Page 36 of Suddenly Dating
“Whatever,” Kennedy said. “Is he gone?”
“He’s gone,” Lola confirmed.
The young woman said, “Sometimes I hate him.”
“Don’t say that. He’s your brother.”
“I don’thatehim, hate him. He just makes me so mad. Hey, Lola—do you have any money? I found this sweater at Topshop that Ilove.But I don’t get paid until the end of the month.”
“How much?”
“Fifty bucks.”
Lola groaned. “Okay, fine, I’ll PayPal you. But that’s it, Kennedy. I’m not working right now, I can’t keep you in sweaters.”
“I know. Thank you!” the young woman chirped. “You’re the best big sister ever.”
“And remember, you’re going to go see Mom this weekend.”
“I will!”
“And I’m going to call you tomorrow to talk about this Moonie business.”
“She’s not a Moonie,” Kennedy said. “I’ll talk to you later.”
Lola said good-bye, and with a tap of her elbow, ended the call. She smiled sheepishly at Harry. “Sorry about that. Siblings,” she said with a shake of her head. She removed the sauté pan from the stovetop, then picked up a rolling pin and began to roll a glob of dough directly onto the kitchen counter.
Harry decided not to say anything because he also noticed two glasses of wine on the bar. “One of these for me?”
“Yes! Please take one. I’m going to join you just as soon as I roll out this extra dough. I’m going to make some extra piecrusts and wedge them into the freezer around your mountain of frozen dinners.”
“Yeah, well, I’m pretty sure I got the freezer when we divided things up.” He winked at her.
“Ooh, making a joke about it now,” she said brightly. “We must be getting somewhere.”
“I think we are,” Harry agreed. “It’s been a couple of weeks and no one has been murdered. I’ve cleaned your kitchen and rescued you, and you’ve bit my ear. I’d say we’re off and running with this roommate thing.” He picked up the wine and slid onto a barstool.
“I apologize for the ear thing. That was a failure of personal impulse control. I promise,” she said, pressing her hand to her heart, apparently having forgotten it was covered in dough, “that I won’t do that again.”
“It’s okay.” It had surprised the hell out of him, but it hadn’t been unpleasant. Quite the opposite, really.
Lola continued working on the dough as Harry sipped the wine.
“So... those people were your brother and sister, huh?” he asked, curious about Superwoman now.
“Yep. That was exactly half of the herd. I have two more.” She stopped rolling a moment. “You ought to hear all five of us go at it.”
He’d rather not. “That’s a lot of kids in one house,” he said absently.
“Especially in a two bedroom, one bath walk-up. It’s a wonder any of us made it to adulthood.” She laughed at herself, wiped her hands on Superwoman’s bare middle, and picked up her wine, but Harry was mentally taken aback—she’d grown up with four siblings in a two-bedroom walk-up? He and Hazel had had their own bedrooms, a nanny, and so many extracurricular activities that they’d rarely seen each other when they’d been kids.
“Hey,” she said, as if a thought just occurred to her. “Let’s have a drink on the terrace while the sun sets. It’s so gorgeous, every night. I can see why Sara and Zach bought this house. They bought it, right? Or did they build it?”
“I don’t know.”
“I’ll ask Sara next time I talk to her.IfI talk to her. I got an email from her. Apparently she met a new boy toy at the Thai resort and now she’s pretty hard to get hold of,” Lola said as she walked out, leaving the dough flattened to the counter top, the rolling pin still on it. “Oops, I probably wasn’t supposed to mention that. Promise you won’t say anything. But why would you? Zach would wonder how you would know anything about Sara, am I right?”
She stepped outside and began to chatter about the view instead of Sara’s love life.
