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“I didn’t sleep much.”
That makes two of us. I’m running on fumes and family duty. I pour myself a cup of coffee and lean against the counter.
Luna is fiddling with the wrapper of a protein bar she’s barely nibbled on. Off to the right is another plate. Peanut butter toast with bits of crust left behind.
I stiffen as I put two and two together. “You’ve seen her already.”
“What?” She looks up and follows my gaze to the plate next to her. “Oh. Yeah. She was eating when I came down.”
“Blyat’,” I curse under my breath. “Just what I needed. Like she doesn’t have enough ammunition as it is.”
Luna frowns. “I’m sorry. Hold on. Do you think I met your sister for the first time and immediately started bad-mouthing you? Is that how you think I started my day?”
“Mariya would be a sympathetic audience. She’s pissed at me.”
“So am I,” she snaps. “That doesn’t mean I’d try to come between you and your sister. I actually tried to defend you. Not that you deserve it.”
She tucks a strand of hair behind her ear and I don’t think she realizes how much that simple, thoughtless gesture fucking undoes me. I grip the coffee mug so tightly I’m surprised it doesn’t shatter.
“How did it go?” I ask sarcastically. “Defending me? I bet Mariya ate it right up.”
“Oh. Um. Well…” She tugs on her lower lip with her teeth. “Mariya is confident. I can tell you that. She’s not shy, either.”
I run a hand across my forehead. “Who did she insult, you or me?”
“Both of us. Mostly me, though.” Luna laughs. “Apparently, I need to get rid of my jeans.”
A thought blares in my head, completely unasked-for: I’ll rip them right off you if you just say the word.
Out loud, I say, “I should have warned you she was here, but she got in late.”
“After you unlocked my door?”
I nod. “If I’d known she was coming, I might have locked you both in. Would have made my life a lot less complicated.”
Suddenly, a fork bounces off my chest and clatters to the floor. Luna is biting back a smile. “That’s not funny.”
“Who says I was joking?”
Luna toys with her protein bar a bit more before she gets up and drops it in the trash can uneaten. She leans her hip against the counter and crosses her arms. It’s a fight not to drink in every inch of her. “What are you going to do?”
I’m not going to close the gap between us and lift you onto the island, spread your legs, and fucking devour you, that’s for sure. That would be a terrible, terrible idea.
Although, on the other hand…
I might.
I grit my teeth and force myself not to move. “Sending her back to live with my mother isn’t an option. She’s almost eighteen. It won’t be long and she could come here without our mother’s permission, anyway.”
“For what it’s worth, I can tell she likes you.” Luna shrugs. “Or, she wants to like you, anyway. As much as a teenage girl can like her older brother.”
“She’ll like me less when I sit her down and explain the conditions under which she’ll be allowed to stay here.”
“She’ll thank you later. Even if it’s hard now, she’ll see one day how much you must have cared about her to make that tough choice.” Luna slides closer. “You are willing to let her hate you just to keep her alive. You have to care about someone a lot to do that for them.”
Luna isn’t just talking about Mariya here. Her eyes are on me, wondering what I’m thinking. Part of me thinks she knows I’m still hearing the echoes of her moans from the last time we fucked.
Everyone in my life needs something from me right now, but Luna is trying to help. She’s offering support. The fact that I want to lean into is reason enough to back the fuck away.
