Page 71 of In Somnis

“You already asked me yesterday to work… right before you kicked me out.”

He winces. “Yeah. That.” He scratches the back of his neck, looking genuinely embarrassed. “So I’m asking again. Properly this time, without the weird trauma response in the middle.” His mouth quirks. “Would you consider working at the inn? It doesn’t have to be full-time. Just dinner service. Or lunch? Literally, whenever you feel like showing up, honestly, because the current chef is me, and my cooking is actively dangerous.”

“You’re really selling it.”

“I know, right? I should be in marketing.” He smirks, but then it softens into something more sincere. “Look, I get why you’d want to say no. But I promise, I’m not usually like that. I won’t treat you like that again. And Jasper will never forgive me if I let you leave without at least trying to convince you to stay.”

“Pulling the little brother card is mean.”

He runs his thumb absently along his eyebrow piercing, but his mouth curves with it.

Am I really considering this?

I still don’t know what I’m supposed to do next, but I know that I need to be useful.

Standing still is where the grief catches up.

A kitchen is the one place I know how to think.

Or hide, depending on the day.

“I’m probably only going to be here short term,” I say carefully.

“That’s fine.” No hesitation. “We can work with short term. Hell, we can work with super short term. However long you’re willing to stay.”

I turn the offer over in my mind. I’m here for Tessa. It wasn’t supposed to include a job, but given how the dreams are already affecting me, making me question my sanity, maybe it would be good to have a routine to connect with people in the real world, so someone notices if I completely lose the plot, something to anchor me.

And God help me, I’ve been wishing for exactly this. My job back, a kitchen, and a purpose.

Somewhere to put all the love, panic, and grief so it looked like competence instead of damage.

Oh well. I already half agreed to it yesterday.

“Okay,” I hear myself say before I’ve even totally landed on the decision.

He grins, then sticks out his pinky finger like we’re kids making a playground pact. “Promise?”

I hook my pinky with his, and the gesture is so unexpectedly sweet that I can feel a flutter in my stomach. “Yes, promise.”

His smile reaches his eyes and carves dimples into his cheeks, and then his gaze catches on the lemon clip in my hair. He taps it gently with one finger. “Thanks, Lemon.”

Lemon?

No one has given me a nickname in years—not one that didn’t make my skin crawl, anyway.

Spencer called me Cherub, and I never told him I hated it. I folded the hatred up small and quiet as I did with everything else.

Lemon fits.

Dad used to call me Lenny-girl, back when I was small enough to sit on the kitchen counter and “help.” I didn’t realize how much I missed it, being seen like that.

I smile at him, trying to ignore how my heart is doing something complicated behind my ribs, but even as warmth spreads through me, something cold curls low beneath it. I came here for clarity, for answers, for Tessa. Instead, I just ended up with more complications—a job, a nickname, one baby brother who needs someone in his corner, and one big brother with kind eyes and paint on his hands who is struggling in a shape I recognize anyway.

And as terrible as it is, it makes me feel less… alone.

“So,” he lets go of my hand. “When do you want to start? I’m flexible. Desperate, even.”

“Desperate is not a good negotiating position,” I point out.