Page 42 of Break Point
“Jesus, Henry!” I whisper-shout, setting the carton on the counter. “You almost gave me a heart attack!” I slap his shoulder and he snorts out a laugh. He quickly gathers himself, and a deep line forms between his brows.
“You should be resting,” he says, crossing his arms at his chest. “Not awake, roaming around the kitchen at this hour,and?—”
“I couldn’t sleep,” I cut him off before he can start lecturing me, moving around him to grab a glass from the cabinet.
“No shit.” His eyes scan me from head to toe as if trying to decipher the reason behind my insomnia.
I turn my back to him, unable to hold his gaze any longer, and pour myself a glass.
“He’s still in there, isn’t he?” He narrows his eyes at me, wordlessly warning me to be truthful with my answer.
Self-consciousness washes over me as if the things I did with Liam in my bedroom were written all over my face and body for Henry to read like a bold headline. I brace my hands on the countertop and let my head hang with a sigh, realizing his opinion of me is still up there in theThings I Give Many Fucks Aboutlist. But I can’t let it show on my features.
“Who’s asking?” I taunt instead, turning around to face him. “Henry? Or Coach Henry?”
“Can’t see how that’s relevant,” he replies, his frown getting deeper.
“Well, ifyou’reasking, it’s none of your business,” I say, sipping on my glass of milk with a raised brow, mindful of not breaking eye contact with him, hoping to make him uncomfortable. I fail at it. He seems unfazed, so I keep pushing. “And if Coach Henry’s asking, that would be creepy and inappropriate.”
“No wonder Joe thinks he’s an unnecessary distraction.”
“For God’s sake, not you too. Liam isnota distraction,” I shoot back. I can feel the irritation bubbling inside me, but I force myself to breathe, breathe, breathe before it turns into anger. “So please stop sucking up to my dad and tell me you don’t agree with him.”
Henry rolls his eyes at me like he’s not in the mood for my tone, especially not at this hour.
“He shouldn’t have stayed over,” he rasps out, shaking his head with evident disappointment. “We have an early day tomorrow.” Henry’s attitude is bossy, his voice is getting lower and more gravelly with every word he utters, and his dark hair is a disheveled mess of curls. It seems like I wasn’t the only one unable to fall back asleep after waking up in the middle of the night. That is if he ever went to sleep in the first place.
I lower my glass on the counter and give him an unbothered shrug.
He runs a hand down his face and rests it behind his neck.
“Sit,” he commands. “I’ll get you a cookie.”
He knows how I roll.
“Acookie? As in singular?” I say, sounding appalled as I obediently sit on one of the stools. “Am I grounded or what, Coach?”
“How many cookies will it take for you to go back to bed then?” he muses, perusing the lower cabinet where we keep our pots and pans—my usual cookie hiding spot, and he knows it.
Henry and I ate more cookies than we could ever account for growing up, especially during our countless sleepovers when our parents used to go out on double dates or MLB-related events. Henry would sleep in Robbie’s room, and Vivienne, our babysitter, would stay in mine until my parents arrived. She sometimes fell asleep thinking I was too, and that’s when I escaped to the kitchen to get my cookie fix before Henry could beat me to it.
It amused me to pretend to hate sharing my cookies with him, secretly loving the part where he inevitably started to beg for one. The way his eyes lit up with mock desperation made it even better, turning the whole teasing-over-cookies thing into something I looked forward to.
Henry begged every time, and I always ended up sharing.
Rationing the cookies was a strategic necessity since Mom disapproved of me eating sweets. So I hid them behind the pots and pans, a safe location Henry and Carmen discovered early on since Mom never cooked. But I allowed them to hang onto the intel, knowing I could trust them not to share it with anyone else.
“So?” He drops the Insomnia Cookie box on the counter with a soft thud. The name of my favorite cookie place is so ironically fitting. “How many?” He places a small plate beside the box and raises a questioning brow at me. “Be reasonable.”
“Two.” If memory serves, there should be three cookies left in the box, so I plan to eat two and give one to Henry after making him suffer for a bit.
“These aren’t Oreos, Bells.” He snorts. “They’re huge.”
“I know,” I say. “And I’m starving. I’ll eat two and leave one for dessert tomorrow.”
Henry lifts the lid just a tad and closes it again with pursed lips.
“I don’t know if it’s a good idea to consume that much sugar at this hour,” he warns. “Might keep you up for a while longer.”
