Page 33 of Nave
“Sure,” Nave said after checking to make sure I’d only made it halfway through mine. “This is Lolly. Lolly, this is Croft. And that’s Rune out there,” he said, nodding toward where the other twin was pushing a stick vacuum around the common room.
Which was probably why we didn’t hear anyone else coming in until another man appeared in the kitchen doorway.
“You,” I gasped, jerking back in my chair as I eyed the familiar man. The same face, the same tattoos, the same devil-may-care attitude. “You said you were alone,” I said, looking back at Nave.
“I worked with Dezi only on that one job with Ben,” Nave explained. “It was complete fucking happenstance that he ended up here. He made it back here before I did.”
“Oh, okay.” That was weird, but what did I know about their lives?
“How you doing, Loll?” Dezi asked.
“Free.”
“Always a good thing to be. I brought cinnamon rolls.”
The groan was out of me before I could stop it, making both men smirk.
My stomach felt full to bursting after I finished off the last of my breakfast. But it felt wrong to turn down a cinnamon roll.
“You look a little green,” Nave said, his eyes warm. “We could take it to go, so you can enjoy later when you aren’t full.”
Food had never been something I could just… freely reach for. Not with Ben. Not when I was growing up. There’d only been about a year or so when I’d been an adult and had my own money when I had that privilege. It was a big realization that I was able to do that now. And, hopefully, forever.
“Okay,” I agreed.
Nave gave Dezi a nod as he got up to grab the dishes.
“Oh, I can wash—”
“Nah. I got it. Why don’t you take Edith out again? We can head out after this, if you’re ready.”
As much as I liked the clubhouse, I was eager to see what the homestead—and my new life, at least for the time being—was going to look like.
By the time I finished with Edith, Nave was waiting for me with my new keychain jiggling. “Do you want to drive?”
“I’m not, uh, exactly, legally, you know, supposed to be driving.”
“Well, I can fix that eventually. But for now, I’ll drive.”
With that, I grabbed Edith’s travel bag and the clothes I’d taken off the day before—along with my toothbrush, since no one else could use that now—and followed Nave to the new crossover.
I knew it had been a newer model. But upon closer inspection, it almost looked brand new. Itsmellednew as I climbed into the passenger seat with Edith in my lap.
“I did hook up her seatbelt thing in the back. Don’t want you to think I left anything behind.”
I glanced back, seeing the dog seatbelt and the top of my bags over the backseat in the trunk.
“Even got your hair ties,” he said, gesturing toward the cupholder.
“You thought of everything.”
“Not really a lot of thinking involved.”
Except there was.
Not just for the car.
But figuring out somewhere safe for me to stay, setting it up, cooking for me, making sure I had extra food.
