Page 12 of Ellie Hayes and the Himbos
“I felt it, too,” Grant replies, shaking his head at himself as he rolls out his shoulders. I remain agog. How is he not incapacitated right now?
“As long as you know. Imma get dressed.” Alistair bumps me with his shoulder. “Ellie just saw my ass,” he says, chuckling, and departs.
Diego shakes his head. “We’realwaysseeing his ass.”
I nod. “This is what you do? To maintain—” I motion toward them, hoping it conveys their general vitality without having to directly address the fact that each appears to have been hewn from marble. Because neither of them is wearing a shirt, and it’s hard not to stare. Grant is a tribute to long, lean, athleticism, while Diego is a stockier version, softer, but powerfully built. They gleam in the spring sunshine, breathing heavily, but steadily. The way they’ve bounced back from last night’s activities brings to mind the adage that youth is wasted on the young, but considering what they just did with their youth, I’m going to settle on being jealous.
“My brother owns a gym,” Grant explains. “Actually, we were gonna talk to you about that—oh!” He interrupts himself. “Were you okay in back? We kind of threw together the stuff for you to sleep on.”
“Yeah, thank you! I appreciate it. I’m just sorry you had to take care of me.”
Grant waves me off. “Nah. It’s all good.” He chuckles. “You wereawesome.”
I don’t believe I’ve ever been dubbed “awesome” before. I can’t help smiling. “Thanks?”
“Seriously!” he insists. “You, like,crushedthat trivia game. You could have been your own team and totally won.”
“And you’re so good at flip cup! Do you think that your nails are an advantage? They’re so elegant.You’reso elegant,” he says, voice dropping off into shyness.
My smile expands to a grin, which, oddly, relieves somepressure on my aching skull. “Thank you. That’s very sweet,” I say, otherwise unsure how to respond. I’m not accustomed to this degree of unfiltered flattery. A gal could get used to this.
“It looked like you had a great time, too!” says Grant. “I’m so glad, especially after how your night started.”
“I still cannot believe you were dumped at a restaurant,” says Diego.
The reference abrades my freshly stroked ego. Except for that inventory of misfortunes when I woke up, I haven’t spared a thought to the general unpleasantness of my reality. Some of that could be simply prioritizing my hangover and the exploration of my surroundings, but the guys have been a welcome distraction.
“At least it ended up a tie,” I say.
“Hell yeah!” Grant raises a hand for a high five, and, why not? We slap palms.
He grins and pivots toward the frame they were on earlier, like he’s just remembered the three-subjects-ago thread of conversation. “Yeah, we coach at Ian’s gym, and also work out here.” He points to an open-sided shed. Inside are black weight plates, as well as an assortment of dumbbells and some kind of round, handled weights in yellow, orange, green, red, and purple.
“You wanna get in a few pull-ups? You’d have total freedom of movement in what you’re wearing. Oh! We left stuff for you to change into. C’mon!” He starts walking toward the house, leaving me several conversational turns behind.
I follow him and Diego, still trying to formulate a response to the offer to do pull-ups, as if it were a given that I’m capable of performing them, when I remember the laundry that had been at the end of the bed. “Where did you get clo—”
But the guys gasp in unison, breaking into a sudden run for the open back door. I can make out a shrill beeping, and Diego’s dismayed cry of “The bacon!” before he dashes inside.
Bacon?—Ah!I congratulate myself as it clicks. They’d been cooking bacon. And the beeping is a smoke detector. Which means that the bacon is burning.
Then I’m running for the door, too. “The bacon!”
5
THE BACON IS NOT ONLYburning; it is activelyablaze. Flames are leaping from the pan when I arrive to find the three men in the kitchen, panic in their voices as they bicker over what to do. Alistair’s on a chair, poking at the buttons on the wailing smoke detector, while Grant swings a broom, fanning the air. Diego moves toward the stove with a pitcher of water.
“No!” I cry, and they freeze, Diego stopping so suddenly, some of the water spills. “It’s a grease fire. Water will make it worse.” I lunge for the stove and turn off the burner, dodging the inferno still raging in the frying pan. “Salt?” I ask. “Or baking soda?”
Three pairs of eyes blink at me through the smoke. Grant gives the air a broad swipe with his broom.
Shit.“Fire extinguisher?”
Grant points toward the cabinet below the sink. “Down there, maybe?”
I lurch for it, yanking open the little door. The space is a clutter of cleaning liquids and sponges, but a red canister peeks from behind the pipes. I grab it, knocking over a sticky bottle of dishsoap. Crossing back to the stove, I scan the directions on the side of the extinguisher. I’ve never had to use one before, but I pull the pin, aim the hose, and squeeze the handle. White foam explodes across the stovetop, and the fire is out.
No one moves. My heart is racing, and the smoke detector is still going off, the sustained wail rattling my skull. I may vomit again.
