The Revelation (28 page)

Josh suddenly looks like he feels sick. I don’t
understand the expression on his face. He’s grimacing like he’s in
pain.

“Well, if you don’t cook at all, then how do you
feed yourself?”

“Um,” he says. “I... uh... I go out with friends or
get food delivered. Sometimes, if I’m exhausted, I just make myself
a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Speaking of which, are you
hungry? I can make you a peanut butter and jelly sandwich that’s so
good, it’ll make you come.”

“Wow. That sounds like quite a PB&J.”

“Oh, it is.”

“I’ll definitely have to take a rain check. Every
girl should try an orgasm-inducing PB&J at least once. But I’m
still pretty stuffed from all the food we had at the hotel. Those
crab cakes really hit the spot.”

“Especially after we’d worked up such an appetite.”
He snickers. “Good times were had by all at the ol’ Four Seasons,
eh?”

“Well, good times were had by two out of three of
us, anyway.” I join him in snickering.

Ah, that was delicious. Just as Josh predicted,
Bridgette was long gone when we emerged from the bedroom,
and
she’d left a delightful text for Josh as a parting gift,
too:
“Fuck you, Faraday,
” Bridgette’s angry text said—and
I’m purring even now remembering the gleeful expression on Josh’s
face when he showed it to me. “
Lose my number, motherfucker. But
tell your hot girlfriend I’ll happily comfort her after you’ve
dumped her ass and broken her heart.
Auf wiedersehen,
arschloch. P.S. I hope she gives you herpes.
”

Josh and I laughed pretty hard about Bridgette’s
text.

“Battery acid in her heart, indeed,” I said when I
read it.

“I told you,” Josh said.

The only thing more enjoyable than reading that text
from Bridgette was seeing the look on her face when Josh abruptly
changed the plan and dragged me into the bedroom, hell-bent on
keeping me all to himself. Delicious.

I’m suddenly aware Josh has been talking while I’ve
been lost in my thoughts.

“... and since I’ve been home from New York,” Josh
is saying, “a delivery service has been bringing me gourmet meals
every few days.” He grabs my hand, leads me to his refrigerator,
and opens the door to reveal four neatly stacked see-through
containers. “Nothing but lean proteins and greens. Everything low
in saturated fats; no simple carbs; all calorie counts precisely
calibrated for my weight and fitness goals. All courtesy of the one
and only Jonas Patrick Faraday.”

“Jonas orders your meals?”

Josh rolls his eyes. “He kept giving me shit about
my burgers and fries and Doritos and I was like, ‘Dude, I travel
too much to think about eating right all the time—leave me the fuck
alone.’ Next thing I knew, these meals started showing up.” He
chuckles. “The dude’s like having a fucking wife, I swear to
God—he’s such a nag. I haven’t eaten any of ’em yet as an act of
protest.”

“Is that what you think a wife does? She nags her
husband about what he eats?”

“Yeah, you know, like that cliché line? ‘Take my
wife, please.’”

I roll my eyes. “Wives get such a bad rap.”

“Well, shit, I dunno. I have no idea what a wife
does—I’ve never actually witnessed one in its natural habitat.”

“Are we talking about a human or a water
buffalo?”

Josh chuckles. “Cut me some slack. My mom died when
I was little; my uncle’s wife died before I was born; and my best
friends are either single or in what I’d call
non-permanent
relationships.”

I make a face. I didn’t mean to be insensitive about
Josh growing up without a mom or any maternal influences. I didn’t
even think about that when I made my snarky comment.

“Plus,” Josh adds, seemingly unfazed by my comment,
“and most importantly: there were no wives on
Full
House.
”

“I’m sorry, Josh,” I say softly. “I didn’t think. I
keep forgetting.”

He waves his hands like I’m totally missing his
point. “Forgetting what? It is what it is. Long time ago. No
worries. I’m just saying I’ve never witnessed an actual wife up
close, that’s all. I don’t know what women are really like if you
actually
live
with one.”

I’m suddenly starkly aware of just how different my
childhood was from Josh’s. I can’t wrap my head around how
disconnected and isolating—and
masculine
—his upbringing must
have been. No wonder he has no freaking idea about marriage and
relationships.

“Lori Loughlin,” I say.

“Huh?”

“Lori Loughlin. She played Uncle Jessie’s wife in
the later seasons of
Full House
.”

“Oh yeah,” Josh says. “I forgot about her. I kinda
stopped watching by then.”

“Oh. Well, she didn’t nag. She was happy and funny
and supportive. That’s what a real wife is like.”

“Really? Well, I don’t remember all that. All I
remember is that she was smokin’ hot.”

“I thought you stopped watching by then?”

“I might have caught a couple episodes.” He laughs.
“She was hot.”

“Still is. Saw a photo of her the other day. But,
anyway, that’s just TV,” I concede. “Uncle Jessie’s wife doesn’t
really count as spotting an actual wife in the wild, so your point
is still well taken.”

“Well, tell me, then. You’ve observed the species,
right?”

I chuckle. “Yeah, I’m pretty sure I’ve spotted a
genuine wife scurrying in the bushes a time or two.”

“Well, enlighten me. Does your mom nag the shit out
of your dad or what?”

“No. Never. My mom’s the coolest woman who ever
lived—super happy and energetic and just sort of like, ‘If you’re
not happy, then get yourself happy, motherfucker, and stop
bitching.’”

“Does your mom actually use the words ‘motherfucker’
and ‘bitching’?”

“No, not unless she’s
really
mad—usually at
Keane.” I laugh. “She’s much more likely to use words like ‘honey’
and ‘complaining’—but she’d say both in a
really
‘motherfucker’
tone.
”

Josh looks absolutely mesmerized right now. “Did
your mom stay home with all you kids when you were little?”

“Yeah. But she always helped decorate people’s
houses on the side. At first it was just her friends, and then it
expanded to her friends’ friends. Nowadays, she’s got her own
little interior decorating business and she absolutely
loves
it. In her spare time she cooks the most incredible food—the best
turkey chili you’ve ever had, oh my God—oh, and her spaghetti sauce
is next level, and her lasagna is to die for. I think she wishes
her ancestors came from Italy instead of Sweden.” I laugh. “Oh,
sorry, what was I saying? I get all excited when I talk about my
mom’s food.”

“You were saying your mom doesn’t nag your dad.”

“Oh, yeah, that’s right. She doesn’t. She leaves him
the hell alone and makes herself happy cooking incredible food and
decorating people’s houses and going to her exercise classes. You
should see my mom with her little five-pound weights, doing her
classes at the gym. She’s such a little badass.”

He chuckles.

“Oh, and she plays Bunco with her friends, too.”

“What’s Bunco?”

“It’s this stupid dice game. It’s basically craps
with wine. But I think the dice are just an excuse to get drunk. I
can’t be sure of that, but that’s my strong hunch.”

Josh laughs. “I love your mom already.”

I bite my lip. I know Josh meant that comment as a
throwaway—a figure of speech—but it made my heart flutter
nonetheless.

“So do you cook like your mom?”

“Not really. She’s always wanted to teach me, but
I’m too frickin’ lazy to learn. Dax is an awesome cook, though—he’s
the one who always hangs out with Mom in the kitchen. And Colby
cooks in the firehouse all the time, so he’s pretty good, too—but
he only knows how to cook in quantities for ten guys.” I laugh.
“Ryan’s adequate—a little better than me—but he makes the best
guacamole. And Keane is freakin’ hopeless. The dude can’t boil
water.”

“Well, thank God you’re at least better than
Peen,
” Josh says. “Or else I would have had to un-friend
you.”

I grin. In one of our many conversations this past
week, I told Josh a bunch of stories about my brothers, including
several that showcased Keane (also known as “Peen” in our family)
as the beloved fuck-up of our family.

“Hey, can I get you something to drink?” Josh
asks.

“Thanks. Do you have sparkling water?”

“Club soda okay?”

“Yep, same-same. Thanks.”

Josh moves across his kitchen and pulls a couple
glasses out of a cabinet. “Would you care for a little vodka in
your club soda, Party Girl? I’ve got Belvedere and Absolut.”

I shrug. “Why the fuck not?”

Josh laughs. “Words to live by. Which one?”

“Surprise me. I feel like living on the edge.” I
lean my butt against the counter.

“A girl after my own heart.” He grabs a bottle of
Belvedere from a low cabinet. “So what do you guys call Dax?”

“Dax is actually his nickname, a contraction of
David Jackson.”

“I didn’t realize that. Cool.” He fills the glasses
with ice. “And Colby?”

“Cheese.”

“Well, shit. That’s not fair. You’re Jizz and Kum
Shot and Baby Gravy and Keane is Peen, but Colby gets to be
something as G-rated as ‘Cheese’?” He pours vodka into the glasses.
“Not fair.”

“Oh, it all evens out in the end,” I say, enjoying
the view of Josh’s ass as he bends over to grab something from his
fridge. “No one gets off easy in my family, I assure you. We all
get raked over the coals somehow, just in different ways.”

Josh closes his fridge, a bottle of something in his
hands. “What about Ryan?”

“Ryan is RUM, Bacardi, Captain, Captain Morgan.”

“Oh yeah, you said that in your application.” He
grins. “Ryan
Ulysses
Morgan.”

“That’s right.” I grin. “Sometimes, when he’s
dressed up to go out—which he is a lot—he’s ‘Scion’ or ‘Pretty
Boy.’ Ry is basically you if he had a
much
bigger budget to
work with.”

“I like him already.”

“You would, trust me. You’d love him. He’s perfectly
groomed and put together at all times, slays it with the ladies,
charm oozing out his pores. The other guys ride him mercilessly for
how pretty he is and how much he cares about his appearance. I can
only imagine how much shit my brothers would give you if they ever
met you.”

Josh chuckles. “Well, thanks for the heads up. I’ll
make sure to dress down when I meet your brothers. I’ll take a page
out of Jonas’ book and go with a T-shirt and jeans.”

“Aw, come on now, Josh—don’t go changin’ to try to
please ’em. You just do
you
, baby.” I pause. I really
shouldn’t say what I’m thinking. But I can’t help myself. “So are
you thinking you might wanna meet my family one of these days?”

Josh’s cheeks flush. He swallows hard. “Um. Yeah.”
He busies himself with our drinks again, his body language suddenly
verging on robotic. “Maybe.”

I laugh out loud. This man is a raging head
case.

“No pressure, Josh,” I say, genuinely amused by his
suddenly anxious body language. The man is visibly twitching. “I
brought it up just to watch you squirm. No worries.” I should leave
it at that. I really should. But, no. When it comes to Joshua
William Faraday, I simply can’t help myself. “But, um, actually,” I
begin, trying really, really hard to sound easy-breezy-Cover-Girl.
“Colby’s birthday is next weekend. My mom’s gonna make her famous
spaghetti and Dax is gonna make carrot cake—Colby’s favorite meal.”
I clear my throat. “Super chill. Just the fam. You’d be welcome to
join us for dinner, if you... happen to be... in Seattle. But if
not, then no pressure, of course.” Oh shit. What am I doing? Even
as the words tumble out of my mouth, I know they’re a horrifically
bad idea. I should know by now: Josh is perfectly fine when we’re
enjoying each other in the here and now, but the minute I start
talking about the future, he breaks into a frickin’ cold sweat. I
quickly wave at the air like what I’ve just said is the stupidest
thing I’ve ever said. “Actually, pretend I never said any of that,”
I mumble. “I’m just kidding. Again.”

Josh remains focused on the drinks he’s making.
Notably, he doesn’t turn around and say, “Don’t be silly,
Kat—that’s a great idea!” He just continues silently mixing our
drinks, his back to me.

Holy hell, this is awkward. Why did I say all that?
I really should know by now that pinning Josh down to anything even
remotely relating to the future is a nonstarter.

“A twist of lime?” Josh finally says, his back still
facing me.

I look down at my hands, heat rising in my cheeks.
After everything I just said,
that’s
what Josh asks me? If I
want a lime in my drink? I really should have known. I’m such an
idiot.

“Um. Sure,” I say. “A twist of
lime
would be
amazing
.” Oh boy, that last bit came out way bitchier than
I’d intended.

But Josh seems to be unfazed by my bitchiness (which
seems to be par for the course with him, thankfully). He turns to
face me and clears his throat. “Colby’s birthday dinner sounds
great,” he says, his jaw muscles tight. “Thanks for the invitation.
I’d love to go.” He tries to smile. He’s not successful, but he’s
trying.

My heart leaps into my mouth.

Holy I Think I Just Harpooned a Whale, Batman.

“Tell the truth,” I say. “The only reason you wanna
come is Dax’s carrot cake.”

Josh laughs. “How did you know? Yeah, I’ve always
had a soft spot for carrot cake.”

“And cheesecake,” I say, remembering our scarf-out
the night we helped Henn in Las Vegas.

“You remember.”

“Of course. I remember everything you’ve told me,
Josh.”

There’s a long beat.

“Actually, Daxy makes a great cheesecake, too. It’s
just as good as his carrot cake. I’ll see if he’ll do both.”