to be so verbal—and verbally abusive to each other, while consuming as much food as they did and still never seeming to talk with their mouths full—she'd never know.
If they weren't insulting each other, they were arguing about things that polite people didn't at the dinner table, and at one point, Ryan threw a crouton at Adam, who was poised to throw a piece of garlic bread back.
But Jace stepped in, as she sensed he usually did. "No. No throwing food. We are not home, and I won't have you guys creating a mess for Laurie to clean up. You guys have no couth at all."
Adam and Ryan both apologized to her most sincerely.
"Couth or consequences," Ryan snickered, and Laurie rolled her eyes.
"Very bad."
"A-couth-tics?" Adam suggested.
She closed her eyes. "Not getting better, guys."
But then, seconds later, she came up with, "The Fountain of Couth, which none of you are."
That got them all laughing.
"The couth is out there," Jace ventured.
"To Tell the Couth."
The puns flew fast and furiously for a while, with everybody supplying them.
Then they veered off onto another subject that had Adam and Ryan arguing again, and Adam did throw that piece of garlic bread at his brother.
But Laurie just casually leaned over and plucked it out of the air before it got to him, taking a bite out of it as if nothing unusual had happened.
Then, when they all suddenly fell silent at that, Adam leaned toward his brothers and said in a stage whisper, "Uh oh. She's fitting in. That's never a good sign."
Laurie had to laugh. "Really? Don't most women?"
"Absolutely not," Ryan piped up. "Jace had one girl come to dinner at the ranch one time—and, in her defense, she was subjected to all five of us at once—and she literally left in the middle of the meal. Just got up from the table, got into her car, and drove away. We all thought she was just in the bathroom for a really long time until we realized she was gone."
Jace cleared his throat, twirling his wineglass on the table, then he looked up and right at her. "Yeah, we're usually really careful about who we bring home and when. There are some girls we date who we know we'll never be able to bring home."
"Really? Like who?"
"The neatniks—because we're men and we're messy. Those who are insane, but not in the right way, like we are," Adam joked.
"And here you are, having invited us over—voluntarily, even—and you're actually feeding us, too!"
That got everyone laughing, and she looked at them quizzically, having missed the joke in that sentence.
"Most women don't make anywhere near enough food. They make enough to feed their girlfriends, none of whom actually eat anything, as far as I can tell."
"Well, I eat, and I'm nowhere near as thin as I should be, because of it."
All of them then protested that quite nicely with variations on, "Don't you let anyone tell you that; you're beautiful!"
They were just talking now, which she loved. They joked a lot and hassled each other, but they were also all smart, thoughtful guys who were very welcoming about her opinions on whatever they were talking about at the time. They didn't mansplain, and they all paid attention to what she said and made comments and asked questions that proved they did.
When the conversation had died down a bit, Laurie got up to clear off the table, but the boys all stood and motioned for her to sit back down.
"No way. It might not be our house, but she who cooks does not do the dishes!" Adam declared, and the other two cheered.
"Hear, hear!"
The three of them, wedged into her tiny kitchen, were a riot to watch, but even as they jabbed each other in the ribs—hard enough to make each of them grunt—to get their brother out of the way, when they were done, her kitchen had never been so clean.
More than that, Jace brought her a cup of coffee, Adam put her sweetener into it, and Ryan poured in a dollop of half and half.
"Wow, can I hire you guys to come in and do this for me every night?"
Ryan smiled. "You can hire one of us, hopefully."
"Okay, well, we'll get to that later. I think I'm afraid to ask this question, or maybe I'm more afraid to hear the answer, but does anyone have room for dessert?"
Three men gave her very greedy grins, and she had to giggle as she got up. "You're all bottomless pits!"
They