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“Not really,” Ollie said.
“Not really. Okay, that leaves a little room for doubt. Good to know. Note to self—must take shower.”
I couldn’t help but smile. Ryder straightened up and met my eyes again.
It was hard to look at him, because doing so just felt…intense. I knew I had a lot of explaining to do. He would want to know why I never told him I had a brother, let alone one I cared for as if he were my own child. He might not understand my reasoning for keeping it from him.
Even though I felt like maybe I shouldn’t give in to Ryder being here, I couldn’t just go home and leave him standing here. He’d come all this way. Before I had a chance to say anything, Ollie broke the ice.
“Are we just gonna stand here, or are we gonna go home? I’m hungry. You comin,’ Ryder?”
Ryder continued looking into my eyes. “That’s up to your sister.”
Here it was. This was the moment when I either coldly told him to go back to California, or I invited him home with us. One thing I was finding, it was far harder to resist this man in person than from afar.
“We only live a few blocks down the road,” I said.
That wasn’t exactly a direct invitation, but it was me agreeing to Ryder coming home with us.
He pointed back with this thumb. “My car’s right there. I can drive us.”
“Okay,” I said, leading Ollie by the hand.
We walked over to Ryder’s car. It was really nice for what I assumed to be a rental.
Before he started the engine, Ryder paused and looked at me. I could practically hear all of the silent questions in his head.
With Ollie here, I knew he wasn’t going to get into it too much with me. That gave me some time to think about how I was going to explain everything.
As we drove along, I directed him. “You just take your first left up there. We’re gonna be the last house on the right.”
Ryder parked in our driveway, then followed me into the house as Ollie held my hand. I didn’t always have to hold onto my brother. Despite the fact that he couldn’t see, he knew his way into the house pretty well, but given his recent injury, I was being extra cautious. Even though the doctors had confirmed that nothing happened to his brain when he fell, I was still paranoid.
I watched as Ollie walked to his room. He was safe in there because I kept it pretty empty, nothing sharp or anything that could potentially harm him. He always got a little time after school to veg out before he had to do his homework.
When he was safely out of earshot, I just started talking so Ryder didn’t have to initiate the conversation.
“I’ve been taking care of him ever since my mother died. We don’t have the same father. Ollie’s dad was a young tourist my mother had a fling with over a decade ago. He was her midlife crisis. The guy left to go back to Costa Rica before Mom found out she was pregnant. He didn’t want anything to do with Ollie when she told him, so his dad has never been in his life.”
Ryder took a few steps toward me. “Why didn’t you tell me any of this? Did you think it would matter to me?”
“No,” I insisted. “I’m not ashamed of my brother. I want to make that very clear. And it’s not that I thought you would judge me for having to take care of him. But what good would telling you have done? It would have completely ruined whatever fantasy you had in your head about my ability to be what first attracted you to me—that carefree girl. My life is not that way, Ryder. Ollie is my entire life. The camming happens at night because that’s when he’s sleeping. He obviously doesn’t know about it, doesn’t know that’s how I support us.” I sucked in a breath. “And the past couple of days, you didn’t hear from me because he fell and hit his head the one moment I wasn’t paying attention to him. I took him to the emergency room. He needed stitches and some neurological testing. He’s fine, but I freaked out a little because I thought it was going to be more serious than it was. I blamed myself. That type of thing is my reality. I can’t ever travel or move to California or be the type of girl a man like you needs. Ollie’s school is here, as is the house he’s familiar with. Everything he needs is here.
I took a deep breath. “But I couldn’t come out and tell you what my life is really like because I didn’t want to lose the fantasy we had either. Somehow it seemed not telling you would prolong everything.”
