Bond (Klein Brothers 1)

“Will do,” I repeated, checking to make sure I hadn’t left anything behind. Seeing my phone sitting on my chair, I sighed and put it in my pocket. It wouldn’t be the first time I’d had to come back to find it. At least it wasn’t the middle of the night again.

This time when he spoke, he moved his eyes away from his computer to do it. “Hey, did you eat that slice of cake I put on your desk from the Townsend get-together?”

I stopped and braced my hands on the top of my desk. “I did. Was that a Heidi creation?”

“It was. To begin with, when I saw the strands of zucchini in the carrot cake, I kind of felt nauseous and like someone had finally ruined cake completely for me.”

I froze and then shuddered. I hadn’t noticed that in it, and now that I knew, it was forever ruined. Who the hell put zucchini in cake, man?

Rubbing my stomach to settle it, I winced. “I’m sure I could have done without knowing that nugget of information.”

Drumming his fingers on top of the notepad on his desk, Canon nodded slowly. “I felt the same way, but after I’d eaten some and realized you couldn’t even taste it and how good it was with it in there, I made it a case of mind over matter and allowed myself to enjoy it.”

This was a fair point.

But… zucchini. Cake with zucchini in it.

“What’s your point with this? Well, aside from putting me off eating any of her cakes again.”

“Nah, that’s not the point. What I’m saying is that, even with that grossness in it, the cake was fucking outstanding. You should have seen it, man. Eight fucking tiers of cake—four carrot, four lemon. Even in the sun, that shit looked awesome, and the frosting didn’t melt. For the first time in my life, I ate zucchini without puking in my mouth.”

“It wasn’t sickeningly sweet either, was it?” I mused, rubbing my jaw. “I wonder what she uses.”

“Apple sauce.” When I frowned at him, he nodded. “It’s true. Linda and Heidi’s mom told me she’d used apple sauce in it. Apparently, she doesn’t like Nemi having too much sugar or artificial sweetener or fried food, and with there being kids there and Hurst’s high sugar levels at his last check-up, she went with the natural sweetness of homemade apple sauce to do the job for her.”

I already knew about the sugar and fried foods because she’d told me that information at the hospital while Nemi was getting her foot x-rayed. I’d offered to get her a candy bar out of the machine, and she’d allowed it but had explained how Nemi didn’t get a lot of candy, so it’d be counted as a treat.

“That’s pretty neat.”

“She also looks for ways to reduce the saturated fat percentage in the cakes and can make gluten-free, dairy-free, vegan, and diabetic ones—including the frosting.”

That was… impossible, wasn’t it?

“How?”

Shrugging, he leaned back and smirked at me. “Dunno, but she’s spent hours perfecting it. She has a condition in her stomach that means Heidi’s got to be careful what she eats, so she gets her family to do taste tests for her. Her mom said when she’s not fulfilling orders or parenting, she’s thinking up ways to change the cake world.”

Of course I held onto the information about her stomach, making a note to ask her about it the next time I went to see her with a lunch that wasn’t a salad from the restaurant for her, but it also made me think about the menu here.

“I like that. Right now, we have no items available for people with issues like that, and it makes sense to have them. Maybe I should ask her about it?”

“That’s why I mentioned it. I think we need to expand our horizons, both on the dessert and the normal menus.”

Saluting him, I straightened up from my desk and began to walk toward the door.

“Bond?” Canon called as I opened the door. “She’s a good woman, man, with a beautiful daughter. If you can’t give them everything, then don’t lead her on, okay?”

Tensing my jaw against the ‘fuck you’ that wanted to pop out of me, I turned and left, not saying a word. He had a point, but I was also done with people underestimating me.

Yes, I’d enjoyed my life, living practically carefree and partying until the sun came up, but so had he. Did that mean neither of us could sober the fuck up and be responsible? Were we not meant to be interested in someone? Did that mean I’d be a bad influence on Nemi? Hell, no. It was the total opposite if you asked me.

Getting into my truck, I slammed the door harder than I should have as I hit the button to start the engine. The whole time, all I could think was that I’d never felt more sober and serious in my life about anything.