I’m just snoopy enough to wish I knew more about his story. Where his parents are and how he got to where he is. The fact he hasn’t said a damn word throughout dinner has me even more curious. He smiles at people from behind the brim of his team cap. Little smirks and winks. He seems nice enough. He seems like he requires more investigation.

Beau, on the other hand, has barely stopped talking. Except for now. When Luke talks, everyone listens.

“We threw lettuce out the window while driving really fast down the back road!” For a kid who seemed suitably chastised a few days ago, he sure is hamming it up now.

“Goddamn. That sounds like fun.” Beau shakes his head and spears some lettuce, a look of nostalgia touching every feature.

My eyes snap to Cade’s, who is scowling at his brother. I absently wonder which scowl that is. Irritated? Scolding?

Through the salad in his mouth, Beau adds, “I’m gonna do that with you when I get back from this deployment, Lukey. We’ll do watermelons instead.”

“Yes!” Luke shoots up in his seat, like he’s forgotten the conversation we had earlier this week.

“You sure as shit are not.” Cade pushes the salad around his plate even harder. Hard enough that the tines of his fork screech across his plate. This guy needs to work out some goddamn tension.

My mom would say he needs some good sex.

I’m not so sure she’d be wrong.

“Luke and I have had some good chats about food scarcity this week,” I pipe up to defuse the conversation. “That not everyone is as fortunate as he is. We dug out a garden and today we planted our lettuce seeds, didn’t we?”

He nods enthusiastically at me, and I’m relieved I wasn’t a total buzzkill. Five isn’t too young to hear some truths about the world, but I’m wondering if I overstepped.

When I peek over at Cade, though, his scowl is less irritated. Possibly an appreciative scowl?

I mean, fuck my life. How did I get to the point where I’m analyzing the way a man scowls at me?

Beau chuckles. “Well, you know. Boys will be b—”

“No,” I cut him off. Because that saying is straight trash, and years of bartending have given me plenty of time to see boys being boys. Which really is just boys being shitheads. “Boys will be gentlemen.” I point my fork at the big army Ken doll sitting across from me.

It’s then that I hear a huff of air in the otherwise dead silent dining room, and I almost drop my fork when I figure out it came from the least likely person.