Garrett
What the hell was wrong with me? I never should have asked Penny out on a date. I was in the home office, stewing. When Penny had dropped me off, I walked straight past my brothers and upstairs, ignoring their cries to come eat dinner. I was too worked up to eat. Besides, I’d had that crêpe for breakfast with Penny.
How had I misread the signals? I needed to withdraw from the play—that much was obvious. I also needed to find Penny her own office. Maybe we could finally evict Archer from Mace’s assistant's office and put her there. Or I could put her with Bronwyn. They seemed to know each other.
I couldn’t believe I had broken my own rules. What had gotten into me the last week? Penny. She was unlike anyone I’d ever thought I would be attracted to.
The door swung open, and Archer barged in. He had a plate of tacos with him. "Remy made Memphis-style tacos. They have pulled pork and coleslaw. They are extremely addictive."
"Go away."
"Hey, I brought these up here especially for you. I could have just lied to everyone and taken them to the library and eaten them."
"You aggravate me."
"Aren’t you hungry?" Archer said, waving the plate in my face.
"I’m working," I growled.
"Working on how to get into Penny’s pumpkin patch?"
I glared at him. "That is an incredibly inappropriate comment."
"But accurate, right?" He waggled his eyebrows. "Remy said he saw you two having a long, romantic brunch, and Hazel said looks were exchanged."
"Nothing happened."
"She held your hand!"
"Lies."
"Davy took a picture." Archer pulled out his phone, scrolled, and stuck the screen in my face. There was a picture of Penny and me. She was laughing at something I’d said. I looked… not like myself.
"You sure you don’t want these tacos?"
I shook my head.
"You can tell your older brother what's wrong," Archer cajoled, patting me on the head. He jerked his hand away when I slapped at it. "I have quite a lot of experience in the woman department, and I am currently engaged to be married."
He waggled his left hand in my face, displaying the tattoo reading I BELONG TO HAZEL around his left ring finger.
"I can’t believe you got that tattoo, on your hand no less. It's so unprofessional."
"It’s romantic." He gazed at his hand.
"You aren't even married yet," I said, crossing my arms.
"It's my engagement tattoo. It’s the twenty-first century, Garrett. Get with it. Plus chicks dig tattoos. I was watching a YouTube video on how to do prison-style tattoos. We could give you a real sexy tattoo. That will really have Penny jumping you in your office, glass windows or not," Archer said as he took a huge bite of a taco.
"We aren’t having this conversation."
"I knew you weren’t bringing him those tacos!" Mace yelled from the doorway.
"Garrett said he didn’t want them!" Archer protested through the mouthful of food.
"Then you should have brought them back downstairs and shared them with the group," Hunter said, coming in and sitting at his desk.
"Garrett’s having woman troubles," Archer said. "He’s lost his appetite."
