“I figured you still liked to eat it straight out of the can. Do your bite of pie, full mouth of whipped cream routine. I always loved watching you do that.”
“You don’t even like whipped cream.”
“No. Still can’t stand it, even the homemade stuff. I think it ruins pie.”
“Just like I hate rhubarb and apple assholes.”
“Pretty much.” He raised a brow. “So… you want the can, or should I squirt it on top?”
Syd grinned. It pretty much split her face in two. And stopped his heart. One second it was pounding away in his chest, ba-bam, ba-bam, ba-bam and the next second, apparently, he was in cardiac arrest because there was no beating going on at all. Like- zero. His hand curled over the can and what do you know? Maybe he wasn’t in danger of dying- at least as long as Syd didn’t mention eating assholes again- because his heart slammed back into action so hard that it hurt.
“Pass that can over here.”
He slid it across the counter, towards Syd’s waiting fingers. They curled around it, perfect and dainty, with blunt square nails, trimmed short, like she used to keep them because she hated getting dirt underneath. They weren’t fake and they weren’t polished, since Syd literally hated anyone touching her hands and her feet and despised salons. She hated the fussiness of nail polish and never wore it. He was glad to see that hadn’t changed.
“Thanks.”
While he cut into the pie, which looked and smelled amazing, Syd shook up the can of whipped cream. He slid her plate over a minute later. She cracked the seal on the whipped cream, and just for old times’ sakes, bit off a piece of pie, scraping her teeth along the fork because she knew he hated it. She shook up the can and pointed it at her mouth.
Something must have malfunctioned or maybe she shook the can too enthusiastically, with more strength and force than she realized she contained in her small hands, because when she pressed the top, the whole thing detonated.
Straight into her face.
CHAPTER 12
Sydney
Holy mother loving fuck me with a kettle. What the hell just happened?
Sydney’s life divided into two parts. Before whipped cream explosion and after whipped cream explosion.
Because it wasn’t just like the can shot out a little stream or even a big stream. Hell no. The whole thing literally burst, like the entire thing, all over her face.
She was pretty sure, even though she couldn’t see it, that it looked like she’d decided to give herself a new face mask. She let out a cautious sounding scream, not too late or overdramatic, and reached up to swipe at her hair. Yup. It was up there too.
She swiped at her eyes frantically, trying to clear the white sticky goo off them, then out of nowhere, something fluffy was pressed into her hand. A towel.
“Holy farfinugan. Just sit there. Let me get you a wet cloth.”
“Don’t take a picture of this,” she pleaded. “And you better not have security cameras in the kitchen recording this, because if any of this footage leaks, I will never forgive you.”
“Look on the bright side. You could get internet famous. You do look pretty funny.”
“I’ll kill you, Jesse.”
His deep chuckle filled up the kitchen, and holy shit… that laugh hit her in all the wrong places. Unguarded places, where she had no business feeling it. His steps echoed on the kitchen floor as she waited. The whipped cream was that stupid aerosol kind and it wasn’t even melting off her face like the homemade stuff would have.
She reached out blindly when the footsteps came near, expecting to wrap her fingers around a wet cloth, but instead, they landed on something hard. And warm. Yikes!
She pulled her hand back like she’d just put it into a tank filled with angry scorpions and prickly cactuses, like- a torture tank meant to induce the worst finger nightmares ever.
“That wasn’t the cloth,” she moaned. God, could it get any worse?
“Definitely not the cloth,” Jesse agreed.
“Please tell me that was above the belt.”
“It was. Barely. Lucky for you.”
“Lucky for you too.”
“That’s debatable.”
Something warm and wet and squishy was placed into her outstretched hand. She unfolded the cloth and brought it up to her face, attacking her forehead first. Holy crap, there was a lot of whipped cream up there. Enough to fill up the cloth with a few passes.
“When did you start going to the gym? I thought you hated all that.”
“Who says I go to the gym?” Jesse’s voice was dark and rich, and way, way too close. Was he leaning in? Getting a kick out of all of it? Filming her frantic swipes at her gooey forehead with his phone?
“I- you- I just…” She realized how stupid that statement was and cursed herself for blurting out the first thing that came to mind. As usual. She’d never really developed that whole skill set of having a filter. “I felt abs. You never really had abs. I remember in gym class on the fitness test you could do, like, three sit-ups.”