Page 28 of Protecting Clove
“I don’t mind cooking for her. I was going to make myself some eggs. Would you like eggs?”
Clove shook her head. “Thank you for offering, but I need coffee first.”
“Mom is addicted to coffee.”
Bud chuckled and grabbed himself a mug. “I like coffee, too.”
Neo wrinkled her nose. “It’s gross.”
“Well, it might be, but you also have more taste buds than I do, so it tastes good to me.”
Neo narrowed her eyes. “What do you mean by that? I’ve never heard that before.”
“Yeah, it’s why kids don’t like certain foods.”
“How do you know this?” Neo asked.
Clove poured herself coffee and turned to stare at him. “Yeah, how do you know this?”
“One of the various classes I had to take in training. We were discussing nutrition and MREs, and someone complained about the taste, and the instructor brought it up, saying that the person just needed to get older and the MRE wouldn’t taste so bad because we lose taste buds.”
Neo frowned. “Show me.”
Bud searched for the information on his phone and pushed the device over so Neo could read the article as she ate. After a moment, she looked up, horror showing on her face.
“That means when I’m an adult, I’ll actually like broccoli.”
He busted out laughing. “Sorry, I shouldn’t laugh. But yes. When you’re older, you might actually like broccoli. I like it now, but when I was younger, the flavor was too sharp.”
Neo closed her eyes and shook her head. “This is terrible.”
“Or maybe it’s good,” Clove said. “You could end up liking a whole new set of foods, and then you could try new recipes and enjoy them.”
Neo huffed. “Some days, I like science and other days, I get tired of it. I just want to enjoy pancakes and cereal for my whole life.”
“Oh, I still like pancakes and syrup,” Bud said.
“But why don’t adults eat them more?”
Clove’s mouth screwed up to the side, and she shrugged. “I guess because our bones aren’t growing. You remember it takes lots of calories to grow, and adults stop growing at a certain age. Like I’ll never get taller, but you’re going to be at least as tall as I am.”
Neo nodded. “I guess it makes sense.”
They finished breakfast, and he headed over to his place to switch to workout clothes. He needed to go for a run and was planning on meeting a few of the guys to work out. They got in some exercise during the week, but he liked doing stuff on the weekends.
The guys met him at a park close to where they lived, and they did a bodyweight workout using the pull-up bars in the park. They were almost done when Kevlar asked him about Clove.
“She’s good. Her ex showed up at her work yesterday, so she’s a little freaked out.”
Trip came up beside him. “Oh shit. Are you for real? Anything happen?”
“The security guard ran him off. From what we can determine, he doesn’t know where she lives.”
Kevlar finished his pushups and stood, hands on hips. “Well, there’s that. Do you need anything?”
“I don’t know. It’s all new right now. We have Tex and Thario trying to keep tabs on the guy, but obviously, he had a way of traveling that we weren’t prepared to track. He either is using fake IDs, or he has a lot of cash and isn’t using his credit cards.”
“If you need something, we’re here for you,” Trip said.
