“It just feels…” Danny thrust his hands through his hair. “Catie, my big brother owns half the city, my other big brother started an empire in his early twenties, and my third big brother is the vice-captain of the national team—a team which he made while having a kid as a teenager and losing the love of his teenage life.”

Breath harsh and the volume of his voice rising, he slapped both hands down on the table. “My dreaming of a future making pastries is not going to cut it!”

9

IN WHICH THERE ARE ABS OF STONE (AND “INTERESTING” TWINGES. UH-OH.)

Catie blinked, stared, took a sip of her smoothie. “Whoa.” She’d never, not once, thought about what it might mean to be the fourth sibling in the Bishop-Esera family, but when Danny put it like that… “Big boots to fill.”

“Tell me about it.” Expression glum, he slumped back in his seat.

But Catie wasn’t done. “Jake says all the time that he’d never have made the team without your support.” Danny had actually been picked for the national squad first, though Jake was two years older.

“He always talks about the family support that got him through and how if other teen parents had that kind of support, they’d be able to achieve so much more.” Jake was actually an ambassador these days for a youth program that supported teen parents. “He never ever tries to say he did it on his own.”

“Sure,” Danny agreed, having drunk half his smoothie in the interim. “But you know he just started a degree in automotive engineering and he’s already getting broadcasting gigs? I wouldn’t have believed it if you’d told me a year ago—Jake can be weirdly shy, but these days I turn on the screen, there’s his face.”

“Exaggeration much?” She raised an eyebrow. “Jake is doing a single paper this semester, and he has one show that he films around his rugby and other commitments.”

“It’s on prime time,” Danny shot back. “Highest ratings of any new sports shows in the past ten years. And all I want to do is make pastries and cakes and muffins and not have a restaurant empire.”

“You know your entire family would buy out your bakery and tell all their friends in support of your new career?”

“I know.” If anything, he slumped farther down in his chair. “Your mum ever lean on you to follow in her footsteps?”

“Nope. Not since Harlow came through back when we were teenagers.” Her stepbrother was Jacqueline’s true son when it came to the business world.

Jacqueline respected Harlow even more because he’d left her company and worked internationally for several years, gaining valuable experience—and doing it all on his own. Catie was her brother’s chief cheerleader and loved how he didn’t flinch at butting heads with the Dragon.