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“Oh.” Heat filled her cheeks, turning her pale skin bright pink. She glanced at Asad, who didn’t look sorry at all—although maybe sorry they’d been interrupted before they could finish. “Sorry, I must not have heard the alert go off.”
“It’s fine.” Now, he just needed to retreat to his room. He gave Asad a half-hearted wave. “You two just keep on as you were. Sorry for interrupting. I’m going to go rest. It was a long plane ride.”
“Are you sure?” Morgan asked, just as Asad spoke up.
“We can move it to her room.” They gave each other a little look, one of those looks that two people who were connected by more than physical attraction gave each other. The kind of little look that couples shared, where they didn’t need to speak to know what the other was thinking.
The kind of little look that Brian so desperately wanted to share with someone.
That he’d almost felt like he’d had with Rae the last week.
“Thanks. You can do what you want, but I’m definitely going to my room.” He needed to be alone for a while. He gave them a wan smile, trying his damndest to make it seem like he was tired from traveling and nothing more. “I just want to lay down and sleep until tomorrow.”
Surely, tomorrow would be better. Or at least, he’d be a little further away from it all. He could mope around the house. Hopefully, Morgan and Asad would decamp to Asad’s, then he’d be ready to go back to work on Monday. A buffer day to let himself recalibrate and reacclimate to reality.
And the reality was that he and Rae were never going to work.
“Okay,” Morgan said, nodding. “Do you want me to make some food for you for dinner, so you don’t have to?”
That was one of the best things about having Morgan as a housemate. She tended to take things at face value. While Asad was looking at him with curiosity, as if he’d realized there was something more going on, Morgan just heard that he was tired, accepted it, then did what she could to offer help. Thankfully, he and Asad weren’t close enough for Asad to feel comfortable questioning him.
“Only if you were going to make some for yourself and will have extra. Otherwise, I can just order in.”
“Well…” Her voice started to trail off, and she glanced at Asad, who nodded encouragingly. “I was going to make you a welcome home dinner, but if you feel too tired to come eat with us, that’s okay.”
Dammit. He was an ass. He pushed another smile he didn’t feel onto his face.
“I just didn’t want to intrude on your plans, but if you were planning for me…”
“She was,” Asad confirmed, shooting him a grateful look, as if he knew Brian really wanted alone time but was adjusting for Morgan. “You do look tired, though. We won’t keep you up late.”
“Oh, no, definitely not.” Morgan’s expression had lit up now that she knew Brian was going to have dinner with them. “I can’t wait to hear about the week and the resort.”
Great. Now, he really needed to go sit in his room and figure out what highly edited version he was going to tell her. Or if he could tell her a highly edited version. Somehow, he didn’t think it would be better to let her hear about him and Rae hooking up through the grapevine, and it would reach her, eventually.
Hell, probably sooner rather than later, now that she was with Asad. He was very close friends with Law.
“Great. I just need to rest my eyes for a bit, then I’ll tell you all about it.” He nodded his head and headed to his room. Yeah, he’d have to tell her all about it, though he’d emphasize that he and Rae were not getting into a real relationship or anything like that.
She and Rae had gotten off on the wrong foot when they’d been in the Intro for Submissives class together, and things had only marginally improved since then. He didn’t think she’d be upset or anything, but who knew? Morgan could also be very protective of him, so he’d have to ensure she understood there really were no hard feelings between him and Rae. He didn’t want to accidentally exacerbate the divide that already existed between the two women.
As he was headed down the hallway, he heard the chime of Morgan’s phone going off. It practically echoed down the hall. She must have turned it up after realizing she’d missed his text message.
He’d just opened the door to his bedroom when he heard the screech.
“You spent the week hooking up with Rae, and you didn’t tell me?!”
Ah, fuck.
Rae
Home sweet home.
Except it was more like home lonely home. Not that she’d ever been an extrovert, but she had lived very happily with Domi and her daughter Ana for years. Now Domi lived with Mitch, and when Ana wasn’t with her father, she was over there. At first, Rae had liked the quiet.
Now, she was semi-grateful for the quiet because she didn’t really want to put up with any more of Domi’s interrogation about Brian, but…
She’d gotten used to living with Brian during the week.
