Page 81 of Not in Love

“I like to feed you well.” There was a pang of regret in his chest. McKenzie had tried to teach him as much as she could, but Eli had been too busy building a business. What a waste. Rue could have marveled at his kitchen prowess for weeks on end. “You can grate the cheese. Try not to shave your fingers—Minami’s in one of her vegetarian phases.”

They worked as well in his kitchen as they had in her lab, except that this time Eli took the lead and was surprised by how studiously Rue applied herself, treating garlic and olive oil like they were highly volatile substances. Cooking with McKenzie had been a lot of fun—McKenzie, who was bright and sunny and made everything turn into banter and kisses flavored with whatever ingredients they’d been using. Rue was nothing like that. She was intense and focused. A real fortress. She spoke little, always relevant questions and the occasional deadpan joke that had Eli biting his cheek to avoid laughing. She rarely volunteered information, and never started sentences with I.

And yet. There were shy smiles, and the rapt way she stared at his hands, and when he stood behind her to stir, she leaned back against his chest, just a little, just enough to make his brain and his heart and his dick pound in ways he wasn’t ready to analyze.

What would it be like to be in a relationship with her? Long, comfortable silences. Incessant honesty. Peaks and valleys. So easy to imagine some poor, hapless guy hanging from her every word. Making a full-time job out of teasing her. He’d put her at the center of his universe, and feel on top of the world when she eventually returned the favor.

Just the thought made him feel jealous, and angry, and a little sad.

“Is it ready yet?” Minami asked, popping by the kitchen. “Sul’s starving. I saw him lustily eyeing Tiny and had to distract him with saltines.”

“In three minutes. Thanks for saving my dog.”

“I consider myself more Tiny’s friend. You’re incidental.”

“Of course.” He kissed Minami on the forehead on his way to the fridge, and she took the chance to whisper in his ear, “It’s called an undercut.”

He gave her a puzzled look.

“You’ve been staring at Rue’s hair like you wanted to know.”

Rue couldn’t possibly have heard, but when he was back at the stove, she eyed him strangely. “What?” he asked.

She shook her head. “Nothing.”

Rue liked the risotto, which had Eli trying to play it cool even as he was ready to take a victory lap around the block and invest in some fireworks. Dinner went without incident, and the conversation didn’t touch sensitive topics; it flowed mostly among Harkness people, but Minami, and even Hark, made an effort to include Rue. She was shy, he realized, but he wasn’t sure whether the others were able to recognize this in her. Perhaps Tiny did, because he put his chin on her knee and gazed up at her with an adoring expression that seemed like a parody of Eli’s.

He was absolutely charmed by her inability to interact with his dog. He pictured her waking up in the morning, making her way outside to walk Tiny, politely but assertively asking him not to eat other dogs’ shit. When she lifted a hand, as though considering a tentative pat on Tiny’s head, Eli almost held his breath. She gave up after a few moments of nervous hovering, and Tiny looked absolutely crestfallen.

Me, too, buddy, Eli thought. Me, too.

Maya returned while Hark was in the middle of a scathing recount of the art house movie he’d watched the night before. She first gasped, then smiled, then roasted them. “Oh my god—is this a party?”

“It’s a dinner,” Minami said while hugging Maya. “Which is what passes for a party among people in their thirties.”

“Must be hard, being so millennial.” The last word was clearly an insult. She hugged Sul, made heart eyes at Rue, but stopped short of Hark. “Hey, Conor,” she teased. Her cheekbones were flushed pink. From the night chill, Eli hoped.

Except it was June. In Texas.

“Hi, Maya.” Hark nodded, pointedly looking elsewhere. He was always nice enough to pretend not to notice Eli’s sister’s crush, but did a miserable job of it.

“There’s leftover risotto in the kitchen,” Eli said. When his sister left, Hark’s eyes followed her. Then he poured himself another glass of wine and downed it in a single gulp.

“You know there is this thing called sipping? It’s not tequila,” Minami pointed out. She and Sul hadn’t been drinking much.

“Isn’t it? Who’s to say?”

“Its molecular structure, for one.”

“Electron pairs are overrated,” Eli interjected.

“They are not. And that’s why I finished my PhD in chemical engineering and you two did not.”

Eli and Hark exchanged a look, mumbled “savage” and “low blow,” and then stopped in the middle of shaking their heads. Because Rue glanced between them, then focused on Eli and asked, “You were in a chemical engineering PhD?”

Fuck.

The table fell silent. Eli considered damage control possibilities, but Hark beat him to it. “We sure were.”

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