Knight side-eyed Lake, popping a strawberry into his mouth. “What do you think?”
“About what?”
Knight waved across the row. “The possibility West and Josh have something going on.”
“West and Josh?” Lake derided.
“You don’t think so?”
“What makes you think so?”
“Before you joined us this morning, I caught a . . . look between them. Like an inside joke.”
Lake couldn’t believe it. “How many hours did you sleep last night?”
“Four, maybe.”
That explained it. “You’re imagining things.”
Knight pivoted and looked at Lake, brown eyes steady. “I sincerely hope that’s not true.”
But it had to be. Surely. West and Josh? No way. “I wouldn’t count on it.”
West was laughing with Harry, which was far more promising. But Lake refused to share his little hope with anyone.
He meant it when he said he wouldn’t get involved.
Knight’s phone sounded. He passed his basket to Lake and answered. “Paul.”
The wide, pleasant smile on Knight’s face had Lake’s stomach crunching fearfully.
“Tomorrow?” Knight murmured. “. . . Of course. . . . I’d love to meet with you in person. I’ll book a flight tonight.”
They shared a few more words, then Knight laughed and disengaged.
“You’re flying out?” Lake asked, voice pinched.
Knight cocked his head, then gently pried Lake’s rigid grip from the basket. “He has a proposal he’d like to discuss.”
“A proposal?” Flashes of Paul on one knee screwed with his mind.
Knight chuckled quietly. “Business proposal. I’ll be gone the week in Melbourne, and return Saturday morning.”
“Uh-huh.”
“You’ll be okay in the house alone?”
Lake struggled to shake off the tightness in his gut. Knight may not have liked Josh but he had liked Paul and what if that reignited? What was Lake to Knight?
Why did the idea of second-best hurt so much?
“Sure,” Lake mumbled. “I’ll throw a kegger.”
“Just clean up afterward.”
What? No chastising look? “You don’t care if your beautiful house is used for a kegger?”
“You have as much right to our place, and there’s no one I trust more in its walls.”
“You’re forgetting the time I threw up in your vase!”
Knight laughed and picked more strawberries.
A melting pot of emotions, Lake drifted from row to row. When Taylor asked if he was okay, Lake nodded—the most reassurance he could cough up—and absently chatted with his best friend.
Shading his eyes with his hand, he scanned for Knight, spotting him as he tripped and brought Harry crashing into the strawberries under him. Taylor laughed at the spectacle.
Knight quickly clambered off Harry and helped him up, apologizing.
Harry flushed and shrugged. No big deal.
Lake loved that they seemed to get along better than they had when Harry first moved in.
An hour later they set up a picnic between woods and strawberry fields. Checkered blankets were laid out, and Taylor and Amy had made dozens of sandwiches.
West sat between Lake and Harry—as far from Josh as possible, which Lake hoped Knight noticed.
“Let’s play a game,” Taylor said, bringing out slips of paper and pens and tape. “Who am I. Twenty questions.”
They all wrote a prominent figure on the paper and the slips got redistributed and taped onto their foreheads. Ishmael. Beyoncé. Hitler. Bill Gates. Oprah. Jacinda Ardern. Elvis. And whoever Lake was.
The first rounds elicited a few laughs, but Lake was stumped. Most people had figured theirs out; he was still struggling. It didn’t help that his gut churned, caught in an emotional whirlpool. He couldn’t stop glancing at Knight, and thinking of Paul, and—
His turn again.
Across from him Cameron grinned. “A good one I thought up, there.”
“It’s your entry?” Lake said. “Then I must be Jane Austen.”
Taylor ripped the slip off his forehead. “You’re right, how’d you guess?”
“Of course it’s his favorite author, not like he talks about anything else.” Lake immediately wished he could take it back, and glanced at Cameron. “Sorry.”
Cameron chuckled as if it were a joke, then grew quiet. Redness crept up his neck and flushed his cheeks. “You’re right.” He nodded. “Yep.”
The round continued, but the mood shifted, clouded, and Lake knew he’d gone too far.
A darting glance worsened the guilt in his gut. Knight turned away from Lake and the moment the game ended, he stood and dusted his shorts.
“I need to stretch my legs.” He looked at Cameron. “Want to come with me?”
Still blushing, Cameron shoved to his feet and followed.
Guilt tightened its sick-inducing fingers around Lake. He busied himself cleaning up and carrying the blankets and empty picnic basket to Taylor’s car. When he shut the trunk, he startled at Knight leaning against the side door, head bowed, intently thoughtful.
“Knight,” he choked.
Knight shifted. They were alone. The others were still perusing the gift shop.
Lips set in a grim line, Knight scored a hand through his hair, frustrated. “That was unnecessarily harsh.”
Regret sank Lake’s insides to his knees. “Yeah, but I didn’t mean to hurt him. It just came out, and he does talk about Austen and adapting her work a lot.”