Page 17 of Royal Games (The Royals of Monterra)

It wasn’t there.

Had it landed on the floor or rolled somewhere? I didn’t see it. I went over to check on Clover, our milking cow, and discovered there was no milk left in her teats. And she had a trough full of hay. I turned to see that the pigs had also been fed, and the chickens were all happily squawking and pecking at the ground. A search of their nests showed that all the eggs were gone.

Danny, the teenage son of our nearest neighbors, had helped with the chores in the past when I was gone on trips. But he knew I was back. We had talked at the diner the night before. And he’d been at the town meeting.

But if it wasn’t Danny, then who was it?

I tromped back to the kitchen, where the light had been turned on and the delicious scent of breakfast made my stomach rumble. I went in and hung up my coat. The milk bucket was in the kitchen.

Aunt Sylvia stood at the stove. “Back so soon?” From the tone of her voice I knew that she knew what I had just found.

“Rafe,” I realized out loud. “Rafe did my chores, didn’t he?” How did he even know what to do? I was sure he didn’t do a lot of farm chores back in Monterra.

She just hummed to herself, scrambling the eggs. “Such a sweet young man.”

I opened the cabinets to get plates and silverware for us. Sweet. He was sweet, all right. And a lying liar. “You need to let it go. That door is shut.”

“You know what they say: when life shuts a door ...” she replied, carrying the eggs over to the table.

“Open a window?”

“No. Open the door again. That’s how doors work.”

I had no intention of reopening that particular door. I was trying to figure out how to install heavy-duty locks and nail it into the frame. Because that particular ship had sailed, crashed into rocks, and sunk to the bottom of the ocean.

“Will you grab another place setting?” She had her back to me.

Now he was coming to breakfast? “Really?”

But before I could demand more of an explanation, Rafe came in through the kitchen door with Laddie, letting a blast of cold air inside. He had an armful of firewood. “Good morning,” he said to us, kicking the door shut behind him like he’d done it a million times before. Aunt Sylvia responded to his greeting, but I just glared at him. He carried the wood into the front room, giving me one of those intense Rafe stares that made my insides go rubbery. I grabbed another plate but refrained from slamming the cabinet door shut. He had his own kitchen. He didn’t need to invade ours. I asked Aunt Sylvia to sit down while I brought the rest of breakfast over.

He took off his coat when he returned to the kitchen and put it on the back of the chair. He was still sporting that scruff on his jaw. I wanted to reach over and see what it felt like. Which made me mad at myself.

So now I was officially mad at every person in the room.

We started eating. Ever the gentleman, Rafe made sure to serve Aunt Sylvia first. Laddie trotted over to beg me for scraps. “You’re a traitor,” I whispered to him. He laid his head on my lap and gave me his sad face. He knew just how to manipulate me. I gave him some of my bacon, and he ran off with it.

I didn’t want to be rude to Aunt Sylvia, but I couldn’t stay. I couldn’t sit this close to Rafe and not react. He seriously smelled good enough to eat.

Or maybe that was the bacon.

“Genesis, do you have something you want to say to Rafe?”

“Yeah. I don’t need you to do my chores.” I shoved some toast into my mouth, but realized that I had lost my appetite.

Aunt Sylvia coughed into her milk and gave me a look of disappointment. It made me feel overwhelmingly guilty.

But that guilt went away when Rafe replied cheerfully, “You’re welcome,” choosing to ignore my foul mood and that he was the reason for it. “I wanted to mention that I spoke to the mechanic and he agreed that it was the battery.”

“Great. I’ll just run out with the money I don’t have and replace it.” I carried my plate and silverware over to the sink.

“I can just—”

I whirled around. “No, you can’t ‘just.’ I don’t need you to take care of me.”

He stood up, breakfast forgotten. “I know you don’t need me to, but I want to take care of you. And I want you to take care of me. That’s how relationships work.”

The ice encasing my heart was starting to melt a bit around the edges.I can be strong. “In case you hadn’t noticed, we aren’t in a relationship!”

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