Colt let loose another grunt, but this one held more frustration than the last. “I’m heading over there after this beer. I found a house I want to look at this week, and I’m buying one whether she likes it or not.”
“Oh, that conversation is going to go well,” Saylor muttered, drinking the beer she’d intended for him.
Just to rub salt in the wound.
Colt opened his mouth, but Kinsley beat him to it. “Yeah, yeah, we know. She wants you to move in with her so you can have a baby, but her apartment is smaller than yours and she doesn’t own it, so what’s the point when you’ve saved up enough for your dream house?”
“His dream house is going to be completed next week,” I said dryly. “And he only wants the house because he wants to steal my idea of a man cave in the basement.”
At that, Colt smirked. “Who wouldn’t want a man cave in the basement?”
“I’d take a library,” Kinsley said.
“But not in the basement,” Holley added. “In a castle. With ladders. And enchanted teapots that talk and tell me I’m pretty.”
“Hell, I’d take the beast for all that.” Saylor finished the detour with a raise of her bottle, and all three clinked their drinks.
“What are they talking about?” Colt asked me.
“Beauty and the Beast,” I replied without missing a beat. “What? Piper used to love that movie as a kid. At one point, she used it for blackmail. Like if I watched it with her, she wouldn’t tell our parents I’d cut all the hair off her Barbie again.”
“You used to cut the hair off her Barbie?” Kinsley’s eyebrows shot up. “That’s low.”
“No, I didn’t,” I said. “Didn’t mean my parents believed me when she told them I had, though.”
“Aw, man, that’s genius. Why did she never share that with me?”
Colton frowned. “Hey! You were way more of a little shit when we were kids than I was.”
Holley snorted. “No.”
“Yeah, no,” Saylor agreed.
“She used to beat me with books!”
“And you deserved it every time.” Kinsley calmly sipped her wine. “As Lisa Kleypas once said, “A well-read woman is a dangerous creature.” But not because she’s smart, but because she’s always got a weapon on hand.”
“Who’s Lisa Kleypas?” Colton asked.
“And did she really refer to a book as a weapon?” I followed up.
She blinked at us both. “An author, and no. The latter is a Kinsley original, thank you. And a warning.”
“Terrifying,” I muttered.
“Watch it. I’ll beat you with a dictionary.”
“She will,” Holley assured me. “She might not look strong, but I’ve watched her haul encyclopedias around like they’re nothing.”
“Let me guess—a hidden talent of bookworms? Superhuman strength?”
Saylor grinned.
“No,” Kinsley mused. “But we do have extraordinarily strong fingers.”
“I don’t think I want to be part of this conversation anymore.” Colt drained the rest of his beer and got up. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said to me, throwing a wave over his shoulder to the girls.
I waited until he’d gone. “Why do you have strong fingers?”
All three of them mimed licking their fingers and flipping the page of a book.
“And now thumbs, thanks to e-readers,” Saylor added brightly, mimicking the tapping of a thumb on the side of a device.
“I’ll keep it in mind,” I said dryly.
This conversation had gotten weird.
Like Colt had a few minutes before me, I finished my beer. “Well, this has been enlightening, ladies,” I drawled. “But I’m leaving. This is getting a little strange, even for you.”
They all laughed.
“Oh,” Kinsley said, looking at me. “Um, would you give me a ride home?”
I blinked at her. I opened my mouth to tell her no, but instead what came out was, “Sure. If you leave now.”
Like a pro, she downed the rest of her wine and put the empty glass down. “Thanks. Holley, I’ll text you when that shipment arrives tomorrow.”
“Should be by ten. Let me know if you need help with it.”
She waved her hand and slid out of the booth ahead of me. “I’ll be fine. Have fun.”
I bade them goodbye and beat Kins to the door, holding it open for her. “Are they staying?”
She nodded. “I left the store early tonight so I could get ready for my date, and they’re both supposed to be off tomorrow. Holley’s just panicking because we’re getting a big delivery of books and her inner control freak won’t let it go.”
“Inner control freak? I don’t think she’s containing it very well,” I said, letting go of the door.
She laughed, the same laugh she’d given Elliott earlier tonight. The laugh that had reared my little green monster. “I know, but nobody really wants to point it out to her. It’s just the way she is, but me and Say aren’t control freaks at all, so she keeps us on the straight and narrow.”
“Well, you’re the awkward introvert, so what’s Saylor? The rebel? Is she going to have a bright purple mohawk next time I see her?” I unlocked the truck and got the door for her again.
“Rebel is a little too far. Rebels don’t hide in libraries from bullies. They punch the bullies.” She hopped in.
“You’ve just been telling me about how dangerous books are. Don’t tell me you’ve never smacked a bully with a book before.” I closed the door and rounded the front of the truck and got in the other side. “Well?”
She mulled it over while I started the engine. “Once. It was seventh grade and Charlie Fisher was teasing me about being the only kid in the class who got full marks on the reading test that morning.”
“Really? Not even Holley and Saylor?”
“I don’t think I was in the same class as them that year. Anyway, I was trying to read and it was getting to the good bit. He wouldn’t leave me alone and actually kept tugging on my hair and touching my leg, so I whacked him. In the face. With my hardback.”
“Did you break his nose?”
“Does it
