Macon pauses and looks at me from under his straight brows. “You were preparing her brunch when I first texted.”

“I never finished.” I set my cup down. “I want to go home and host a makeup brunch.”

“This is your home now,” Macon says in a quiet tone. “Host the brunch here.”

My home? It doesn’t feel like that in the slightest. “Here? You’d be okay with that?”

His dark eyes are guileless. “Why wouldn’t I? I love your mother.”

“I know.” After he befriended Sam, Macon was at our house at all hours. Mama took him in like a stray puppy. There was always a seat open to him at our table. Even when he was being a shit to me.

“You two need to put aside your stubborn pride and mend this rift, Delilah,” my mother said when I complained. “If that boy needs safe harbor from his homelife now and then, I’m not going to deny him because you have a bee in your bonnet.”

To this day, I have no idea why she thought of Macon’s visits as a safe harbor, given that his favorite pastime at my house was to dog me at every opportunity.

I shake those memories aside. If I think of them for too long, I’m going to want to throw my mug at him. I have to live with my nemesis now. The past needs to stay in the past.

Macon is frowning at me as if he’s working things out in his head. Maybe he’s remembering things as well. Sometimes I wonder how he views our past. Does he imagine himself the wounded party? I suppose he was at times.

Whatever the case, he crosses his arms over his chest and gives me a level look. “Quit trying to pick a fight, and call your mother, Tot.”

Patronizing . . . I bite my bottom lip and shake my head. “All right, then, prepare to be invaded.”

Macon raises his cup in salute. “Bring it on.”

Exactly one day later, Mama and her best friend, JoJo, descend upon Macon’s house with wide eyes and gaping mouths.

“Well,” my mother says. “I can see why you’d give up trekking around Asia if you get to work here. It’s simply beautiful.”

So far, I’ve told Mama the bare minimum—that I took a job as a personal executive chef—and left out the part of assistant because I knew she wouldn’t buy it. I insisted that the pay and opportunity were too good to pass up, all the while fighting down the bitter taste in my mouth that came from lying.

When she pushed for more, I promised to fill her in when she came for lunch.

We have the house to ourselves. Macon and North are down in LA, doing God knows what. I think they made up an excuse in order to flee.