cooking? “Frozen waffles?”
“Packed with transfats and white flour, dude.”
“Oh. Sorry. Hmmm.” The coffee stopped gurgling and he poured two cups.
“What are you doing?” she asked. “I don’t drink coffee.”
“One’s for Elena,” he said without thinking.
A deep pause. “She spent the night here?”
“Not like that.” He turned around and looked at her. “She’s in the guest room.”
She raised her hands, palms open. “None of my business.”
“It is your business, actually. You live here, too, you know. I wouldn’t want to make you uncomfortable, Portia.”
She stared at him for a minute, a thousand small betrayals swimming over the surface of her irises. It shamed him. “Really?”
He nodded. “Really.”
“Okay—here’s the truth: it’s weird when your parents have a boyfriend or girlfriend over.”
“She’s not my girlfriend. She’s my chef.”
“I get it,” Portia said.
“Hello—I’m warning you that I’m here,” Elena said from the doorway.
Alvin wiggled happily toward her, head down, body arched, looking like a comma. He shimmied into her legs and Elena chuckled, a low earthy sound, and she knelt, or kind of crumpled, to kiss him and hug him, rubbing him all over.
“That was awful,” she said in a ragged voice. “I missed you so much.” She held Alvin’s muzzle and kissed the velvety snout, then between his eyes, and Alvin made a low, pleased noise. Licked her nose very politely.
Julian wished to be a dog. Her fine hair was loose on her shoulders, long and pale. For the first time, he noticed a thin, faint scar edging from the top of her shirt, along her collarbone. Inexplicably, the sight made him think of his mother.
After a minute, she stood up, and Julian saw the swollen eyes, the extreme paleness. “You all right?” he asked.
“More or less,” she said with a tilted grin that made her look about sixteen. “I’d kill somebody for that coffee in your hand.”
“It’s all yours,” he said. “Cream and sugar, as I recall.”
“Bueno.” She looked at Portia. “He was sleeping on your pillows when I got here, and he wouldn’t come with me. You’re a real dog charmer, aren’t you?”
“But look how happy he is to see you now!”
“Yeah, yeah,” Elena said. Alvin dashed into the great room, grabbed his crocodile, and brought it back to her, his head and tail high and happy. Elena grabbed it and yanked, letting him play tug-of-war for a minute before she took it away and tossed it toward the hallway. He danced toward it, and leapt on it as if it were a live thing.
Julian watched her with a sense of airlessness, feeling stricken, starving, yearning, and for no earthly reason. Her hair, stick straight and too fine to be particularly alluring, was combed, but hardly styled. She looked a little hungover, and she wore the same clothes she had on last night.
And he really would have liked kissing her good morning.
Elena sat across from Portia. “How was he last night? He seems very happy. Did you guys have fun?”
“We did.” She grinned. “He is such a good dog!”
“I couldn’t stand not waking up to him this morning, so I had your dad come get me from the restaurant and then you guys looked so peaceful, I didn’t want to disturb you.”
“That was nice. Thanks.” She frowned. “There were some fireworks, though, and he totally freaked out. Does he always do that?”
“Oh, yeah. He’s absolutely petrified of thunder, fireworks, anything like that. I tried drugs but they don’t really help.”
“Poor baby.” Portia rubbed Alvin’s back. “I’ll do some research, ask around, see if there’s something to do for it.”
“I’d be so grateful if you found something to help him.” Elena put her cup down. “Now. How about if I make breakfast to thank you both?”
“You don’t have to wait on us, Elena,” Julian said.
Elena inclined her head. “You don’t actually know how to cook anything, do you?”
“Uh—”
“He offered frozen waffles,” Portia said.
“Ugh!” Elena rolled her eyes. “Well, I’m starving,” she said. “And I am—as you may remember—a spectacular cook.”
He smiled. So did Portia.
Elena narrowed her eyes, as if she were reading something written on the air. She peered at Portia carefully, and Julian swore he again saw that odd bend of the air around her, a shimmer of heat or light or something. “Let’s see—you are a pancake girl, aren’t you? Is it…nuts…no, bananas. Banana and—is it chocolate?”
Portia’s mouth dropped. “How did you know that?”
Elena raised her eyebrows ruefully. “Well, here’s the deal—it’s kind of magic.” She grinned, and for the first time, Julian noticed that she had a great dimple