was thinking I would do something nice and help you organize your things. This place is—was—a mess.”
The pounding intensified. “It was my mess. I knew where everything was. I had a system. I use the kitchen all the time. You don’t even cook!”
“I could.”
The snort slipped out before he could stop it. “No, you can’t.”
Wrong thing to say.
Olivia’s cheeks flushed red, and defiance sparked in her eyes. “It’s been eight years. I’ve improved.”
“Hate to break it to you, but there was nowhere to go but up.”
Harsh? Perhaps. True? Absolutely.
Sammy had eaten Olivia’s cooking once, and his stomach still rebelled at the thought.
“It wasn’t that bad.” Olivia’s chin jutted out even as pink tinted her cheeks.
He stared at her in disbelief. “We got food poisoning!”
“Once! We got food poisoning once!”
“Once is enough!”
“Stop yelling!” Olivia took a deep breath and pressed two fingers to her temple. “We’re off-topic. The issue is not that one tiny mishap years ago—”
“We threw up for three days. My throat was so raw I could barely speak afterward. I had to call in sick to my internship.”
She continued like he hadn’t spoken. “—it’s that you’re throwing a fit over a rearranged spice rack. You had no system. The spices weren’t arranged alphabetically, by height, or by category of flavor. It was chaos, and I brought order. They’re now in alphabetical order because that’s the easiest organizational method. The containers’ different heights are irritating, but that’s nothing a quick trip to The Container Store won’t fix. We can buy a pack of labels and matching spice shakers—”
“We’re not going to The Container Store,” Sammy gritted out. “We’re not buying labels or new spice shakers. You know why? Because there’s nothing wrong with the old ones or the way the spices were organized.”
“They were not organized.”
“They were to me. And I’m putting them back.” He didn’t take his eyes off Olivia as he picked up the chili powder—currently nestled between the ground cardamom and cinnamon—and shoved it on the bottom rack, next to the turmeric powder.
Take that, alphabetical order.
Olivia gasped. “You did not just do that.”
“Oh, I’m just getting started.” Sammy opened the fridge—because contrary to what she said, Olivia hadn’t reorganized just the spice rack but the whole damn kitchen—and stuck the milk on a shelf instead of the door storage.
Her eye twitched.
When he retrieved a half-empty box of green tea packets from his new “tea and coffee cabinet” and placed it on the counter next to the hot water dispenser, angling the box so it didn’t line up perfectly with the wall, she stormed over and shoved the tea back in the cabinet.
He took it out.
She put it back in.
There was a dirty joke lurking there somewhere, but Sammy was too riled up to concentrate on anything except not strangling the woman in front of him.
“This is my kitchen.”
“It’s our kitchen,” Olivia corrected. “I signed a lease. I’m paying rent. The kitchen is a communal space, which means it’s mine and yours.”
“You don’t even use the damn kitchen! You eat dinner at your office half the time, and the other half you order takeout.”
“I have to look at it,” she fired back. “You know I dislike clutter.”
Sammy’s molars ground together until his jaw hurt. “Right. I forgot. Everything has to be perfect for the mighty Olivia Tang. Your house, your career, your fucking relationships. How’s that working out for you? Living in your ex’s house, still single because no man on earth can live up to your unrealistic expectations. Careful, Olivia, or you’ll end up like your mom always feared you would.”
The second the words left his mouth, he wished he could take them back.
Olivia reeled like she’d been slapped, her eyes wide.
This time, Sammy was the one who rubbed his temples. Shame and regret lodged in his throat. “I didn’t mean—”
She turned and walked away. A minute later, he heard the firm thud of her bedroom door slamming shut.
Sammy let loose curses that would have his mom washing his mouth out with soap.
He’d been cruel, and he never wanted to be cruel. But that was what happened when you fought with someone you knew so well—you understood which buttons to push and which words would cut the deepest.
“What are you looking at?” Sammy growled at the green tea in the cabinet. He slammed the door shut and, with another curse, shoved the chili powder back between the cardamom and cinnamon and placed the milk in the fridge’s door storage before he stalked to Olivia’s room and