Chapter 111

[MIA]

"So, Mia, how did you get into baking?"

"It's a simple hobby," I shrugged, adding too much sugar to the mix as instructed. "And I needed something to keep me busy."

"That's it?" Ronan raised an unimpressed eyebrow. "No touching story about how your mom passed on her secret recipes before she died?"

I laughed. "Not many touching stories to go around when you don't have a mom."

"Ah." He clicked his tongue, offering no sympathy.

"What do you do?" I asked, "Besides being a hellion and getting on your brother's nerves?"

"I love how well you've gotten to know me in an hour," he whipped the cake mix. "And getting on my brother's nerves is my birthright. I'm the only man he wouldn't kill."

I shrugged. "I'm not hearing a real hobby, Ronan."

"I party."

"Still not a hobby."

"You sound like my sister," he scrunched his nose. "And I don't willingly consider hot girls my sisters."

"I'm hot?" I raised an eyebrow. "Because I do remember you saying about five minutes ago that I look like a grandmother when I get too protective of my recipes."

"Only when you get too protective of your recipes." He smirked.

"Too old for you, Ron."

"Four years," he mused nonchalantly, passing the cake mix to me. "Besides, I like old."

"You're barely an adult," I chuckled.

"Hey! I'm twenty-one."

"Not with the way you're whining, you're not." I laughed. "And making an extremely sweet cake just to see your brother's reaction? Not very mature."

"Remember what I told you?" He grinned. "Birthright."

Ronan was much more easygoing and better company than his older brother, especially to talk to. He didn't glare. He didn't grunt. He didn't give murderous glances.

As if proving the saying "think of the devil and the devil appears," I had just been thinking of Alex, and he appeared, leaning against the kitchen entrance. "What's going on here?" he mused, his eyes flickering between his brother and me.

I opened my mouth to answer, but no words came out as I took in his rolled-up white shirt and those hands. They were going to be the death of me. Flashbacks of the morning flooded back, and I gulped.

"Mia's spending time with her favorite Whitlock," Ronan replied, a smug smile challenging his brother.

One of Alex's eyebrows rose, his eyes meeting mine. "Is that so?"

"No," I leaned forward on the counter. "My favorite Whitlock happens to be Sofia. Your mom's so pretty."

"Do you play for the other team, Mia?" Ronan asked seriously. "Did I spend all this time flirting with you for nothing?"

"Flirting?" Alex's ears perked, and he walked in. "You were flirting with her?"

"Healthy flirting. Unserious flirting," Ronan chuckled nervously, tossing the cake batter into the preheated oven. "You remember that thing I told you about how I wouldn't be killed?" He whispered to me, "I'm beginning to doubt that."

I rolled my eyes at his dramatics.

"I—I should go call Aurora. She went to lunch and isn't back yet." Still nervously smiling, Ronan strode off, leaving me alone with his older brother.

I shook my head and laughed before setting the oven timer, ignoring Alex, who had walked closer.

"So?" he asked.

"So?" I repeated dumbly, gathering the ingredients from the counter and putting them away.

"Were you flirting with my brother, cupcake?"

"More like he was flirting with me," I chuckled.

"And?"

"And?" I glared at Alex—a look that had zero effect on him. One of his hands grabbed the counter near me, blocking my path, and forcing me to stop. His other hand wrapped around the back of my neck, pulling me closer.

My breath hitched at his closeness.

Alex didn't kiss. He had never kissed me. We had had sex, but there were no kisses, hugs, or cuddles involved. It was just sex.

"I don't share," he grunted.

I bit my lip. "Alex, he's your younger brother."

"Mine." he reminded me.

"In life and death," I said, as if it were a mantra. "I remember."

"Good."

"You've never kissed me," I mused.

Something flickered in his eyes, and his hand retreated. "Do you want me to?"

"N—No?" I offered. Just say yes. Damn it. Missed opportunity. "I meant, it was an observation. You don't kiss."

"I've never kissed."

My eyes widened. "You've never had a first kiss?!"

"What's the point of kissing?" He shrugged, stepping back. "I've never understood the allure."

My lips parted, and I hid a smile. "You've never kissed anyone."

He shook his head as if it wasn't a big deal.

It was. It totally was.

"Have you?" he asked.

"Duh."

"You said that like it was the most obvious thing in the world."

"It is?" I replied sheepishly. "Kissing is common."

"Who have you kissed?" He crossed his arms.

"A few?"

"Names, cupcake."

"W—Why?" I chuckled nervously.

"I want to have a talk with them."

"Alex!" I huffed.

"What?"

"Am I interrupting?" A third voice made me jump. Alex didn't flinch, rolling his eyes at his twin.

"Yes!" "No!" We answered simultaneously.

Aurora smirked, clearly in a better mood than when she left, her cheeks flushed. "I'm taking Mia," she told Alex. "We're going to have some girls' time."

Alex shook his head as Aurora grabbed my wrist and pulled me away. I knew his twin sister meant much more to him than he let on. At home, he wasn't the mafia strategist Alex King. He was just Alex. And I loved every bit of that plain, simple him.

Loved.

I let that word sink in while I talked to Aurora, and Alex glared at us from the couch where he played a video game with Ronan, who kept winking at me despite the death stares from his brother.

This felt normal—a kind of normal I'd never felt before—and I pondered how I felt that way because of a mafia man who had upended my life.