Page 16 of Sweet Chaos
“Starbucks.” I beeped my locks and climbed the stairs to the side entrance. Two men in their mid-forties who looked like surf bums, were lounging at an outdoor table, their faces tipped up to the morning winter sun. One of them looked like Jimmy Wilder with his longish brown hair and suntanned skin. I felt a sharp pang of sadness that it wasn’t him. Shane’s dad, Jimmy was like the father I’d never had. I missed him every fucking day.
“Hang on,” Cruz said. “I’ll take orders.”
“The fuck? I’m not the office errand boy,” I said as I stepped inside Starbucks and got in line behind a few suits.
Cruz ignored me and came back on the line a few seconds later. “I’ll text the order. It’s a big one.”
I shook my head and pocketed my phone.
“Hey Romeo.”
I turned to look at Scarlett who gave me a dimpled smile, revealing her pearly whites. Today she was wearing an oversized maroon knitted sweater, the hems unraveling, zebra print leggings and Doc Martens. Her blonde hair was pulled up into a messy topknot that tilted to the right and her face was makeup-free except for the smudged eyeliner under her bottom lashes. Yet somehow, this grunge angel was the sexiest thing I’d ever seen.
I wasn’t sure when it had happened, but baby sister had become the stuff of my wet dreams. Literally. I’d woken up this morning hard as stone, and rubbed one out in the shower, envisioning her on all fours, my hand fisting her hair. In my head, we’d fucked on every available surface in my house and in every imaginable position.
“I thought you only did drive-thrus.”
“If they had a drive-thru, I’d use it.”
“Misanthropy 101.”
“I aced that class.”
We both laughed. When our humor faded, we just stood there and engaged in a silent staring contest. I had sex on the brain. More specifically, sex with Scarlett on the brain. But it was more than that. She was cool as shit and didn’t care about anyone’s opinion of her. She just did her own thing, had her own sense of style, and fuck what everyone said about it. She’d always had a rebellious streak, and it was one of the things I liked best about her. Unlike Sienna who loved her designer clothes and shoes and shiny toys, who used to tremble with fear at the thought of losing her trust fund, Scarlett had given her father the proverbial middle finger.
Fuck you, Daddy dearest.
That took guts.
“Hey. I’m Nicola.” The brunette next to Scarlett gave me a little wave and it was only then that I noticed Scarlett wasn’t alone. Because… sex on the brain.
“Oh. Sorry.” Scarlett snapped out of it to make the belated introductions. “This is Dylan. Dylan, Nicola. Nicola’s my roommate. She’s a chef at Cinque Terre.”
“I’m a line cook. But chef sounds better.” She gave me a big white smile. She was hot, a brunette with big brown eyes and big tits. Exactly the kind of girl Cruz always went for. But she didn’t do it for me.
My gaze returned to the blonde bombshell next to her.
Scarlett rocked back on her heels, her hands clasped in front of her. “Kind of weird that I never used to run into you and now everywhere I go, there you are.”
“It’s synchronicity,” Nicola said. “You’re in sync now so you’ll probably see each other everywhere.”
“Funny how that works.” Because I did see hereverywhere.
It was my turn to order, so I moved up to the counter and opened the text from Cruz. Son of a bitch. Eight drink orders.
“What can I get you?” the guy behind the counter asked.
“Can you give me everything on this text? But instead of the tall Americano make it a venti with a triple shot. And whatever they want,” I said, ushering Scarlett and her friend up to the counter.
“Oh. You don’t have to get ours. We’ll go after him,” Scarlett told the barista.
“Just tell the guy what you want,” I huffed.
They put in their orders and tried to give me money which I refused to take. Everyone knew that Starbucks was overpriced. When me and Remy were teenagers, we couldn’t afford these little luxuries. Sienna used to bring Starbucks to school for Remy every morning. She’d been a good friend, I had to give her that, but it used to make Remy feel guilty that she couldn’t afford to return the favor. Now we could afford it and ironically, Sienna’s sister couldn’t. Pay it forward and all that.
We moved down the counter to wait for my big-ass drink order and formed a cozy little circle of three. At this rate, I’d be late for the meeting.
“So Dylan, we’re planning Scarlett’s twenty-first birthday party,” Nicola said with a smile. “Are you free on Thursday night?”
