Really, there was no harm in telling him what only Karmel knew. It wasn’t so much that she was keeping it a secret as that she didn’t have anyone else to share it with. Did that make her sound like she had one friend and pretty much no one else? Yeah, well, reality was like that sometimes.

“I’m writing a book,” she said as she walked into the kitchen.

“Oh, that’s cool,” he said, following her into the tiny galley. “What’s it about?”

Chelle grabbed the two dog bowls from their spot on a shelf above the sink and scooped dry food from a cookie canister on the counter. “It’s part of a fantasy series.”

While she supervised the dogs eating—Groucho was true to his namesake, kind of a dick when it came to protecting his food—Nash reached into the fridge and grabbed the carton of eggs he’d bought the other day. He set to work cracking eggs, pouring in some heavy cream, and adding a few seasonings that hadn’t been in her cabinet before, then beating the mixture like it had insulted his mother. Finally, he poured them into the pan where he’d been sautéing some spinach and chopped tomatoes.

She wasn’t sure whether she was watching because it all smelled so good and she hadn’t had breakfast yet, or because Nash looked fucking hot in the kitchen with a daisy dishtowel slung over one shoulder. There was also the fact that he’d started a playlist and was dancing while he chopped, stirred, and tilted the cast-iron pan so that the egg mixture covered the veggies. His butt looked good when he did a little shake-shake thing.

Mouth-watering? Hers? Yeah, for the food, definitely for the food.

She turned around before she made a fool of herself by drooling and grabbed the box of Fruit Loops from the top of the fridge. Nash’s tsk-tsk sound stopped her before she opened a cabinet to get a bowl.

“What?” she asked.

He gestured toward the pan with the clementine he was peeling. “I’m making you breakfast.”

“You don’t have to do that.” But it was sweet, and part of her kinda liked the idea of having someone want to help her, instead of expecting her to always be the one helping simply because of her gender and her family’s dedication to outdated patriarchal bullshit.

“I know I don’t, but I’m doing it anyway. You know, breakfast is the most important meal of the day.” He folded his arms across his chest, laughter glimmering in his eyes as if he knew he was pushing her buttons. “Skipping breakfast is associated with an increased risk of diabetes and heart disease.”

“I have these.” Chelle shook the cereal box. “I don’t need you mansplaining the importance of breakfast to me.”