Page 62 of Rescue

She shoots me a little grin. “Somewhere warm and tropical. Probably sounds lame to someone as cultured as you.”

“Cultured?” I bark out a laugh. “I’m hardly cultured. Have you met my brothers?”

“You’re not your brothers,” she says, and something in her voice makes my chest feel tight. “I was with you in Edinburgh,” she continues, sounding more like herself. “I heard you going on about the castle and the Royal Mile and all of that stuff. You obviously knew what you were talking about.”

I feel a little uncomfortable. It’s a strange feeling, knowing someone was listening to me, paying attention. I’m usually the one who stands in the back, unnoticed, especially when my brothers are around.You’re not your brothers, her voice seems to whisper in my ear.

“Okay, these should be ready to come out,” John says. “If someone wants to—”

Cash and Paige are across the room with oven mitts before he can even finish. They pull out the pastries, which smell pretty amazing, and place them on the front counter. “These look great,” John says.

“Which ones would you say are best?” Paige asks.

John looks taken aback. “I don’t… they’re all very nice.”

“Yes, but which arebest?” Cash presses. “If you had to choose.”

“Oh my God, you guys,” Karen snaps. “Sit down so we can eat.”

John divides the pastries onto plates and passes them around as Marie joins us again, bearing a tray of coffee and tea. “You all did very well,” John says as we start to dig in. “So now you can enjoy the fruits of your labor.”

“Except for Daltrey and Daisy,” Levi calls out. “Who did virtually nothing and shouldn’t be rewarded.”

“Except for Daltrey and Daisy,” John agrees, smiling. “But we’ll let them eat as well.”

“Holy crap,” Haylee mutters, mouth full of pastry. “That’s good.”

“Itisgood. I kind of can’t believe I made this.”

“I helped,” she says, poking my arm.

“You did. Even your pathetic little basket turned out okay.”

“It turned out delicious is what it turned out.”

She’s smiling at me, and I can’t help but smile back, even though a little voice in the back of my head is warning me that this isn’t smart. Sharing food and coffee with her, both of us tired and messy, our guards down… what good could come of this?

As if sensing the direction of my thoughts, Haylee looks away. “Thanks for this, Lennon.”

“For what?”

She looks back at me, and my breath catches. Her eyes are wide and pleading. “For being so nice to me, after… well. After I was so awful.”

“You weren’t awful,” I say automatically, wanting to make her pleading look disappear.

She smiles sadly. “You don’t have to say that. I know what I did.”

“Haylee…” I trail off, not really knowing what to say. “It’s like you said,” I finally continue. “We could both use a good friend, right?”

She’s quiet for a moment, watching me. When she finally responds, her voice is wistful. “Yeah. Good friends.”

As we finish our pastry and thank John, I can’t help running her words over and over in my head. Good friends. It was what she asked for, what she says she wants. So why did she sound so sad when she said it?