Can't Stand the Heat - Louisa Edwards [99]
“So. You’ve seen them together?” Miranda asked slowly, her eyes narrow and intent on his face. “Before last night?”
Oooh, shit. Back up that triumphal float—there will be no parade in my honor today, fellas.
“Ah. Well.” Adam cleared his throat. “Um, yes. I mean, at the restaurant. You know.”
Very slick. Master of Misdirection, you are.
Adam winced.
Miranda clearly wasn’t buying it.
“You knew,” she said, all accusing. Her chest started to heave a little bit, which did interesting things to her braless breasts.
Adam always liked to look on the bright side. Which was good, because this was about to get ugly. Christ, he hated secrets.
“Okay, yeah, I knew. I saw them together—you know, together together—about a week ago. Right after the egg lesson.”
“Days ago,” she seethed, jumping up from the chair and starting to pace. “You knew all this time, you slept with me, and you never told me. You just allowed it to continue, allowed that deviant scumbag to prey on my innocent brother—”
“Whoa, hold on,” Adam broke in before she could build up a good head of steam. “First off, whatever you think of him, Frankie is my best friend and I can’t let you talk about him like that. Secondly, Jess is the one who swore me to secrecy. I kept it quiet for his sake, because he asked to be the one who got to tell you.”
Miranda balled her fists. She looked ready to take his head off. “That’s completely irrelevant. I trusted you.”
Now Adam was starting to get pissed. “Yeah, well, so did Jess. And give me a break. I made that promise before anything had really happened between you and me.”
“Oh, so making out in your kitchen was nothing?” He could practically see her blood pressure skyrocketing.
“That’s not the point, and you know it.”
Jesus, what a cock-up.
Miranda felt as if Adam had taken that thick slab of slimy bacon and thwapped her in the head with it.
“Basically, you’re telling me that a promise to my brother, a boy you barely know—didn’t even want to hire until I forced your hand—means more to you than . . .”
Means more to you than I do.
She couldn’t say it. The words, the foolishness of the sentiment, stuck in her throat.
God, what was she doing here?
Adam ground his back teeth audibly. “Frankie and Jess both swore me to secrecy. And since it really wasn’t any of my business, I kept my mouth shut and my nose the hell out of it.”
“You know what?” Miranda stood, aware that her legs were wobbly but willing to ignore it. “Thanks for last night. You really did help me through a rough patch, and I appreciate it.”
His jaw dropped. “You’re leaving. Just like that.”
“You lied to me, Adam. For days, while we stood in this very kitchen and talked for hours—”
“About me!” Adam’s shout seemed to surprise him as much as it surprised Miranda. He pulled in a deep breath in a visible effort to calm down. “We always talked about my past, my family. You didn’t offer dick about your own history. Shit, all I mean is, Jess never really came up.”
Miranda stiffened, renewed anger strengthening her knees. “Never came up? Are you serious? That’s your justification? No. That’s it. I have to go.”
Adam stared at her for a long moment.
“Fine. I guess I can’t stop you.”
Miranda could have sworn the air between them crackled with angry heat. She could almost smell it burning.
“Crap,” Adam yelped, spinning on his heel and grabbing for the waffle iron. “I forgot about breakfast.”
The iron smoked when he opened it, released an acrid, burned smell into the air.
“I had high hopes for these waffles,” Adam said, poking at the crusty remains sadly.
Miranda left him in the kitchen and went to gather her things. The last view she had as she let herself out of the townhouse was of Adam flaking blackened crumbs into the trash.
TWENTY-FOUR
Frankie snapped the cell phone shut with a grimace. He had no landline for the Garret, always used his cell for everything.
“That was Adam. Evidently your sister’s on the warpath and he thought we should know.”
Jess snorted and leaned back against a corduroy cushion covered