Stop oversharing, Bright!
“Must be nice there.” Lewis’s tone wasn’t snarky. It was curious, as if he was actually interested in what I had to say. For a moment, I wanted to lie, but I’d never been great at it.
“Well, to be honest, it’s getting a bit old.”
Lew snorted, and he palmed the wheel with his huge hands in a way that had me even harder. I groaned and fidgeted a little on the passenger seat. “The ocean, sandy beaches and palm trees not to your liking?”
I dragged my horny brain away from thoughts of what Lew could do to me. He was so much stronger and bigger; he could easily hold me down and take what he wanted.
Fuck.
I wanted that so badly.
“Uh.” I forced my brain to ignore Lewis’ sex scent that filled my nostrils. “It’s great but ... I don’t know, it’s ….”
“So you’re not going back?”
“Well, I suppose I will. I built my life there.”Lie. “I have friends there and everything.”Another lie.Maybe I’m getting the hang of it.
I had no idea where I was going from here. True, I’d requested a visa for Bali again, but would I actually get on the plane come February?
“Your partner?” he asked bluntly.
“Uh no,” I muttered, feeling heat creep up my neck.
Chapter 4
Lewis
Noah is single, then.
My mood lifted when he told me, and it made me even more obsessed with him. I had guessed when he’d stopped posting images of himself and the bird guy, but hearing it from his mouth made it feel real.
He’s your best friend’s brother!
But did I really care? If I started dating Noah, it wouldn’t really affect Ollie, would it? It wasn’t like we’d fuck in front of him.
I mean, I had never stopped pining for the Noah my teenage self had been in love with.
In the decade since, I’d longed for the boy I lost and the time we’d had together. Those summers were among the happiest of my life.
But this new Noah was all grown up andhot. I caught my own eye in the rear mirror and rolled my eyes at myself. Neither of us were anything like the boys we’d been back then.
It wasn’t like I lived an ascetic life, but I would be lying if I said that being near him didn’t awaken a different kind of longing.
Adult Noah made me want to do things to him that Ollie definitely wouldn’t approve of.
True, it didn’t take much these days. Half a year ago, Callum and I had agreed we did better as friends than as lovers. The end of our situationship had been the last time I’d been intimate with anyone else but my right hand.
Being with Cal had beenconvenientrather than romantic. His croft wasn’t too far away from the distillery, and he was hot and great in bed. But ultimately, I knew we’d both just been stand-ins for the ones we really wanted to be with. I hoped his dumb-ass Kraken would see sense one day.
My eyes flickered over to Noah and then back on the road.
Even being in the same car as him felt more meaningful than anything I had with another person in over a decade.
You’re a sad fuck, Lewis Sinclair.
I hadn’t lied when I’d told Maddie on the eve of her and Fitz’s wedding that I still loved Noah, or rather Noah as he had been. My brain clung to the marriage pact that we had made like a life raft. On that sunny day by the burn I had recognised what I wanted my forever to look like. We’d been kids, yes, butsomehow the idea had burrowed into my brain. If he asked me today, I was sure I’d say, ‘yes, let’s elope and tie the knot today.’ Noah had never specified if it was going to be my or his thirtieth. Not mine, of course. That ship had sailed a couple of years ago. His thirtieth was coming up in March. He’d be back in Bali by then, and I would spend the day getting drunk alone.
