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“I moved back. She followed.” He sighs. “I fucked up. I… there aren’t excuses, Trav. But you’re my brother. My twin.”
“This isn’t the time, like you said.” I clear my throat to get rid of the emotion I hadn’t expected to rise with our conversation. “Shit between us needs to be handled face-to-face. There aren’t any promises, but yeah.” I pinch the bridge of my nose. “Look, I just wanted you to know I’m planning on talking to her.”
There’s so much unsaid, and I don’t know if we’ll be all right, but as Maya pointed out, I need to man up, so here I am, an olive branch in hand.
“Tomorrow?”
“Yeah, Tyler. Tomorrow.”
I think I hate my house now. It’s too big, too empty. After the talk with Tyler, I expected some kind of shift, a weight gone. If anything, it’s heavier, like I’m being crushed, and I think maybe it’s because I need to talk to him face-to-face.
I need to see Jessica.
Need being relative.
What I need, ache for, want is Brandi. And that’s something I can’t fix without clearing the air of the past. I can’t fix what I need to without setting rules that Jessica can’t walk right through.
There’s no doubt in my mind that right now she’s sitting there, an ugly little smirk on her face, thinking she got to me, and the cards are all hers.
Play brothers against each other and…
I’m not sure why she’s decided she wants me again. Not when we’ve already been here once before. He has the same trust fund as me, the same everything. But he’s the one with the title and the prestige that she wanted. That she still wants.
I don’t care beyond morbid curiosity. I—
I almost drop the cereal bowl when my phone rings.
Brandi.
The moment my eyes hit the name on the screen, my heart clenches tight and my guts knot.
I snatch it up and hit answer. “Baby— Brandi?”
“I’m sorry if it’s too late to call,” she says.
“For you? You could call the second I close my eyes at the end of a sixteen-hour shift and I’ll answer.” Was it cheesy? Absolutely. But it’s the truth.
“I thought… my appointment with the OB-GYN got moved up to tomorrow and I didn’t know if maybe… so I thought— If you—”
“You say when, I’ll be there.”
Absolutely nothing could keep me away from her.
19
BRANDI
I’m panicking,that’s all there is to it. Everything is topsy-turvy and keeping down breakfast is beyond impossible today.
All because I called Travis.
I shouldn’t have.
But this is his baby I’m carrying, and no matter what, he deserves to see his baby. At least, that’s what I believe with every piece of my heart. I sit at work, doing my job, automatically answering Poppy’s sass between calls. Banter and barbs against Travis when she wants to get a reaction from me. It’s good-natured and actually good for me at the same time. At least, I think it is.
She wants us to work our dumb shit out—her words.
But right now, I don’t think I can take much more.
