Page 42 of Tripped By Love
“I’s Velle. I’s two,” Chevelle said, holding up two fingers.
“Two. Wow, man, that’s old. Bet you can drive a car and everything,” Jonas teased, and Chevelle giggled.
He pushed against my chest. “Car. I get car.”
I put him down, and he ran out of the kitchen toward the toy box in the living room, digging through it.
Cassidy joined us in the kitchen. “Thanks for distracting him.”
I eyed her up and down. She’d taken off the yellow sweater, showing off a tank top of the same lemony color that bared her shoulders and arms in a way that called to me to touch all her visible skin. She looked like a lemon drop cookie that would be sweet and tangy and addicting, which had me thinking of sliding hands and tongue over every inch of her.
She turned to Jonas, and before either of us expected it, she wrapped him in a hug, squeezing tight. I knew what that felt like. I’d had a handful of those hugs. As if she was embedding herself in your memories with the strength of the embrace. I hated that I was jealous of Jonas for getting one of them. Especially when he’d earned it by defending her.
“Thank you,” she breathed out. Jonas’s wide eyes met mine over her shoulder.
Then, she let go and looked at us both. “Dinner is on me, gentleman. Thank you for getting rid of him.”
“You don’t owe us anything, Ang?Cassidy,” I said, flushing at the almost slip up I’d done again. She smiled at me.
“Well then, stay because I’m celebrating the deal I signed and don’t want to eat alone.”
“I’m sure Arlene and Petri would be happy to celebrate with you.”
I wanted to kick myself because it made her smile slip a little.
“You’re right, but I’m not up to Mom and Dad tonight,” she said quietly, and then the smile turned full wattage again, capturing my breath and holding it almost as if she’d hugged me. “It’s lasagna, and you know you love my lasagna.”
I did love her lasagna. I shouldn’t have, because it was made with none of the things one expected of the Italian dish, but somehow Cassidy had made hers taste even better than the meat and gluten-loaded ones I’d known before hers.
“Let me shower, then I’ll come help,” I told her, easily giving in, and impossibly, her smile grew wider.
“Deal.”
“I’ll be back, and then you can have a turn in the bathroom,” I said to Jonas, sending him a message that I wanted him to stay in case Clayton came back.
“I don’t stink like you do. I’m fine,” Jonas said.
I moved in, sniffed the air around him, and pretended to gag. “You smell worse.”
He stuck his tongue out in a way he hadn’t done in years, and it eased the twisted pain I’d been holding tight in my heart for him. He was going through a lot with Maliyah, and Mel, and the crowd he’d merged himself with just to be there in case she needed him. Today proved just how much he would stand up for her. I needed to teach him a few moves.
I took off out the back door, determined to shower in the quick, military-efficient way that I’d become accustomed to. And I would have been back in Cassidy’s house in less than fifteen minutes if it hadn’t been for Brady’s number lighting up my phone.
“Where are you?” he asked.
I was glad I could answer truthfully. “At the apartment. What’s up?”
“That’s what I want to know. What gives? How come my sister knows you have family in Texas and I don’t, after more than seven years together? What was the deal with you and her in my office today? Are you sleeping with Cassidy?” There wasn’t really anger in his voice, but maybe a layer of hurt.
“Wow. That’s a lot of questions,” I said in order to buy myself time while I tried to assemble all my answers. I didn’t know how to feel about the fact that Cassidy had told him about Maliyah. Had she told him about Jonas as well? Not that I expected to keep him a secret while I was in Grand Orchard. I’d actually been hoping Brady would let him hang around the studio and absorb what was going on. Reignite his interest in music that I was pretty sure he’d put aside so he could be in an art class with Mel. He hadn’t said as much, but I could put one and one together and end up with two just like anyone else.
Brady was as silent as I was, and it turned awkward.
“You’re more than my bodyguard, Marco. You know that, right?” Brady asked, breaking the silence.
I sighed, rubbing my hand through the damp stubble of my hair. “Yes.”
Ever since the Fiona Fiasco?as we liked to call the incident with the dead stalker?Brady had surrounded himself with people who meant something to him. People who could see him for the real person he was and not just a celebrity with a ginormous-sized bank account. It was important to him that everyone around him feel like they were family. We’d spent thousands of hours in each other’s company. On planes, in cars, waiting behind the scenes in stadiums. I knew every little thing about Brady, Tristan, and Hannah. I even knew the moment they’d found out that he and Tristan were having a baby. I’d been the one to buy him the goddamn pregnancy tests—multiple because he’d wanted to make sure there wasn’t another false negative. I’d walked into the pharmacy, bought a dozen of the damn things, and everyone in the store had looked at me like I was a pimp.
