talk some reason into your little brother.”
“Jay, reason with your reflection.” Bad move. Mitch and I hated to be lumped into one person. I slapped Liam in the head. Mitch had his arm around Emma and moved it to do the same as me, making Emma lose her balance. I caught her by the waist, and by instinct pulled her toward my body to support her. Emma’s eyes went wide and I loosened up my grip, but I didn’t let her go. It was easy to mold her close to me, as if we had been made for each other.
“Sorry, I grabbed you too tight, right?” She nodded, but didn’t push me. My brothers apologized to her after I gave them a well-deserved glare. I didn’t release her. “We’re ridiculous together, sorry. Strawberry Daiquiri, peace offering, on me. You can draw some ideas for him.” Work, a distraction that brought a smile to her face, and she didn’t notice I still had her in my arms sucking in her sweet aroma, relishing the softness of her body. “Mitch, after you’re done, you can give them to whoever has your account. They don’t need to know she did them. Happy everyone?”
Thank you, she mouthed. I gave her a smile and a kiss on the forehead.
Chapter 12
Emma
I STARED AT THE pad where I had been doodling for the past twenty minutes. Jake found me some paper and a pencil—a brand new pad and a box of pencils. That was Jacob Knight, a solverer—my own word for his superpower—to any problem, even though such a word didn’t exist. Mitch needed a new menu, and I needed paper and pencil. He made it happen. I took a deep breath while I glanced at Mitchel Knight, who had asked me to reinvent his menus. Easy task, if it wasn’t for the daiquiri I was drinking, the fact that I didn’t know his restaurants, and my personal confusion.
I sat next to Jake with his brothers. Mitch was the exact replica of his twin—Jake—a slight difference between their body tone and minus the scar on Jake’s left eyebrow. Oh yeah, and the slight bump on Jake’s nose. They had the same green eyes. Unlike Liam who had amber eyes and light brown hair. They were about the same shoulder width and height; a quarter inch taller than six foot three.
This entire picture was wrong, I cut ties with Jake three months ago. I made sure we didn’t bump into each other, and all that work went to the trash today when Gaby introduced him as the cousin to be. He should be in London, or wherever he had to travel for work on that rent-a-cop gig he had on the side. Not here, next to me while I was having one of the worst crises in my life. Yet I wanted to place my head on his shoulder for one second, and feel as if someone had my back for once. Stupid tears, they really didn’t want to stay put today.
“What’s wrong, babe?” Jake came close to my ear and whispered, sending a shiver through my entire body. Then he pointed toward the pad. I wanted to explain that it seemed as if my hand-brain communication system had been turned off. However, he didn’t wait for an answer. “Too many daiquiris?” I wanted to say yes and let that be my excuse, but my disconnected brain didn’t stop my mouth in time and proceeded to answer honestly.
“No.” I had only had one so far and was making my way through number two. “Though, I could use more strawberries and limeade to level the alcohol quantity that thing has.”
My ninety percent rum, two drops of limeade and one drop of strawberry mix didn’t help with the moving room and series of ants marching through my arms. Jake sipped some of what was left of my drink. Immediately he snapped his fingers, calling the waiter.
“Leave it like that,” I said.
Infuriated, I rolled my eyes. Jake problem solved—everything. He didn’t solve the weather when I was too hot or too cold, because God and he agreed not to mess with the ecosystem. A self-reliant person like me didn’t like meddlers, and the guy had a doctorate in meddling—like his Mom. I noticed that today.
He snapped his fingers at
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