Page 118 of Crossing the Brooklyn Briggs
Queens: I knew it couldn’t just be me. And for the record, I WILL knock them dread. Good luck with Houston!
Though I groan, dreading this conversation as much as Brooklyn will be knocking dread into her interviewers, I can’t be such a coward when she is facing a huge fear. Before I can talk myself out of this again, I march back up to Houston’s door and unlock it, letting myself in.
“Honey, I’m home!”
There’s a bang upstairs, followed by a loud curse and a string of muttered expletives that tell me I might have just woken Houston up with my shout.
I glance at my watch. It’s almost eight, and Houston rarely sleeps past four or five. I’ve had enough four A.M. text conversations with the man to know he’s as bad at sleeping as I am. Maybe worse.
Sure enough, he stumbles down the stairs a minute later in a pair of basketball shorts and a t-shirt that is both backwards and inside out.
Sleep lines crisscross along his face, while his blond hair—which is too long, in my opinion—sticks up in several different directions. He looks like a toddler who just woke up from the deepest nap of his life as he stares at me with one bleary eye.
I grin. “Good morning, sunshine.”
Dragging a hand down his face, he looks around his living room as if that might explain why I’m here. “Jordan,” he croaks.
“Late night?”
“Not really.” But then his eyes land on a mostly empty to-go container of what I’m pretty sure is nachos from the tavern where we did trivia night, and he turns bright red, eyes wide. For a second, I think he might try grabbing it from the coffee table and hiding it behind his back, but he’s not quitethatasleep. “Um.”
I nod toward the container. “Nachos? Iknowyou didn’t eat those because you ate half a plate by yourself at the tavern and were probably feeling that all night.” He never eats junk food during the season, which means he can’t tolerate much when it comes to the good stuff.
“Um.”
My smile grows. “So who were the nachos for, I wonder? Could it be you had a late night rendezvous with your spunky neighbor?”
He opens his mouth, clearly about to argue, but then he sinks onto the couch with a heavy sigh. “I like Darcy.”
I fake a gasp. “What? You? LikeDarcy?” I don’t dodge his foot quickly enough when he kicks, which means he gets it hooked around my leg and tugs me right off my feet. I land with a crash and a groan because that’s twice in two weeks I’ve gone from standing to lying flat on my back. He and Rick would get along.
“Sorry,” Houston says. He doesn’t look sorry. In fact, he looks downright angry.
He’s always so good-natured, which has made our friendship easy. This doesn’t feel easy. Still on the floor, I frown at him. “Hey, sorry, I didn’t mean—”
“When were you going to tell me you’re dating Brook?”
I freeze. Literally, my whole body goes stiff and it feels like my heart stops pumping, sending a chill through me. “What?”
Houston clenches his jaw. “You. And Brooklyn.”
“How did—”
“I saw you last night. When I went back into Grey Bird to get the nachos for Darcy.”
I curse and slowly sit up. “I was going to tell you last night.”
“Clearly you didn’t.”
“There was that whole thing with Tamlin.”
“What does she have to do with you making the moves on my sister? Mytwinsister!”
I don’t like having this conversation from the floor, so I stand up. So does he. “I didn’tmake any moves,” I growl. “Stop making this sound like it’s some sort of game.”
“Isn’t it?”
“No!”
