“About?”
“Sunshine.”
“What would I have to say about her? If she wants to make a mistake, that’s her choice.”
Seb narrowed his eyes. “I don’t care if this makes shit awkward. I’m just gonna say it. If you have feelings for her, let them go. It’s not happening.”
Tanner had a brilliant brain, but he was also cocky with his age, and he kicked back his chin. Seb expected his sarcasm.
“You think you’re the king of the roost.”
“No, I don’t.”
“But you don’t get to say what I can and can’t do. Whatever I feel or don’t feel for Sunny is my business. She’s been my friend for just as long as you.”
“Never denied that. Just as long as it stays only friends.”
He smirked and rolled the leather cuff around his wrist. “You feel threatened by my place in her life, Seb? Maybe you don’t have such a hold on her as you think you do.”
The hairs on Seb’s nape rose, but he had better control of his reactions because he only smiled as he leaned a shoulder onto the brick wall outside. He knew his place in Sunny’s life; whatever Tanner wantedit to be, it wasn’t the same as Seb’s and never would be. It would be something for Tanner to come to terms with.
“Why are you trying to bait me on this, huh? You’re acting dumb, Tanner. You know how things stood for Sunny. Even if she and I weren’t there yet, you still knew if you were her friend.”
Tanner remained silent, but Seb read his tight facial expressions as clearly as if reading a book.
“I’m not gonna drag this out for you. I said what I needed to say. Sunny has always been mine.”
He headed back toward the club entryway.
“Has she, though?”
Seb stopped and looked back. Tanner had the left side of his lip curled with a taunting smirk. Cocky little shit was about to feel a fist in his mouth if he went where his eyes threatened to go.
“Yes, Tanner, she has. Get the fuck over it.”
“She didn’t talk to you for a year. She talked to me, though. And more.”
Seb’s throat burned, and he felt his fingers clench, hanging low by his side. The tension rode across his shoulder blades, holding himself in check, knowing his brother was a dumb kid still, and he couldn’t put him through a wall for firing fucked off bullets.
“I’ll say this, Tanner, only once, but if the next words out of your mouth are insulting toward Sunny, you’ll break her fucking heart, and that means I’ll have to hurt you. I don’t want to hurt my brother. How the fuck would that look at my wedding?”
He saw the news hit like a bomb. And he couldn’t be sorry about it.
Tanner was bristling with all his twenty-year-old bluster, and Seb watched the emotions flit through his stare, deciding what shit he wanted to say to fuck up their brotherly relationship.
He walked off before he could.
It would never be a love triangle. He meant what he told Tanner: Sunny was always his, even when she wasn’t talking to him. Tanner would have to roll up his fucking pout and be a grown-up about it. Seb was confident in how his sunbeam felt about him.
No longer in the mood to hang around the club, he headed home, airing out the place since he hadn’t been there in days; he’d only just finished in the shower when he saw a row of messages from Sunshine.
His lips curled, reading down the wall of them.
SUNNY: Hi, my Seb.
SUNNY: I can’t sleep without you. How dumb is that?
SUNNY: It’s not like we’ve been sleeping together for years.
