by Ella Fox
She smiled as we stepped out onto the covered patio area, which had table seating for twenty and enough outdoor chairs to house the same number. Six fans whirred overhead, moving the warm summer air comfortably throughout the space. Directly ahead of us across the yard was the pool where the overhead rain fountains that arced over the back filled the air with the soothing sound of flowing water. We both paused our steps as we came out from under the covered patio and saw Rafe sitting in one of the double loungers to our left, his hand held out in front of him. The reason his hand was out became clear when I noticed the jar of peanuts at his side. Elvis was perched on the back of the lounger eating out of his hand. He nodded toward Kaya and me as we started walking again.
“It’s a shame he’s not a parrot,” he called out, “because I gotta think I’d have made a badass pirate.”
I let out a bark of laughter at the same time Kaya’s sweet laugh rang out through the air. My brother laughed too when Elvis pecked his shoulder, almost as if he understood what Rafe had said.
“Aw buddy,” Rafe laughed as he turned to Elvis, “I’m just playing. Having a peacock pal is just as cool as having a parrot. Besides, I don’t have a peg-leg, and I get seasick, so pirating is out.”
“I’m sorry that he came back over the fence,” Kaya said as we walked toward the lounger, “but I see that you like him.”
Rafe shrugged. “He’s a good time. No mindless chatter, unless you count the things I say to him. Not sure why he likes it over here so much, but it’s not a bad thing.”
Kaya smiled as Elvis jumped down from the lounge and walked to her side. “I’m reasonably sure one of the reason he’s excited is that you feed him,” she said dryly. “Watermelon earlier, peanuts now—you’ve got a friend for life. He must think your house is food utopia.” Looking down at Elvis, she raised a brow. “You know you’re a little criminal, right?”
Birds can’t smile, but I swear if Elvis could’ve grinned, he would’ve. He cawed and then pecked at Kaya’s side playfully. “Yeah, yeah,” she laughed, “you didn’t do anything wrong—gravity just floated you over here.”
Elvis somehow managed to look repentant and innocent at the same time. The love he and Kaya had for each other was readily apparent. “I’m going out this afternoon,” she told him, like he’d understand. “You need to stay at home while I’m gone, buddy.”
“Or,” I said, thinking out loud, “Rafe could babysit.”
“Oh, no,” she said, “there’s no need for that—”
“It’s no problem,” Rafe interrupted. “I’m not going anywhere or anything. He can stay with me.”
The crazy bird looked up at Kaya hopefully, like he wanted to stay and hang out with Rafe.
“Ah, okay,” Kaya said slowly. “He can stay, but so that you know, he doesn’t need to be watched the whole time. At least not normally,” she said, looking down at Elvis with a raised brow. “He’s normally content to chill out. This is the most excitement he’s had since last molting season.”
She giggled when she noticed that Rafe and I were both looking at her blankly. “Toward the end of every summer he loses his feathers,” she explained.
My brother’s face scrunched up. “Elvis is going to lose all of his feathers soon? Being a naked peacock has to suck.”
Kaya clutched her stomach as she laughed harder. God, she was fucking sweet. “No, no,” she squeaked, “just the long ones. Everything on his body stays.”
Rafael let out a loud exhale. “Thank fuck. My dude wouldn’t look so good without all of his color.”
I snorted and rolled my eyes at my brother, the idiot. For someone who had originally been scared damn near shitless of the bird, he sure had come around to it.
“So you got this?” I asked.
Rafe nodded. “Just call me the bird watcher.”
“Alright, then we’re out as soon as I change my clothes.”
I reached out to touch Kaya’s arm again, not because it was necessary to get her attention. “Come inside—it’ll only take me a minute to get changed.”
She bit her lip as she turned and looked up at me and nodded. Fuck, I wanted to do things to those lips. How someone could look so beautiful and pure while simultaneously inspiring dozens of XXX rated fantasies was a mystery to me. Her face was flushed with color when she looked down at Elvis and ever so gently tickled his fluffy crown with her finger. “You be good, okay?”
The innocent look Elvis gave her made me snort. The little shit acted like butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth, but Rafe had filled me in on all the crap the bird showed up with that morning. Like Kaya had told me the day before, Elvis was a thief. I did not doubt that he had a substantial stash on the other side of the wall.
Kaya waved at Elvis before she turned and followed me into the house. I left her in the living room before I hurried up the stairs to my suite. The way the house was set up had my parents, Rafe and Diego’s rooms on the ground floor while mine was upstairs on the opposite side of the house from Mateo and Ava’s. Joaquin’s room was at the front of the house, next to the game room. My father and mother both had separate office spaces downstairs, but the rest of us had chosen to have one large office installed up on the second floor for all of us to use if need be. There were two large desks, two separate seating areas, and a boardroom table to accommodate the all of us, and whomever else we had in the office with us. The rest of the top floor was taken up with two guest rooms and an in home theater that had seating for twenty. The Malibu house was designed to be a fully functional vacation home for the entire family, and at just over twelve thousand square feet it still managed to feel cozy. In my opinion, my mother and Ava had hit the ball out of the park when they’d worked with the architects who designed it.
Once in my bedroom, I stripped out of my suit and quickly donned jeans, a white tee and a pair of white Nikes. I changed quickly before throwing open the door and running to the stairs to get back to Kaya. I found her standing in front of one of the many displays of family pictures that were woven throughout the house.
She turned my way when I entered and gave me a bemused smile. “How many times a day does your mother get asked if all of her sons are models? This many good looking people is ridiculous,” she said as she gestured at the photos.
When I snickered, she went on. “That’s not even taking into account how attractive your parents are—and don’t even get me started on your sister-in-law,” she said. As she spoke, she gestured to one of the biggest photos on the wall, a photo of the entire family picture that had been taken at Mateo and Ava’s wedding. We’d been told collectively and separately for as long as I could remember that we were blessed with beauty, which meant I was somewhat used to it—but that didn’t mean the fact that Kaya had, for all intents and purposes, admitted that she found me handsome, didn’t please me.
“Thank you, I think,” I said.
She swiveled my way with a grin. “It was a compliment but enough about looks. I wouldn’t want to give you a big head. Are you hungry?”
“Starved,” I answered. Technically I was talking about my hunger for her, but she couldn’t know that.
“Awesome,” she said excitedly. “Let’s get on the road.”
I gestured for her to walk alongside me as we headed to the front doors. “Your chariot awaits.”
11
Kaya
I let out a satisfied sigh as I finished eating my humongous burger and fries. Folding my napkin, I set it down on my plate before looking across the table at Alejandro. He’d been answering my barrage of questions about Barcelona, but he’d stopped speaking a few seconds before. This was because he was staring at me with an expression I couldn’t immediately identify. Self-conscious, I wiped at the right and then the left corners of my mouth with my thumb.
“Is there ketchup on my face or something?”
He shook his head. “No, you’re perfect.”
I cocked my head to the left and gave him a wry look. “Really? Because you’re s
taring at me like I’m a science experiment.”
“No, no, nothing like that,” he hurried to explain as he gestured to my plate. “I’m just marveling that you took down a burger damn near the size of your head and a giant side of fries. And that’s not even including the wings and buffalo cauliflower we had as appetizers.”
I shrugged and leaned back in my chair. “What can I say? I love food. More accurately, I love good food. If you’re used to dining with women who nibble on bits of salad, I must seem like an alien.”
The last bit came out a bit snippy because I found myself oddly sensitive to the idea that he might think I was weird.
Alejandro shook his head. “No, Belleza. You seem like perfection. I was more wondering where you put it all. You’re so tiny.”
Ah, that I understood since I’d gotten it my whole life. I made a dismissive gesture with my hand before leaning forward to pick up my glass of lemonade. “I’ve been asked many versions of that same question my entire life. I guess the answer is a combination of genetics and exercise. Later tonight I’ll run three miles on the treadmill in Emery’s sunroom and tomorrow when I wake up I’ll do twenty laps in the pool.”
“Bear with me here, but I have to ask,” he said as he leaned forward in his chair. “Do you have any kind of weird collection, a dead body in your garage or a penchant for stealing weird shit?”
I could tell that he wasn’t serious so I rolled my eyes. “Nope,” I answered, popping the p as I did. “Why?”
“Have you ever watched Seinfeld?” he asked as he leaned back and draped his arm over the empty chair beside him.
“All the time,” I answered. “Dean lives for Seinfeld. A few years ago I gave him the entire series on DVD for Christmas.”
“Who’s Dean?”
Unless I was crazy, Alejandro was jealous. I did my best to ignore the shivery feeling that gave me as I hastened to explain. “Dean and his wife Gigi raised me. I call them my fairy godparents.”
“Ah,” he nodded, “that makes sense. Not a lot of people our age watch Seinfeld. My brothers and I watched because my father and my late Uncle Quino were very fond of the show. They insisted that it was a much-watch comedy.”
“It’s a classic,” I agreed.
“So you remember some of the girls Jerry had weird relationships with then, right?”
I leaned forward and set my arm on the table so that I could prop my chin on my hand. “You mean man hands Gillian, good light bad light Gwen, Marla the virgin, Erica the phone sex worker who couldn’t spare a square, Lena who had the lifetime supply of contraceptive sponges, Pimple Popper M.D. Sara, Celia and her giant toy collection, Beth the racist and Sophie who got gonorrhea from riding a tractor in her bathing suit?”
Alejandro threw his head back and laughed, his delight in my knowledge of Seinfeld readily apparent.
“Yes, them,” he said with a low laugh. “It’s been a long-running joke within my family that I have Jerry’s luck with women.”
I ignored the nervous feeling in my stomach. We were dancing close to a line where there could be an admission that there was an attraction between us and I didn’t think I was ready for that.
“How close to the truth is that?” I asked.
He grimaced as he twirled the straw in his soda between the thumb and index finger on his right hand. “His luck would be a step up. My dating history is more Twilight Zone than Seinfeld.”
“Oh, hush. That can’t be true.”
“Trust me; it’s brutal.”
We weren’t officially on a date—I’d have said no to that—but I suspected that he wouldn’t mind if we were. That meant my best course of action was deflection.
I was dying to ask questions, but I knew that my questions for him would open the door to him asking me about my dating history. There was nothing I wanted to talk about less.
“Well, you’re safe right now,” I said playfully as I sat up straighter. Turning my iPhone over, I checked the time. ““Someday you’ll have to tell me all about it, but not today. If we don’t leave in the next few minutes, we won’t have time to stock up on candy and snacks before the movie starts.”
I could tell by his expression that he knew I was deflecting and I held my breath for a second as I waited to see what he would do. Instead of calling me on it he nodded his head and smiled. “If you think you can really fit candy into your stomach after this huge of a lunch, who am I to stop you?”
I chuckled as he raised his hand to get the waitress’s attention, relieved that he’d let it go. That he hadn’t pushed it only made me like him that much more.
12
Alejandro
After leaving the gastropub where we’d eaten lunch, Kaya directed me to the closest CS Market, which was about a mile away. I grinned as I clicked the lock for the car doors and fell into step beside her. “Taking me to work, Miss Porter?”
“Ha ha,” she answered playfully. “Don’t worry, Mr. Oh-so-long-half-day, that’s not why we’re here. We’re going to utilize the bulk candy bar at the back of the store.”
One consistent thing in all American CS Markets was the wall of self-serve candy. My father and Uncle Quino had originally implemented it in a dozen stores at the suggestion of one of our American product-placement executives. Once they saw how popular it was, the feature had gone into the entire chain across the United States.
“Ah,” I laughed as we walked through the sliding doors into the store, “I didn’t realize when you said you wanted to stock up that you meant from the store. You know there’s candy at the movie theater, right?”
She’d been in the process of pulling out a cart, but she stopped dead in her tracks, clutching her chest as she turned to me in horror. “Alejandro! No. You never, ever buy the candy at the theater. It’s like a bazillion percent markup. The same small box of candy that would set me back a buck over at the Dollar Store costs me six at the theater. That just doesn’t sit well with me. There’s nothing I can do about the five-dollar soda or the ten-dollar tub of popcorn—can’t very well lug in a fountain soda of my own and warm theater popcorn with a load of butter is magical—but I haven’t bought candy from the concession stand since I was a little girl, and Dean taught me about bringing my own. It’s why I have a purse,” she said.
I bit back a laugh when she gestured to the white handbag with ice cream cone accents that she’d just set down in the front of the cart. “Besides,” she continued, “at the theater, I don’t get to create my own chocolate mix. Here, I do. Trust me—it’s the best thing ever. Follow me?”
I’d have followed her anywhere. “Of course. Let’s do this.”
She started walking the cart with great purpose toward the back of the store. “The cart’s overkill though, right?” I teased.
Kaya laughed as she continued walking. “Well, I’m certainly not going to fill it to the brim with candy if that’s what you’re asking.”
When she looked over at me, I raised an eyebrow.
“I just prefer carts,” she shrugged. “I figure if anyone gets in my way I can just run them down.”
There was something so unbelievably free and fun about Kaya Porter. She had no artifice—she came as she was, no attempts to change who she was according to the people she was with. I’d spent a lifetime weeding out people who treated me differently because of my family’s wealth. That she was genuine was so damn amazing I could hardly wrap my mind around it. Even the way she ate and enjoyed her food without care for what I’d think was refreshing. She’d been right in the restaurant—I was used to women who nibbled on a chicken salad and swore they were full. It had gone on for so long that I’d stopped seeing just how ridiculous and fake it was. Kaya had me feeling fully engaged with another person—one who wasn’t family or a very close friend—for the first time ever.
She looked back over her shoulder and caught the way my eyebrows rose as she picked up three of the empty candy bags and opened them. “Don’t worry,” she snickered, “I’m not trying to give us
both diabetes.”
I pretended to wipe sweat from my brow. “You had me on the ropes there for a second.”
Kaya laughed as she turned back to the wall of candy. It was interesting to observe the way she worked through the automated candy wall, pressing buttons and holding the bag under individual dispensers. She didn’t go overboard, but she did get a good selection of chocolate, asking me for my preferences as she filled it up. When she was finished, she handed the bag over to me. “Can you close this off?”
I nodded and took the bag from her, folding it down and sealing it shut while she filled her second and third bags with watermelon and apple Jolly Ranchers, one flavor in each bag. Those bags she loaded to capacity before sealing them shut.
“Want to tell me again that you’re not trying to put us into a sugar coma?”
She snorted as she set the bags down in the cart. “Those aren’t all for the movie. I’m addicted to Jolly Ranchers, and I always have some with me. What about you—what are your favorite sweets?”
My mouth watered just thinking of them, so I made a mental note to tell my mother to bring some along with her. “The candies from La Colmena back home. You have not tasted heaven until one of their lavender or marshmallow flavored candies is dissolving in your mouth,” I laughed. “My mamá buys them in bulk because we all love them so much. They are handmade, and you can tell. When I want chocolate or pastries, I stop in at Chocofiro. You would love it there because it is like a wonderland. In my opinion, you have not known true food love until you’ve been to Spain. Our cuisine is the best in the world.”
I was inordinately proud of my home country. Always had been and always would be. I adored America, but Spain was home. The sights, scents, and tastes were all the things I loved most.
She smiled as she began rolling the cart toward the front of the store so that we could check out. “Believe it or not, Spain is the number one place Emery and I have always wanted to visit. There and Paris. Some day when she isn’t filming, we’ll make it happen.”
