“Why so quiet?” I ask when I can no longer take the silence.
She hums absentmindedly, barely registering my question. I wish I knew the thoughts roaming that pretty little head of hers.
“Maybe I’m too traumatized.”
“Sure. I felt how traumatized you are. Your pussy is a snitch.”
She turns away from me again, but I can bet my left nut she’s hiding a smile.
I let the silence stretch before admitting what’s been on my mind since I introduced her to my friends.
“You fit right in.”
Summer rubs her palms on her legs but refrains from commenting.
“With me. With my friends. It was the same with your brother and his friends, wasn’t it? That’s what you meant by troublemaker. Our kind of troublemaker.”
Pulling the hem of the shirt, she folds it between her fingers, stealing a glance through the passenger window, before turning to face me.
“My brother and his friends were pretty much your type of crowd, so yeah... that’s why I fit in. Because it’s all I’ve ever known.”
She keeps fiddling with the fabric of my shirt.
“He was so protective of me.”
“Tell me more,” I prompt when her hesitation to continue drags on for too long.
“Boys didn’t dare to look at me. They wouldn’t even say my name. All of them referred to me as Milo’s sister.” She flinches upon uttering her brother’s name, and it takes her a moment to find her voice again. “Can you guess what happened to the first boy to ever kiss me? I was fourteen, and Milo knocked a tooth out of his mouth,” Summer says, turning her whole body toward me and tapping her index finger on one of her top incisors. She’s adorable when she does that. I should definitely check my head because everything she does is either sexy as hell or adorable.
“I don’t know what he threatened the boy with that day to make him tell his parents it was a skateboarding accident, but there were no repercussions for my brother. After that, no one wanted to risk it with me. It took more than two whole years for my brother’s best friend to do so. When Milo found out, he tied him to a boat, completely naked, and left him in the middle of a lake for twenty-four hours. They were still friends after that, but the guy didn’t even look at me when I was around. I used to be so mad at my brother for chasing away everyone who ever tried to get close to me.”
Why do I have a different take on her brother’s motives?
“He wasn’t chasing them away,” I note without taking my eyes off the road, but she turns to face me in an instant. “He was testing them.”
“Testing them?”
“If they’d kept coming back after the beatings, they would’ve proven they were worthy. He wanted someone willing to bleed for you.”
I peel my eyes away from the road to take in her expression. She swallows hard before turning away, hiding her face once more.
“I’ve never... thought of it that way.” Summer goes silent again for what seems like a never-ending minute, but I give it to her. She’ll need more time to process this, to understand the new perspective of how deep her brother’s love ran. “Regardless, Milo would’ve killed you for what you did to me tonight.”
“He would’ve tried. We would’ve fought. And I would’ve earned the right to keep you.”
“First of all,” she whips around to face me, “I’m not property you cankeep. And second, you’re bonkers if you think there’s a scenario in which my brother would’ve been okay to see you treat me like this.”
“I never said you’re property, but that doesn’t mean I can’t keep you. And your brother would’ve seen both a man willing to fight him for you, and you—unwilling to defend yourself. Not because you can’t, but because you won’t. Because you like me that much. You had both a knife and a taser, and you didn’t use them on me. That says more than words ever could.”
“I haven’t used them on you,yet,” Summer retorts, making my heart skip a beat with excitement. Her threats are so effortless, but now, those are empty words. She wouldn’t hurt me. Hit me with a bat, stab me with a fork, maybe, but notreallyhurt me.
“Atlas...” My name sounds too good falling from her lips.
“Yes, honey?”
I eye her long enough for her to force my attention back on the road.
“Tell me about your brother.”
