Page 18 of Interference

“Better than I have in ages. Thanks.” I gestured at the food. “And this is amazing.”

He laughed softly, and I thought he might’ve blushed. “Practice, I guess?”

“Eh, that only goes so far. One of my buddies from the Army could not get it right. We finally convinced him that he should at least try seasoning things once in a while, and then he went to the opposite extreme, and…” I groaned and rolled my eyes. “We just had him bring beer to the barbecues after that.”

Anthony cocked a brow as he brought up his coffee for a sip. “Did he at least have decent taste in beer?”

I made a face and wobbled my hand in the air.

He almost choked on his coffee, but he recovered. “Wow. See, that’s the guy who brings cups and napkins.”

“Yeah, right,” I muttered. “He probably would’ve found the knockoff reject cups that even the PX refused to carry because they were made out of asbestos or something.”

Anthony snorted. “Oh, God. One of those.”

“Uh-huh. Nice guy, don’t get me wrong. Just keep his ass out of the kitchen.”

“Sounds like one of my teammates.” He picked up a strip of bacon and bit off a piece. “Fortunately, his wife is a great cook, so she brings food to everything.” He grinned. “And it annoys him so much that we’re always like, ‘Jody cooked this, right? Not you?’”

I laughed. “Exactly! Does she ever let him cook for team functions?”

“Actually, there’s a funny story about that.” He took a quick swallow of coffee. “Last year at Thanksgiving, she shows up with this container and says Brian made the cookies. And we’re all like…” He made a face that was both dubious and disgusted. “She says to trust her. Then we realize he’s behind her rolling his eyes, so we’re thinking, okay? Did he royally fuck up the cookies and she brought them anyway to troll us?” He picked up his fork again, and as he loaded some eggs onto it, he said with a chuckle, “She opens the lid, and there it is—two packs of Chips Ahoy! cookies.”

“Oh my God!” I laughed again. “That’s hilarious.”

“Right? So now everyone calls him Chip just to piss him off. He gets so annoyed, but it’s—”

A low rumble cut him off. He straightened, his head snapping toward the kitchen doorway, and I thought he mouthed a curse.

My heart jumped. “What?”

Anthony swallowed. Then, just before he ate the eggs on his fork, he muttered, “My boyfriend’s here.”

His… boyfriend? He’d mentioned the guy yesterday, and I hadn’t thought much of it. But why the reaction when the boyfriend showed up?

An engine approached; pulling into the garage, I assumed. Then it shut off, and the garage door rumbled again. A car door shut, and Anthony shifted uncomfortably.

Oh, fuck. Did the boyfriend not know about me? How was he going to react? Was Anthony about to be read the riot act for taking me in? Was I about to get booted out? Oh, shit. Shit, shit, shit.

Lily’s tags jingled. She put her paw on the barstool’s rung and rested her head on my lap. As I absently started petting her, I realized alarm had sent my heartrate up. Trying to be subtle, I took some slow breaths and kept petting her as I willed myself to calm down without Anthony noticing I was agitated in the first place.

His boyfriend wouldn’t be dangerous. Anthony would’ve warned me if he was. Right?

Lily nudged her head against me some more.

“It’s okay, baby,” I murmured.

Anthony turned toward me as if he were about to ask what was up, but of course, that was when the door opened.

The man who strode into the kitchen was white, same as Anthony and me, and he was built a lot like Anthony—tall and lean. Like his boyfriend, he had on a Seattle Bobcats hoodie. His hair was lighter and longer, kept out of his face by a backwards baseball cap.

I couldn’t put my finger on anything that was particularly threatening about the guy, but when he looked at Anthony, the air in the room got about ten degrees colder.

Then his eyes flicked to me, and confusion registered as his brows furrowed beneath his hat. “Uh. Hi?”

“This is Wyatt,” Anthony said quickly as he got up from his chair. “He’s a friend of a friend—needed a place to stay for a while.” To me, he said, “This is my boyfriend, Simon.”

Simon and I awkwardly shook hands over the island.

---