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We switched places. I started defending him when my growth spurt hit and learned what it was to hit back, but I’ll never forget how he watched over me.
I remember his face the first time he held Evie, the tears sliding down his cheeks, looking up and seeing me watching through the window, then waving to me, both of them waving, Janine and Roger.
“Do you want to hold her, Brian?”
“Brian? Brian?”
I clear my throat. “I’m here.”
“I said if she thinks she’s ready, I won’t stand in her way. She’s old enough to make her own decisions.”
Yeah, but does that apply just to her job? Or her love life too?
“Thanks again for this chance.”
“You don’t have to thank me,” I say, voice far too fierce. “It’s the decent thing to do. She’s a friend, really.”
“Almost like family.”
I cringe and almost snap, She won’t be family until she’s my wife. I’m going to have to get used to burying these feelings. I can’t think of her like family because that would mean my fantasies aren’t just wrong. They’re downright perverse.
“Listen, Brian,” he goes on. “I’m sorry about yesterday. I didn’t mean for everybody to mob you.”
“It’s fine,” I tell him. “I know you came from a good place.”
“You looked pissed.”
I swallow, massaging my forehead. “It wasn’t…”
About that, I almost say, but then he might ask what it was about. I’d have to think of an excuse, another lie to stack on top of everything else.
“A big deal,” I go on. “Seriously, don’t worry about it.”
“Okay. I’ll let you go. She should be there soon, right?”
Fifty-seven minutes and thirty-two seconds.
“Yeah, soon. Not sure of the exact time.”
“See you later.”
He hangs up, and I pace the balcony, opening and closing my fists at my sides. The best thing would be to cancel. We’re going to be alone, me and the woman I already think of as mine.
Instead, I go into my home gym, tear my T-shirt off, and work out like a beast. I work out harder than is probably smart, mainly because I haven’t stretched, but maybe I can expel some of this energy. Perhaps I’ll be able to funnel these beast-like instincts into the exercises so that, when she arrives, I won’t claim her, kiss her, grab her, own her.
“Hey, it’s me,” she says over the intercom, her tone unsure. “Uh… Evie.”
As if she needs to add the last part. My balls pulse when she gives her name. The workout plan failed. It just fired me up. Now I’m swollen with hungry energy.
“I’ll buzz you up.”
This is the time to remember my best friend and drive the essential fact into my mind… Kissing, holding, and being with her in any way is wrong. It’s taboo in the extreme, and it would tear Roger and Janine to pieces, shred their life, and leave them questioning everything they thought they knew.
When the knock comes at the door—loud, almost angry, as if my woman is filled with mother-bear fire—I decide I will be distant and cold like I was yesterday when we were talking at the grill. I fail almost immediately.
She’s got sadness in her eyes, clashing with what might be rage. Her flushed cheeks glisten as though she’s been crying. Her hair isn’t braided, instead loose and free, flowing down to her back. She’s wearing a shirt with rolled-up sleeves and simple pants, but she might as well be wearing the world’s sexiest lingerie for her effect on my savage body, but that can come later.
“What’s wrong?” I ask, closing the door behind her and getting a waft of her perfume, or maybe it’s just her scent.
“Nothing,” she murmurs.
“You’ve been crying.”
She shoulders her bag, shifting from foot to foot, unwilling to meet my eye. “I thought I’d be able to hide it, but it doesn’t matter.”
“It does,” I snap. “Tell me. Now.”
She flinches, takes a step back, and bumps into the wall. When she looks up at me, it’s with slightly parted lips, as though she’s getting ready for a…
No, no, dammit, no.
“Just my old boss, Keith. I ran into him on the way here.”
“What happened with him?” I ask as we walk through the sparsely furnished apartment into the living room. I gesture to the couch. She lays her bag down, sitting next to me, within touching distance.
“Seriously, Brian, it’s not important.”
“I’ve already told you it is important,” I growl. “So you better tell me.”
I’m coming across way too aggressively, but it’s difficult not to. Nobody has the right to upset my woman, make her cry, or hurt her in any way. I’m bursting with violent impulses just thinking about it, a different kind of readiness to the sort that washed over me before an op. That was cold, distant professionalism. This is an animal that refuses to allow anything bad to happen to its mate. She turns me into a predator ready to hunt any bastard who even thinks about hurting her. After a long pause, she speaks quietly, picking at the fingernails of one hand with her other.
