Page 10 of The Brave and the Reckless (Bravetown #1)

Bootlegger’s Barrels was a spinning-teacup kind of carousel– which always turned competitive between us.

Losers got dizzy. We turned the center console as fast as we could, knuckles turning white.

Maybe, just maybe, I should have had a more substantial breakfast than sugary popcorn.

Before I even got dizzy, my stomach twisted.

I let go of the wheel and grabbed the seat instead, squeezing my eyes shut.

Sinan laughed and bellowed out a lyrically incorrect version of “We Are the Champions” until the carousel stopped.

With my tummy still spinning, I was suddenly also very aware of the dull throbbing in my right hip that I’d managed to ignore through sugar and adrenaline.

Linking his arm through mine to keep me upright, Sanny sighed. “You know, you don’t have to wait until you need help before you come talk to me, right?”

“Huh?” I doubted he meant my hip. He was only supporting my weight because he thought I was dizzy.

“If you ever need to talk about… stuff.”

“Oh, I’m all right.” I patted his shoulder. “Just figuring things out. You did all the figuring-out in high school. I never got to. Did you know that I’d never even been to a party with alcohol before this year?”

“Really? Never?” He raised his brows. “Fine. Just don’t make a mess. Please. This is more than a theme park. It’s my actual life and my actual friends. And don’t get thrown off the horse.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll be buckled in.”

“I feel like you’d somehow find a way around that.”

I rolled my eyes at him. “Don’t you have to go slip into a tasseled vest or something?”

He shot a look at his watch. “Dammit. Come watch the show later?”

“Sure.”

He gave my arm one more squeeze before tearing off through the crowd.

I had to eat something before the show. And I had to sit down. Preferably in that order.

The show was a children’s play on a small stage between the coffee cart and the candy store. It was a watered-down version of the bank robbery and the showdown between the outlaws and the sheriff.

Sanny stood in one of the front corners of the stage and interpreted everything.

He’d introduced himself as Carl, explained his role and a few words in sign language, like sheriff and bandit, before the actors had come onstage.

He translated the whole show with more energy than a single person should have, with big movements and dramatic facial expressions. The kids were eating him up.

Out of all the other people on stage, I only recognized Kit Holliday, the sheriff, aka the guy who had selflessly accepted my thigh-Dorito when I first arrived.

At least I was spared another encounter with Noah. I had yet to see him in his costume, and I wasn’t sure my brain would survive the clash of Ace Ryder swaggering across my screen and winking into the camera, and Noah goddamn Young with the broomstick up his ass.

“What are you doing?” My concentration was shattered by a voice that sounded an awful lot like its owner had a broomstick up his ass.

I set my jaw and refused to look up from where I was bent over the washing machine, trying to decipher the faded instructions above the detergent drawer. “Reading.”

“Scoot over,” he grunted and set down his laundry basket.

“I can do my own laundry.” I scowled. “I watched a tutorial. I separated by colors, and I checked all the labels to get the temperature right.”

The tutorial had been for a washing machine with a little glass door in the front though, and this one opened on top, and had a completely different detergent compartment.

I didn’t even want to admit how long it had taken me to figure out which one of these contraptions were washers and which ones dryers.

“Give me a break,” he muttered, earning himself a withering look. “Move before you end up flooding the entire house.”

“I’m pretty sure that only happens in the movies.” Although, to be fair, I’d only seen gunslinging cowboys in movies up until a few days ago. “Right?”

Noah raised his dark brows in response, that one streak of white hair falling across his forehead. Ugh. Fine. The alternative was another tutorial, but my phone was in my room, charging. And my hips would prefer to avoid another upstairs trip from this tiny laundry room in the basement and back.

Grimacing, I stepped aside and gave Noah control over my washing machine.

“Pre-wash detergent for heavily stained clothes, regular detergent, fabric softener,” Noah explained while pointing out the different boxes in the drawer.

He plucked the bottle from my hands and pulled a different one from the floating shelf above the row of machines.

“You’re washing colors, so you use this detergent.

One cap of it in the middle slot.” He poured the soupy blue slime into the detergent compartment, then grabbed yet another bottle from the shelf.

I tried to mentally catalog all of that.

“A splash of fabric softener is enough.”

“Not that one.” My hand jutted out to cover the detergent drawer as soon as I recognized the dumb purple flowers on the bottle.

Lavender threw me back to the hospital, to being poked and prodded and scanned.

They may have intended the scented pillowcases to be calming, but there were only so many nights you could spend alone in the children’s ward before the smell started to elicit Pavlovian nightmares. “I don’t like the smell of lavender.”

“All right,” he sighed and switched to a different fabric softener with pictures of honeycombs and milk on its label. Better. “Is this one to your liking, princess?”

“Yes, peasant boy, that’s agreeable,” I bit back. I hadn’t even asked him for help. He had absolutely no right to give me attitude.

“Shut the drawer, hit start, set a timer on your phone.” He rattled the instructions off as he started the machine for me. “Come back on time and put your stuff in the dryer, or someone will throw your wet clothes out to use the washer themselves.”

“Stop talking to me like I’m stupid. I’m doing this for your benefit. You have to get up close and personal with me tomorrow morning. I’m just making sure I don’t reek of sweat.”

“You’re a grown woman. You should have enough self-respect to want to wear clean clothes.”

“I have enough self-respect not to let you talk down to me like that.” I turned on my heels, and wished my hair was long enough to whip it in his face as I pushed past him, out of the narrow room.

Fucking unbelievable. Excuse a girl for trying to learn a new household skill in her twenties.

Huffing and grumbling, I marched into the shared kitchen and yanked the cabinet doors open.

My dinner plans consisted of pesto pasta and my nightly ration of Reese’s Minis– until my eyes zeroed in on Noah’s name on his shelf.

And how it was freshly Sharpied on to every single one of the items on his shelf.

Sandwich , towel and laundry police.

Ugh.

I grabbed bread and jelly from my own shelf, but he had this huge jar of peanut butter from some obscure brand I’d never heard of. I narrowed my eyes at the label. Organic and zero sugar? And he was calling me a princess. Bet he ordered that online or something.

I lathered a thick layer of his fancy-schmancy peanut butter on to my bread, then heaped an extra spoonful of jelly on to the sandwich to make up for his lack of taste .

I screwed the lid back on and eyed his neatly organized shelf.

With this big a jar, I wasn’t sure he’d even notice a portion missing.

And I wanted him to notice. Maybe it was childish, but I considered it payback for being a dick to me all day.

And what was the point if he didn’t know revenge had been taken?

I put the jar on my sparsely stocked shelf instead. Right next to my cheap off-brand sugary peanut butter. Perfect.

“Dorito girl.”

I bit my lip to suppress the gleeful grin as I turned and closed the cupboard.

The parking-lot cowboy, aka Lucky Luke, aka Sheriff Kit Holliday, leaned in the doorway, clad in plain jeans and a Marvel T-shirt. “Fancy seeing you here, Lucky.”

“I live here. Top floor. Last door.”

“Don’t recall asking for directions, but thanks.”

“You might feel like you need them at some point in the future.” He grinned and pushed himself off the door in a strangely rehearsed fluent move that involved entirely too much hair flipping.

It reminded me why I preferred drummers over frontmen.

“Sure, let me know when you’re throwing a party and I’ll stop by.”

“Will do.” He winked at me, but it lacked that confidence I’d seen from Noah in the Kit vs. Ace videos– and I immediately hated myself for taking note of that. Noah had the confidence, but more than that, he had the nerve .

“When you do, make it worth my while, okay? No half-assed parties on my watch.” I grabbed my plate and beelined for the door. I didn’t even hear Lucky’s response to that .

The first couple of stairs toward my room were fine. But my hip buckled by the halfway point. By the time I made it all the way up the stairs, I was leaning against the wall, needles piercing through my right side. The rest of my night had just become a strictly horizontal endeavor.

I dumped the plate on my nightstand and crawled into bed, jeans still on. The coffee stain on my right thigh mocked me like a schoolyard bully, pointing right at me and laughing.

If Noah made even one dumb comment tomorrow about my laundry staying in the washer overnight, I’d hide his stupid fancy peanut butter somewhere he wouldn’t find it.