyes but lets him do it. He then moves down the line and kisses the top of Chloe’s head, who beams up at him.
“Joel, are you staying for breakfast? I can make more eggs,” Louise asks over her shoulder as she ladles up another waffle into the iron before closing it.
“I’d love to.”
“Absolutely not.”
I glare at my brother, our responses overlapping each other.
“Don’t you have somewhere else to be?” I ask over the rim of my coffee cup.
“Nope,” he says, popping thePnosily, his eyes bouncing between me and Louise. With her back still turned, he waggles his dark brows and mouths, “Dude! She’s hot!”
I grind my teeth together again. I hate him.
I have eyes. I know this woman is fucking beautiful.
“Dibs,” I mouth back, and he grins before covering it with a large gulp of his coffee as Louise turns back around to face us.
Some vaguely familiar Disney song starts playing and all four of the girls chorus a round of “I love this song!” Louise reaches for her phone where it’s sitting on the counter and hits that button on the side, turning the volume up several notches.
“Oh no,” I groan, realizing too late. I lean my hips against the counter in defeat. “This isFrozen, isn’t it?”
Joel grabs a wire whisk from the utensils crock on the counter and holds it up like a microphone. Louise laughs and spins, picking up her spatula-turned-microphone and holds it up to her mouth, too.
“All my life has been a series of doors in my face…” Louise sings into her make-shift microphone, making the girls giggle across the counter, and I can do nothing but watch as my charming little brother starts dueting withmy girl.
“…I was thinking the same thing! I’ve been searching my whole life…”
“How do you even know this fucking song,” I grumble above the rim of my coffee cup as Joel practically serenades Louise, dramatic flair and all.
Her wide smile and genuine laughter are infectious as she gets into it theatrically, making my three girls cackle in their seats, singing along with the two of them. Bailey uses a piece of bacon as a microphone before taking a chomp of it. I snort, shaking my head.
It’s the most adorable thing I’ve ever seen, and I hate every second of it. She’s pure, radiant sunshine and unbridledhappiness andgoddammitshe’s looking at Joel withthat damn smilethat I haven’t gotten to taste yet. And I want to sweep my brother’s legs out from beneath him just for spite. See how charming he is from flat on his back in the middle of my kitchen floor.
“Can I say something crazy?” Joel asks, getting down on one knee in the middle of my kitchen, in almost the exact same spot that she was on her knees for me just last night. My jaw is clenched so hard I’m liable to crack a tooth when he sings, “Will you marry me?”
Andmy fucking girlsays, along with the song, “Can I say something even crazier? Yes!”
Oh fuck no.
It’s in this exact moment that I realize the promise I made to myself last night about keeping my hands to myself is blown all to hell.
Seventeen
Louise
Laughing, I help Joel up from his kneeling position on the floor and he groans dramatically, rubbing at his knee. I spin toward the counter, removing the waffle before it burns. The girls cheer from their seats, calling, “Do another one! Do another!”
“Nuh-uh. Show’s over. Eat your breakfast, girls,” Zach says. I glance up at him just as he reaches over and turns the volume down on my phone.
Oof.Mr. Grumpy looksbig mad.
Glaring daggers at his brother, jaw clenched tight, knuckles white where he’s clutching his coffee cup.
Interesting…
Joel turns back to us after putting his whisk back and picks up his coffee cup. He shoves the fingers of his opposite hand up through the shaggy, dark hair and pushes it off his forehead and out of his eyes. Dark eyes that are like molten chocolate behind dark rimmed glasses. Dark stubble shadows his jaw and upper lip, like he hasn’t shaved in a couple days.
