“Coffee?”
She shivered as she accepted the mug and a small carton of cream from him. “Can I help?”
“Nah.” He gestured to the stools at the breakfast bar that overlooked the kitchen.
He turned back to the stove. God. There was something about the unlikely image of the big manly man padding around the kitchen, totally at ease that…did something to her.
“If I had to guess how you take your eggs, I’d say poached,” he said as he pivoted to retrieve some toast that had just popped.
“That’s exactly right!” she exclaimed.
“Which is why I scrambled them,” he said, smirking as he slid a plate in front of her.
She rolled her eyes. But it was good to be reminded that Cameron MacKinnon, despite the solid he’d done her last night, was still, elementally, a jerk.
“Easier,” he said. “Way less fussy.”
“Wow,” she said, her voice intentionally flat. “Eggs as metaphor for personality. How original.”
“I do make a pretty mean hollandaise, though,” he said, delivering her a couple slices of toast and a dish of butter. “But I only make eggs Benedict for women who actually sleep with me.”
The sound of throat clearing came from behind them. Jane whirled.
“Jay!”
On the surface of things, Jay was dressed not unlike his brother. He also wore a white tank, but instead of jeans, it was paired with blue pajama bottoms.
“Jane,” he said, making his way to the coffeemaker and pouring himself a cup. “Fancy meeting you here.” He took a big gulp of coffee without doctoring it—and Jane knew he normally didn’t take his coffee black—before turning to Cameron. “And you. Thanks for waiting for me to get home last night before you took off.”
Whoa. Was this the first time Jay had seen his brother since Cameron had been back? She would have assumed they’d had their reunion last night, before Cameron went to the bar.
“Sorry about that,” said Cameron, talking to Jay but busying himself refilling the toaster with a new round of bread. “I’ve been cooped up since I landed back on Canadian soil. I needed to bust out.”
Jane was suffused with a growing discomfort. She wasn’t used to family conflict. Not since Dad had died. And not really before, either—he had mostly been a happy drunk. She certainly couldn’t imagine this kind of tension between her and her brother Noah.
“And I suppose your phone was conveniently dead last night, so you didn’t get my texts,” Jay said, moving around the breakfast bar to sit beside Jane. She didn’t miss the quick once-over he gave her, even as he kept talking to Cameron in the same deadpan-bordering-on-icy tone. “Or you lost it, maybe.”
“I didn’t sleep with your brother!” she shouted. She wasn’t sure if she was doing it to protect her own reputation or to try to diffuse some of the tension in the room.
Jay turned to her with the barest hint of a smile. “You always were the smart one in Elise’s crowd.” Then he turned to his brother and said…nothing. Wow. It was probably kind of crappy that Cameron hadn’t made contact with his brother yesterday, but, still, where was the “I’m glad you didn’t die in Iraq” welcome home man-hug?
Also, where was Doctor Phil when you needed him? Because Jane wasn’t good at this shit. She stuffed a piece of buttered toast—how was it possible that even Cameron’s toast was delicious?—in her mouth in order to avoid having to say anything.
She’d started on her second piece when she realized what she was doing. “Oh, no!” she exclaimed, spraying crumbs.
Both brothers turned to her with looks of concern so identical that they might have been amusing in a different context.
“I’m on a diet,” she mumbled, pushing her plate away. T-minus nine days till she had to pay the piper…if the piper was a size ten number in mulberry and not plum (the debate had raged for days) with a fitted bodice and a swingy skirt.
God. She allowed herself a moment of self-disgust. Of course, her plan to not only drop fifteen pounds but to, like, somehow magically acquire Michelle Obama arms so that her own wobbly ones didn’t look like bleached sausages at the wedding had come to naught.
“You don’t need to diet,” Cameron said. She didn’t know if his clenched jaw was residual anger at his brother or if it was new anger summoned just for her. But before she could decide, he turned and started rinsing dishes at the sink.
“One thing we actually agree on,” Jay said, turning to her. “Is this about the wedding? Is Elise on you about this, because God bless her—you know I adore her—but that is one step too far.”
“No, no,” she said, waving her hands dismissively. “Elise hasn’t said a word.” She got up, intending to deliver her dishes to the sink.
“Why are you here, Jane?” Jay asked, his brow furrowed as he looked between her and his brother.
“Someone has to rein in the black-sheep brother, right?” Cameron said, his back still to them as he banged around making quite the racket, moving dishes from the sink to the dishwasher. Bitterness radiated from him.
Jane approached with her dishes. “Nope,” she said. “I just went to meet Cameron’s plane yesterday since you were at work and Elise was busy.” Of course that went exactly zero of the way toward explaining why she was in Jay’s kitchen the next morning with her messy hair and her wrinkled clothes, but, suddenly, she didn’t want Jay knowing that Elise thought his brother needed babysitting. For the first time, she wondered how Cameron had felt yesterday when she, a complete stranger, had picked him up and then refused to leave him alone. “Cameron and I ended up at a bar last night.” That was true, if vague. “And I’m afraid I had a bit too much to drink, so Cameron brought me here.”
Jay seemed to accept her explanation. He downed the remainder of his coffee and stood. “I need to hit the shower and get out of here. I guess I’ll see you both later.”
No! Jane wanted to shout! Do a man-hug! Or shake hands, even! “It must be so great to have Cameron back from Iraq, huh, Jay?”
Cameron whipped his gaze to her. He was not pleased with her little outburst. But, damn, somebody had to make these two Neanderthals do the right thing. It wasn’t her fault that subtlety had never been her strong suit.
Jay cleared his throat. “Uh, yeah, it is.” He walked over to Cameron and laid a hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry things didn’t work out in the army, but I’m glad you could make the wedding.” He sounded like he was reciting from a script, but at least it was something. Jane held her breath in the silence that followed. It was probably only a few seconds, but it seemed to stretch on forever.
“Thanks, man. It’s good to see you,” Cameron finally said, and she exhaled.
“So what are you up to today?” she asked Cameron once Jay had headed for the shower.
“Why? You still on duty?”
She had no idea, actually.
Like Cameron, she had been a delinquent texter last night. She had a bunch of them from Elise, but going back in time before the one telling her they were working on the mystery teapots again this morning, they were all of the “WHERE ARE YOU?” and “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” and “DID CAMERON BURN ANYTHING DOWN?” and “OMG, DID CAMERON KNOCK ANYONE UP?” variety.
“I’m not babysitting you,” she said firmly as she scrolled.
“Yes. You’ve mentioned that a few times.” He topped off her coffee, leaned over, and propped his elbows up on the breakfast bar so they were eye to eye.
“I was just wondering what your plans are for today.” She tried to project her voice because she was afraid it was going to come out as weak and wobbly as she felt. The hangover, the virile, tattooed personal chef: it was all a little overwhelming. But she’d overcompensated, and basically yelled the question at him.
He looked like he was trying not to laugh. “My plans are to get laid.”
Her eye roll was as involuntary. “Ow.”
“What?”
“I rolled my eyes so hard my eyeballs actually hurt.”
“Well, you asked. You also cock-blocked me last night, if you recall.”
Jane managed to keep her eyeballs reined in, but only just.
And of course that was the moment Jay emerged from the hallway, dressed in his usual weekday uniform of a navy suit.
“Keeping it classy, I see, brother,” Jay said.
“I always do,” Cameron shot back.
“I gotta get to work.” Without another word, or even a glance back, Jay collected his briefcase and phone from a table in the entryway and departed, leaving an awkward silence in his wake.
Okay, WWTBD? What would the bride do? The answer, of course, was that the bride would continue to cock-block the hell out of Cameron. As much as Jane wanted to go home and sleep off her hangover, she needed to do the responsible thing and redirect this dude. Of course, she personally couldn’t care less if he slept with half of Toronto, and there were no barns in a city this size that he could burn down, but she was suffused with a general sense of foreboding nevertheless. Butterfly effect and all that.
So she pasted on a smile and said, “Let’s go to the CN Tower!” It was the first thing that popped into her head when she thought about what people did when they visited Toronto. But it was also the lamest thing she could have said. The CN Tower was where busloads of tourists from Middle America were disgorged by the hundreds.