“Did you know that Sam and Rachel’s been hooking up and hanging out?” I asked him.
He ducked his head and wouldn’t meet my eyes, so I knew immediately that he had known. That all of them had known.
“Well yeah,” he said finally.
“And nobody told me?” I asked.
He squeezed me. “Well, we didn’t think it was that big of a deal.”
“What wasn’t?” Noah asked as he slid over next to us.
“Sam and Rachel,” I said drily.
Noah looked off to the right. “Um yeah. Right.”
I growled at them. “I would have liked to know. What about your gifts? Have you been using them?”
“We have,” Jace answered joining our conversation.
“Another strike,” I rolled my eyes heavenward. “Dawn says they all have been using theirs,” I hissed quietly. “She told me our gifts were like a muscle, and I should have been using them.”
“I haven’t,” Jaxson said smugly looking at the guys.
I growled once more. “So, it was something you guys discussed, but still decided not to tell me.”
“It wasn’t like that,” Jace stated. “There’s been a lot going on lately, and we didn’t feel like you needed to be further stressed out. With our gifts. With their relationship.”
“I haven’t been.” At his raised eyebrow and pointed look, I sighed. I had forgotten he was an empath, and I’m sure he had used it several times around me. “Maybe just a little, but I don’t like being kept in the dark about anything. I wish you would have discussed all of this with me.”
“Fair enough,” Remy grunted.
I saw the looks they all exchanged. “By the way. I’m putting a sock on the door tonight. Who hasn’t been using their gifts?”
Drake and Troy had joined our conversation by then and immediately turned back around at my question. Clearly, they were guilty of this deception as well.
After lunch, we were more than satisfied with our decision to wait. We had eaten our food family-style, and plates of different variety of dishes had been placed in the middle of the table so we could try a little bit of everything. I was regretting our decision to go grocery shopping; I was beyond full.
My argument with the guys had been forgotten but I still fully intended to put a sock on the door tonight. I determined that it was probably the reason why I had been so high strung and testy lately.
“Do you have your list?” I leaned over the seat to look at Drake’s notebook.
He nodded. “I do.” He handed it to me, and I looked over it and notated some of the items that I had recorded in my phone.
He looked it over and smiled. “That’ll work. Maybe when we get back we can have family dinners once a week in our apartment. It’ll be a tight fit for all of us, but we can make it work.”
“Have you thought about talking to the kitchen staff and Paul?” Remy stated from the front seat. “I did a walk through there yesterday. They have a healthy budget for the food. There’s no reason that the food can’t be more appetizing. They hire these civilian cooks that have little to no experience with cooking, and the guy running the show cares more about the numbers than the food being served.”
Drake cocked his head to the side in thought. “I wouldn’t mind giving it a go, but do you think the kitchen supervisor will think I’m stepping on his toes? My experience at We 7 should be a good enough reference. I can train the cooks and help him, if he likes.”
“I thought about it myself, but you know I’m more about the numbers,” Remy smiled. “I never understood the back of the house like you did.”
“But you ran your restaurant for years without Drake in the kitchen,” I said a bit mystified.
Drake chuckled. “He knows how to hire the right people, and if he had any questions about food cost or waste he had me look at it.”
“That’s about sums it up,” Remy winked at me.
“Then I think that’