Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 75748 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 379(@200wpm)___ 303(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75748 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 379(@200wpm)___ 303(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
Or was it great timing?
Because surely it was a terrible idea to let that go any further. Not only was he my dead husband’s oldest friend, but he was now my neighbor. There were so many ways it could go wrong.
“I make the syrup myself,” I told him, waving the glass jar at him.
“Give me a bump,” he demanded, offering me the top of his hand. To, presumably, drop the liquid onto. I got him a spoon. “Yes, much more civilized,” he said with a twinkle in his brown eyes as I poured the syrup onto it.
He put the spoon in his mouth and let out a moan. “You should sell this. You’d make a fortune.” He glanced around. “An even bigger fortune,” he said with a charmingly lopsided smile. He caught my gaze sliding over his outfit, and the smile went a little self-deprecating. “I’m clearly the brother who doesn’t have his shit together.” He gestured down at his outfit.
“I dunno. Gav might fight you for that place,” Nico said, coming back out of the hall bathroom fully dressed.
Internally, I wept.
Even if the man did wear a suit really well.
“Oh, but did Gav have to use toilet paper as a coffee filter this morning? I don’t think so.”
“Put them on auto ship,” Nico suggested.
“That is a good idea.”
“Now,” Nico added with a quirk of his lips that suggested he knew that if it wasn’t done right that moment, it wouldn’t get done at all.
“Right. Right,” Zen agreed, reaching for his phone.
“Do you want your coffee hot or iced?” I asked.
“Precious,” he said, shooting me another of those charming smiles of his, “I would drink two-day-old burnt coffee out of a dubiously clean cup. However you want to make it is fine by me.”
He walked over toward the dining table to set his backpack down on a chair as he typed away on his phone.
“If you saw his dirty mug collection, you’d know that was true,” Nico said.
“He has executive dysfunction,” I guessed.
“Good guess.”
“My college boyfriend had ADHD. He couldn’t think straight if someone was playing music or a dog was barking in the distance. And as soon as he put something away in a cabinet, he forgot it existed. He ended up with six of the exact same binders because he kept forgetting he already bought them.”
“Is that why you broke up?” he asked. What he wasn’t saying hung between the words. Because I was a little on the anal side, did his spacey tendencies drive me up a wall?
“Oh, no. That would be the chronic cheating.”
“Oof,” Nico said, wincing. “Sorry.”
“Turns out he couldn’t remember he had a girlfriend when I was out of sight,” I said, rolling my eyes. It had been long enough that I could laugh about it now. Besides, the grief over that relationship was overshadowed by the loss of my grandmother directly after. “You’re not a cheater, are you?” I asked Zeno when he came back to take his cup of coffee from me.
“Well, now, see, I manage to avoid that,” he said with another of those boyish smiles of his. Half flirtation, half mischief. “By never getting serious with anyone.”
“A solid plan,” I agreed, shooting him a smile.
After that, he finally sipped his coffee. Then he spent a solid three minutes rhapsodizing about its virtues.
“I suddenly see why you’re not interested in a relationship,” I said when he was done. “Your one true love is clearly caffeine.”
“She does keep me going,” he agreed, cradling his cup in both hands.
There was another knock at the door then, making me stiffen.
“Sorry, Blair,” Nico said, wincing at me, apologetic. “I meant to tell you before they started showing up. But I…” He trailed off for a second. I knew what he was going to say. That he’d gotten distracted. That we both had. “I slept in,” he finished. “That’s Leo. I had him swing by to grab the equipment for Zen to install.”
“Oh, okay. That’s fine.”
“Word to the wise,” Zen said, leaning closer as Nico went to the door. “Just make Leo a plain coffee. His palate isn’t refined enough to appreciate this amazingness,” he said, waving his mug. “But he would be too polite to turn it down.”
“Got it,” I agreed, giving him a grateful smile. “Thanks.”
Nico opened the door and in walked another Costa brother. Just as handsome. But Leo was a little wider, like he really enjoyed the weights section at the gym.
He had brown eyes like Zeno, instead of Nico’s blue. And when he shot me a smile, there was a single dimple in his cheek that etched almost like a scar, giving him a darkly charming look.
“Leondro, this is Blair. Blair, Leo. The second oldest.”
“It’s nice to meet you,” I said, offering my hand. “Oh, uh, I should probably go get dressed,” I said, suddenly realizing I was wearing next to nothing in front of two strangers.