grieving publicly sounded as pleasant as getting my skin ripped off in inch-long chunks.
The guys wandered in, murmuring about plans for tomorrow. We stared at them from our huddle around the island. Our silence made Gentry and the brothers stop before they entered the kitchen.
“Steaks are done,” Gentry announced, breaking the awkwardness.
Kendall sauntered to her husband. “Oh, baby. You know how to sweet-talk me.”
“Yuck,” Beck said and bypassed his dad to set his tray of meat on the table.
“It’s not right,” Xander muttered. “I don’t care how old we are.”
The easy atmosphere between them should’ve made me feel more like an outsider. But as each of the women broke off to walk to the table with their spouse, Dawson appeared at my side. “Did you find the lemonade?”
“I forgot to get it out!” Eva veered into the kitchen. “Good thing or it would’ve been gone by now.”
I arched a brow at Dawson. “That good?”
“I don’t want to brag . . . but I sweet-talk the lemons when I juice them. Then after the sugar, I add strawberries and a splash of cherry juice. There’s lime garnishes too.”
He wanted me to be impressed. I was. “Did you talk dirty to the cherries when you juiced them?”
Kate sputtered first and the rest of the girls dissolved into laughter. My cheeks bloomed. The first thing they’d heard me say that wasn’t defensive or about cattle and it was lewd.
“It’s not right,” Gentry grumbled. Humor gleamed in his eyes as he nudged Kendall. “I don’t care how old they are.”
We all settled into our chairs. Gentry was at one end and Dawson on the other. I sat next to Dawson and to my right was Savvy. I didn’t see who passed the food, but someone started a dish and then it was like dealing cards. The dish was handed to the person on our left.
Ten people surrounded the table. I’d been in restaurants with a bigger crowd. But I’d been on the fringes. These people surrounded me. I was eating the same food they were. The room was closing in on me.
A glass of red-tinged lemonade appeared in front of me. I took a big gulp. When the sweet flavor hit my tongue, I kept drinking.
Damn.
When I looked up, Dawson was grinning at me. “Good, right?”
I scowled, but a smile played along my lips. The anxiety that had been building drained under the sugar rush. “You know it is. Everything you make is excellent.”
Pride rippled across his expression, but there was a twinkle meant just for me that said, It’s the dirty talk that does it.
Savvy handed me a basket of rolls that I’d had no idea existed. When had Dawson found the time for all this? “I know you haven’t had much to do with the guys until now, but I’m all ears if you know of any embarrassing stories from when they were younger.”
The table grew quiet, but the silence wasn’t uncomfortable. An anticipatory air filled the room as everyone waited on me.
I wasn’t brave enough to look at Dawson. It was Gentry’s fatherly nod that broke the seal on my tongue.
“I started running over here when I was too young to be going off alone across the pasture. So Sarah would make Aiden or Beck walk me back. Only they didn’t want to, so they talked Dawson into going with them and then ditched us.”
Savvy’s scandalized inhale was immediately followed by a laugh. “How chivalrous.”
“Hey,” Beck said as he was cutting his steak. “I was all of like, ten years old.”
Which had meant a not-much-older-than-me Dawson running back with me, but always stopping at the fence. It was like we’d both known that Pop would chase him off like a rabid dog.
Yet Pop had never stopped me from going to the Kings’. Not until the funeral.
“What about Xander?” Savvy asked.
A touch of sadness laced Xander’s smile. “I made sure to find somewhere else to be. If Mama was busy with Bristol, that meant she’d put us to work.”
Aiden set his fork down, a line forming between his brow. “How did I not notice that?”
“Too busy kissing her ass, golden boy,” Dawson said around a mouthful of food.
“I did not kiss ass.” Aiden narrowed his eyes and stunned me with an almost smile. “I didn’t have to since I was perfect.”
“Nah, not you. There was someone else who made sure he was a little better.” Xander directed his gaze at Beck.
“Don’t,” Beck growled.
Xander’s grin grew. “What’s wrong, Gooder?”
Beck rubbed his temple—but with