She smiled up at him, and he couldn’t resist the urge to lean in and kiss her on the mouth. They were still kissing right as Lila pulled up, and he realized how complacent they were getting.
Of course, they knew, but that didn’t mean that he and Marlowe made a practice of performing their relationship in front of anyone.
Relationship.
He supposed he couldn’t really deny that’s what it was at this point.
But that didn’t mean that it was…
It didn’t mean…
He couldn’t grab hold of the thought, and he didn’t want to.
“Get a room,” Lila said. “I know where you can get several.”
She jumped out of the truck, holding a case of beer and a box of cookies.
“Thin Mints,” she said. “I couldn’t resist the pack of Girl Scouts that I ran into in town.”
“Well, good for us,” Cody said.
“What are you cooking?” she asked.
“I smoked some London broil. So, you’re in for a treat.”
Lila’s pure joy at the food on offer sparked something inside of him.
And somehow, it brought him back to the beanie weenies.
It gave him a lot of joy to provide things for his family. To make his sister happy. To give things to Marlowe.
Hadn’t it made his mother happy at all to make something for her kid? Even when he was sick?
It was such a funny thing that her taking care of him was actually a bigger source of angst than all the times when she hadn’t.
But maybe because when she didn’t, it was easier to believe that it was a limitation. That she simply couldn’t.
That no matter how hard she tried, she could not do better than that.
But the evidence that she could have done better than that, that she had the capability, just not the will, that was what had broken him then, and it was what crept past his defenses now.
Cara pulled up a little bit later, and so did the rest, and Cody went to check on the meat.
He sort of hoped that Lila would end up talking to Cara, because he felt like there was a shortage of anyone in her age group around for her to chat with that wasn’t a horny, ridiculous ranch hand, who he would like for his sister to have nothing to do with.
“How is everything going with the hotel?” Nolan asked, leaning up against a support beam for the porch, next to his smoker.
“Everything is going good,” he said. “Almost shockingly so.”
“Everything has been good on our end. All the hikes I’ve led have had positive feedback, all the trail rides. Well, except for Lila.”
“You got feedback from Lila?”
“She handed me a comment card the other day,” Nolan grumbled.
“What was on it?”
“A picture of her hand with her middle finger up.”
