Page 26 of One Little Problem
Being busy still wrapped up in Ryan, Zach called him on it instead. “Aww, pretending you care about the game instead of telling the homos to stop? You’ve gone soft Joey,” Zach said.
“I can get h—” Joey responded with kneejerk annoyance, then caught himself. “Nope, not falling for that.” Getting into the innuendo game with Zach never led to anything good. Joey and Zach threw whatever they could find at each other, some trash, quarters, the shot glass.
Still turned towards me, Ryan played with my hair while I pretended to grumble about it while Lydia put a finger to her lips and thought about what to say; it was her turn. Zach was down to one hand, three fingers, and Ryan had almost all his digits up. I didn’t know exactly how many once he turned around again because I couldn’t see his hands since his back was to me.
Everyone else was somewhere in between Zach and Ryan with their fingers. I was down to five fingers, one hand, but it wasn’t totally fair because all of them but Alicia knew me well enough that they could take cheap shots.
“Never have I ever stolen anything,” Lydia said.
“Really?” Zach asked, judgment clear in his voice, like not doing the wrong thing was something to judge people for. “I’m so disappointed.”
“No, I just wanted to say that.” She took a drink.
I discretely took a tiny, little sip and—
“OH MY GOD,” Ryan yelled. “MY ENITRE LIFE IS A LIE!” Yeah, it was hard to hide from him when I drank because I had to reach over him to get my drink.
“Calm down, it’s not like I’m a career criminal,” I tried even though there was no way it would calm him down. Good thing he couldn’t see me clearly, so I could try to sound annoyed. He made a big deal out of everything and I hated it except for how I didn’t hate it. He just got so cute when he was excited and he over-gestured with his hands, that was a positive and negative as those things could be a weapon, because I swear he’d take someone’s eye out.
“Did you steal bread so your starving family can eat?” he guessed, turning again so he was half facing me, hand poking at a place near my mouth. Oh, maybe I was having fond Ryan thoughts and smiling and now he was touching my dimples with his fingers.
“Yep,” I said. “I stole bread so my starving family could eat.”
“Now you’re lying too. Crime is such a vicious cycle,” he said somberly.
I sighed. “It was only a couple pies.” Did four count as a couple? A couple couple.
“MORE THAN ONE?” he screamed. I pulled my head away because our faces were close and I liked being able to hear, but he saw me pulling away and instinctively went to chase me so we just played a really weird game of tag because I couldn’t really go anywhere and I didn’t exactly mind his face being close to mind just not while he yelled.
“Up is down, black is white,” he bemoaned. More than one pie but all at the same time. So it was only one incident of crime.
I tried not to grin. I really liked that he thought I was such a decent guy that I wouldn’t do anything like steal. Ryan poked my face again, so I was probably smiling anyway. “It all happened so fast,” I explained. “And I couldn’t find the blueberry, so I just took a bunch.” I wanted to get in and out, but I ran into a bunch of stuff since I couldn’t see with all the boxes in my hands.
Ryan’s reaction to that was nonverbal, just a sound that might have been his brain shutting down or overloading or something.
“Calm down,” Zach said. “It really wasn’t as cool as he’s making it sound.” Rude! Yes, my hands had been so sweaty I’d dropped the boxes so many times and I overdid it with keeping my head on a swivel as my head turned blindly in all directions so much that I pulled a muscle in my neck but still, rude. I glared at Zach and he raised his hands in a consolatory manner. Damn right, since I was a thief for him.
Ryan turned to Zach. “Were you involved?”
“No,” he smirked. “I had an alibi.”
“The pies were from a competitor’s store,” I said. His family owned grocery stores in town.
Ryan considered that. “You being involved in corporate espionage is hot but still wrong.” He put both hands on my face. “You’re too pretty to be a criminal.”
His warm hands bracketed my face and I smiled at him. “Thanks, babe.”
He blew me a kiss as he leaned away to steal some of my drink. Alicia and Lydia rolled their eyes. Okay, sharing a drink had no practical purpose. Just meant I needed a new drink faster. Still, I felt all content and happy every time he did that. I liked him sharing my drink.
“I’d like to know how you got Luke to steal,” Alicia said to Zach.
“I didn’t make him,” Zach said. “He did it of his own free will.” Yeah, it had actually been my idea, so I didn’t protest his words, but it didn’t seem like anyone believed him. “The owners of the store were saying racist things,” he summed up. About their competitors, Zach’s family.
And not even, like, original things. Zach’s parents and older relatives had been here a long time, and his family was part of the community. Pretty rude to call them terrorists just because they sold turkey for a better price than you and their store did better or whatever. And telling Zach and his cousins to go back to where they came from? They were freaking born here. This was where they came from. Then Joey had been hungry and it all just happened.
I still sorta felt bad about it, pies weren’t exactly cheap, so taking four of them added up. My guilt only lasted for a moment and then I remembered the storeowners were racists, and maybe that was victim blamey but still, maybe they shouldn’t have been racist. No, they definitely shouldn’t have been racist.
“You did it for justice!” Ryan exclaimed and gave me a dreamy look that I probably totally returned even though I tried to look heroic and dashing and whatnot.
