“Just a second. I’ll be right back,” I announce to the rest of the table before striding out of the glassed-in dining room toward the old farmhouse kitchen. I head straight for the pantry, swipe what I need off the shelf, and return to the dining room. Back in my seat, I pop the tab and pull the lid off a can of pineapple chunks before shoving a small spoon into it.

I can sense my family staring at me in confusion. But more importantly, I see Julia’s smile out of the corner of my eye as I serve myself up a few spoonfuls of pineapple right on top of my eggs.

When I finally turn to her, I slide the can in her direction. “Pineapple?” I ask with a teasing wink.

Her smile widens as she hits me with a chuckle. “Yes, please. So thoughtful of you.”

I garnish her eggs, too, trying not to feed into my family’s stunned silence as I set the can back on the table.

“What the hell are you doing?” Opa grumbles.

“Acquiring a taste,” I say as I shovel a mouthful past my lips and cast a quick glance at Julia. Her cheeks are pink. She’s fucking beautiful. But I don’t gawk this time. Instead, I look back down at my plate and announce, “Pineapple on my eggs. It’s a new thing I’m into.”

“Weird. But I’ll try it,” Opa says, gesturing for me to pass the can across the table. Laughter ripples through the table as everyone joins in on trying the wacky combination.

But it’s Parker’s attention beside me that I feel most heavily. She hums thoughtfully as she watches me take another big bite, and when she elbows me this time, it’s downright gentle.

“You know, it’s not her heart I’m worried about.”

Parker

Crawl space.

Emmett

Be right there.

When Parker summons me to the crawl space later that day, I show up. It’s our thing, always has been. When I was eleven, she went missing for a few hours. Oma and Opa were beside themselves with worry, and they’d organized a search party to look for her.

But I’m the one who found her. We were told to stay in the house, so I’d come downstairs to play at the pool table, needing a distraction. As I racked the balls, I heard her quiet sobbing behind the wall.

I opened the small, low door, and that’s where I found her. In the crawl space, alone. She said she needed everyone to stop coddling her, just wanted to be sad without people rushing in to make her feel better.

And quite frankly, I could relate.

So I crawled in beside her, and we sat in silence. Tears on our cheeks. Which, in retrospect, was unfair to all the people who were walking the fields and calling her name. But Parker and I have been kindred in that way. We’re the quiet ones.

And while I love all my siblings dearly, Parker and I are the closest.

Plus, it’s a great excuse to avoid the cameras, whose presence weighs heavier every time I walk through the front door of my home and remember that I’m being watched. In fact, when I went back to change, I couldn’t help but notice crew members affixing even more cameras to nearby trees and fence posts. It seems my great escape has bought me more surveillance.

Which is why I pull straight up to the main farmhouse, leaving my groceries in the back seat, let myself in, and make my way straight to the basement. I walk past the antique pool table, eyes homing in on the small door that blends in with the dark, wood-paneled walls. My lips twitch as I wonder what I’m heading into right now.

In the past, it’s been a horrible breakup, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Christmas Day, hell, even her own birthday. When Parker has big emotions, she still hides here. But now the space has grown up too.

Rugs cover the dirt floor. There’s a stack of old-school mystery novels. A flashlight. Pillows propped along the pink insulation and plastic sheet walls. There’s even a basket stocked with a few different liquors for when shit is really bad.

Sometimes, Parker and I will sit in the crawl space, passing a bottle back and forth in silence. It’s what we did when I lost the championship to Theo Silva last season.

I’d been so damn close. I could almost taste it. But I’d had to choke on the flavor of defeat.

I tug the door open and drop to my knees. The lights are on, and my sister is already waiting.

Parker takes one look at me and twists the top off a bottle of bourbon.

I quirk one brow at her and pretzel myself into position, leaning my back against the wall as I attempt to cross my legs. I’m stiff as shit after a long week of working around the farm in the morning and filming all afternoon and evening.

“Okay. What’s going on?” I jump right in.

Parker takes a swig, and it never fails to amuse me. My petite, rather serious sister always looks out-of-character drinking alcohol straight from the bottle. At least it means she’s summoned me here because something is going on with her and not just to interrogate me about Julia.

I shoot her a questioning look, but all I get back is a blank expression. Something tells me that whatever is going on with her today is more suited to our tradition of drinking in silence.

“We’re not talking today, then. Got it.” I reach for the bottle, taking it out of Parker’s fingers. “Guess I’ll have a few since my life isn’t exactly sunshine and rainbows right now either.”

“Dating ten women isn’t all it’s cracked up to be?”

“Nope,” I reply, popping the p. “Especially not when Richard the pervert has chosen them all for you. It’s like he went through and picked the most outrageous characters he could find. Did you know that Plagiarism Madeline was on the show?”

Parker’s mouth falls open. “No.”

I take another drink before passing it back. “Yes.”

“Why?”

I shrug. “I don’t know. Local flair?”

“Dang, they had an entire valley of women to choose from, and they went with the annoying pick-me girl from high school who almost got me expelled because she couldn’t come up with her own goddamn ideas?”

My head shakes as I remember that drama. “I’m pretty sure she’s just obsessed with you. Wants to be your friend, or your sister-in-law, or wear your skin.”

Parker snorts. “Oh good. My very own single white female.”

“Knowing Dick Wad, it was on purpose.”

Parker laughs dryly and takes a drink. “Fuck me, that is traumatizing. Is she the same as she used to be?”

“Fake as hell and trying too hard?”

“Yeah, that.”

“Big-time.”

Parker cringes. “Please tell me you’re eliminating her.”

I snort and drop my head against the board behind me as I gaze up at the low ceiling. “Parks, I’d never date someone who was so awful to you. Already sent her packing.”

To that, I receive a firm nod and the bottle of amber liquid shoved back in front of me.

“Julia seems nice.”

“Ah, there it is. What I figured you called me here for.”

“It’s not my fault you brought a girl to breakfast.”

My eyes close as I spin the bottle in my hand. “It’s just breakfast, Parks.”

“We both know it’s not just breakfast, Em.”

I don’t respond, because she’s right. It’s unspoken, but all of us have kept that tradition sacred. None of us Brandt kids have been keen to invite outsiders in on our traditions. Evan is the only one who has brought a girl to breakfast. And we all knew she was special—special enough to marry.

Which is why my bringing Julia is so inexplicable. I didn’t even think twice. It felt obvious. Like, of course, it would be fine if she came for breakfast.

“She’s cool. You’d be overachieving if that ever became a thing.”

I chuckle at that, because she’s not wrong. But it’s still impossible. “Shit, thanks, Parker. But don’t get your hopes up. She’s Theo Silva’s little sister. A terrible fucking idea. Plus, I have to finish out the show.”