Page 9 of Necessary Time

“I’ll talk to Grayson about it,” I conceded, turning to Colin with a sigh. “What restaurant?”

He blinked, the reprieve from the eye contact allowing me a millisecond to catch my breath.

“What?”

“My brother is going to get his way. He wants to get me a job and he wants you to take me to lunch, so where and when?”

“Oh. I’d have to think about it.”

“Come on,” Hendrix goaded Colin. “You have to know what your favorite place is.”

“It’s just…it’s like a…”

“It’s not a date,” I offered. “Just lunch. The faster you say yes, the sooner he’ll leave us alone and the sooner I can get out of here. I swear I’ve been trying to leave since I got here.”

“You’re the one who wanted to move to California.”

“This is boring.” My brother was exhausting. “Just give him my phone number and be done with it. I’ll talk to you later.”

“I’ll see you next weekend,” Hendrix said.

But I’d already turned away from the table. I waved over my head, on my way to the door. I didn’t mean to be rude, but my brother was driving me up the wall.

Out of the restaurant, the humid spring air rolled over me like a wave, and I leaned against the wall of the building to catch my breath.

Hendrix was right. I did need a job, and I did need to learn my way around town, but the way he was going about it was far too demanding for me. There was a lot about my brother’s life that I didn’t know—that I didn’t want to know—but I knew that he generally conceded to Miles when it came to decision-making, and that gave me an idea.

I also knew Miles worked from home, so instead of heading back to the apartment, I went toward Miles and Hendrix’s house. Miles’s car was in the driveway, thankfully. I parked alongside the curb and jogged up the walk to the front door where I leaned down into their camera doorbell and pressed the button.

“It’s your favorite future brother-in-law,” I announced with a smile.

“Who said I’m marrying your brother?” Miles’s voice sounded tinny through the doorbell speaker.

“Call it a hunch. Do you have a few?”

Miles didn’t answer, but I listened to his footsteps grow louder through the house until the door swung open.

“I do,” he said, stepping aside for me to come in. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah. I mean. Well. Yes. Kind of. Nothing is wrong with Hendrix, if that’s what you’re implying.” I toed off my sneakers and closed the door behind me.

Miles gestured for me to follow him inside. His work was strewn across the dining room table and after a few minutes of trying to arrange it into organized piles, he gave up and pulled out a stool at the kitchen island.

“Did you want a drink?” he asked.

“It’s the middle of the day and I’m twenty.”

“I meant soda or water.”

“No, I’m fine.”

Miles grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge and slid onto the stool next to me. “What’s going on?”

“Hendrix is…being a lot. I was hoping you could throttle him a bit.”

One of Miles’s eyebrows arched all the way up into his hairline. “A lot how?”

“He’s being really…I don’t know. Parental.”