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The glass thumps down on the opposite side table and I feel like a jerk.
Did I insult her? Telling her that she’s family kind of goes against everything that’s happened. The way I’d treated her. The way she is around me. But it’s the truth. We’re here, aren’t we?
Brandi sighs softly and shifts closer to me, her thigh brushing mine as she plucks the bottle from my hand, taking a long drink. She sputters, but takes one more swig before relaxing against me, her body touching mine more than it ever has before.
Christ, if I’d felt helpless, how had she felt? All that crushing down on her?
“My parents thought there was something wrong with me because I kept blowing them off for Sunday dinner. But that’s when the group counseling was. I didn’t tell them what happened, you know? I also didn’t want to miss it. So I didn’t tell them, and they tried to stage an intervention for me.” I turn and meet her gaze, then snag the bottle from her to take a drink. “Have you talked to anyone?”
“That’s what I’m doing right now, duh.” She snickers. "Isn’t that enough?”
“Not what I meant. But,” I say, giving her a long look, “I’m happy to listen. Honestly.”
Brandi doesn’t speak for a moment. “The bottle’s already almost half-empty. You sure you wanna talk?”
“Yeah, why wouldn’t I?” I shake my head and take another long pull from the bottle.
“I don’t know. You hate me. You’ve hated me since the day we met.”
I go completely still, her words ringing in my head for the lie that they are. Shit. I really am a jerk. And she… she’s sweet. Too good to drag into the hell that I know telling her the truth will put her in.
I turn, knowing I need to go back down and go to sleep and forget all the bad ideas coursing through my mind. The ones where I tell her the truth. Where I kiss her. Where I forget the history and try to make her a part of my future. Instead, I fail miserably at doing the right thing and I find myself touching her cheek, gently guiding her to look at me.
“I never hated you, Brandi. I just couldn’t look at you, at those beautiful green eyes, and not see the woman who ruined my life.”
She stares at me and I don’t blame her. But I’d said it. Finally. For the first time in the six months I’ve known her, I admitted what I’d been too afraid to say to anyone.
“What do you mean? Who do I look like?”
“My ex-wife.”
“I— I don’t understand.”
Silence stretches out between us, along with a tension I could cut with a knife.
I keep drinking from the bottle of Jack until I feel the familiar pull of the alcohol in the pit of my stomach. When I finish, there’s less than a fourth of the bottle left. I stare at it, then hold it out, almost hoping she’ll say no and a firm good night.
She doesn’t. Brandi takes it, drinks deep, and fingers the label. “Travis? You don’t have—”
“We met in college, while I was trying to decide what I wanted to do with my life.” I take a breath and plunge on. Christ, I’d fallen so hard I’d seen stars. Seen nothing but Jessica. There are times when the memory still hurts like I’ve been punched. “She looks just like you.”
I don’t have to look at Brandi to see her. ‘Just like you’ isn’t exactly right. Both of the women are small and blonde and pretty with killer eyes, but Brandi’s face is round where Jessica’s is sharp and angular. There are other differences. But not enough to matter. Not enough for menotto see Jessica every fucking time I look at Brandi.
“Like a twin?”
She has no fucking idea, using that word. None at all.
“You’re her doppelganger. She looks just like you, except she’s pale instead of tan.” I still don’t glance at Brandi. “I was gone the minute I looked into her eyes. They were just like yours. We got married a few months later. I thought it was love, but it wasn’t. She loved the idea of my money, my family’s money. Of not having to work a day in her life. When she found out my brother—my twin fucking brother—was going to make more money than I did on top of our family trust, it was over. I found them together on my birthday, in our bedroom.”
Brandi gasps, but I still don’t look at her. Everyone who hears what they did goes through the shock.
“I haven’t seen either of them since. I walked away from that divorce with everything and nothing at the same time. I kept all my money and everything my parents set aside for me as part of my trust.”
I close my eyes. I can see it all. Every last moment of that fucking day. Feel everything I went through after. The pain and betrayal that still beats in my veins.
“But my brother got her.”
“Travis…” Brandi’s fingers flit a moment against my arm.
