Page 14 of Cocky Counsel

“And like I said, I don’t need anyone to take care of me.” She barely got the last few words out before she started coughing, her voice raspy from it.

I blew out a frustrated breath and leaned back against the chair, letting my phone sit in my lap while I waited.

“You know, it’s not a matter of you needing someone to take care of you. I know that you don’t need me, however, I wish that you would stop being so difficult and just let me help you. It’s just dinner, Eva, it doesn’t have to be this complicated.”

“Everything with you is complicated,” she spit out, her eyes going wide in embarrassment right after she said it.

I tilted my head to the side and studied her. Something was weighing heavy on her mind, and I wished that she would open up and talk to me about it. If we could clear the air, things would be a whole lot easier.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing, just forget I said anything.”

“It’s not that easy,” I said carefully, trying my best to keep my tone even. I didn’t want it to come across as harsh and make her shut down even more with me. After our random hookup yesterday, I felt a stronger pull to her than I had felt before, and it had been fucking with my head all day. The last thing that I needed right now was for things to get messier and more convoluted. “The only way for us to clear the air between us is if we can actually talk about things with each other. Not make snide remarks and then avoid having to explain them.”

“My head hurts too much to have to deal with all of this,” she said wearily, rubbing her fingers along her temple. “I appreciate all of your help but like I said, you’re free to go.”

I pulled my lips together into a thin line and shook my head before getting up and walking to the kitchen. I opened the freezer door and looked inside, surprised to see a handful of pans covered with foil lining the top shelf. The next shelf had a couple of cartons of ice cream and a few bags of frozen vegetables. On the bottom shelf was a bag of frozen chicken breasts that had at least an inch of ice covering the pieces that were left in the bag and a half-empty bottle of wine.

“What are you doing?” she asked as she leaned forward and peered into the kitchen.

“Well,” I said as I closed the door and turned to look at her. “I was going to cook you dinner, however, unless you want ice cream and wine, we’re going to have to look at other options.”

“Yeah, I could’ve told you that you weren’t going to find anything in there,” she laughed and leaned back against the pillows. “I come from a large family of Latin women, and I’m the only one who can’t cook.”

I laughed and pulled my head back in mock surprise, her eyes briefly lighting up as the smile pulled across her red cheeks.

“You don’t say,” I teased playfully.

“Hey, what can I say?” She shrugged and pulled the blanket up higher on her chest. “While my mom was busy teaching my sisters to cook, I was always up in my room studying. I guess my mom just gave up on trying to domesticate me when I was more interested in school than cooking.”

“Eh, there’s a lot of people who don’t like to cook,” I offered, pulling my phone back out of my pocket. It was getting late, and I wanted to make sure she got some food in her before I left.

“Oh, it’s not that I don’t like to cook. I really CANNOT cook. I almost caught our kitchen on fire trying to make toast, and I’ve ruined macaroni and cheese so many times that no one allows me to even look at the box anymore.”

“How did you almost catch the house on fire? Toasters are fairly simple to use…” I quirked a brow, eager to hear how she could have possibly screwed that up.

“It wasn’t all my fault,” she laughed easily. “My family has a really old toaster that is built into the wall. My dad thought it would be a great idea to save space. Well, obviously you pull it out when you’re using it and then push it back in when it’s not in use. Unless you’re Eva. Then you put your bread inside and pull the lever down to make toast, THEN push it back into the wall.”

I reached up and ran a hand across my face, trying to hide my smile as the laughter bubbled up inside of me. The look on her face was adorable, and I could picture her as a naïve little girl, attempting to make toast without realizing what she was doing.

“Okay, that’s pretty bad,” I laughed. “But we all do silly stuff when we’re kids.”

“That was just last week,” she said, her tone serious and her face straight as she watched for my reaction. I closed my eyes and bit the inside of my lip to keep from laughing.

“You’re kidding, right?” I asked quickly before I lost control.

“Yeah,” she said playfully, her voice still raspy. “It was two weeks ago.”

I watched as the wicked smile pulled across her face, pure satisfaction that she had gotten me when my face fell in shock that she would do such a thing. She leaned back against the couch, holding her stomach as she laughed before the coughing started up again.

“You little shit,” I joked, before pressing the call button to order our food. I felt her eyes on me while I waited for the girl to come back on the line to take my order. “Yes, I’d like an order of chicken noodle soup, a Philly cheesesteak, and a side order of toast.”

I watched as she rolled her eyes while listening to me on the phone.

“And if you can, please make sure the toast is slightly burnt.”

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