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“Nope. I was actually on a plane coming back from Seattle.” She thumbed the ring on her finger, watching it glitter before looking at me once more. “Met the in-laws-to-be.”
“Oh.” I cleared my throat. And here I was worried about her and Beckett. I was as much of an idiot as he was being about Kain. “Congratulations.”
“So polite.”
I turned off the water. There wasn’t enough cold water in the world to calm my racing mind. I moved to the towel dispenser, but Kira beat me to it. “Thanks.”
“Look, I didn’t follow you in here to bust your balls. I’m just watching out for my people. Beckett is on the very short list of people I care about.”
“And yet you were betting on him instead of breaking up the fight?”
She snickered. “Like I was going to stop them?”
“You didn’t even try.”
“I learned a long time ago that if guys want to get into it, to just let them get it out of their systems.”
“Until there’s a broken bone?”
“It doesn’t usually come to that. Mostly, I just dig out a few bags of frozen peas for the inevitable bruises. If they’re really lucky, I might toss a tube of antiseptic at them.”
I crunched the used towels in my hand. “They’re grown adults. Shouldn’t they be beyond that?”
“Oh, honey. Men never become real adults. They must hide it better in the city.”
I tossed the towels in the garbage. “I suppose they just do it differently. They’d rather cut with words.”
“I prefer a punch. At least I can deflect that one.”
“I’m sorry?” The idea of punching anyone was so beyond me, I was speechless.
She laughed. “Look, that fight was just idiot male stuff. Beckett can handle himself even with Kain. And I get you probably don’t see many fights at your glitzy parties, but it’s a way of life here on an orchard. Hell, I’ve put Beckett on his ass a few times when we were younger.”
My jaw dropped.
“Beckett used to be a helluva hothead, but after he took over the orchard, a lot of stuff changed. Not to say he doesn’t let off steam with his brothers here and there, but it’s not like him to go off like that. So, if you’re looking to make trouble, I’m just throwing out the warning here.”
“Trouble?Me?”That was the last thing I expected her to say.
“Pitting two dudes against each other? Never ends well.”
“I would never do that.”
Then again, that was a lie, wasn’t it? I’d brought Reid to the wedding to be a passive aggressive bitch.
I whipped the cap off my head and tossed it on the sink. “Or maybe I did do that. I don’t even know anymore.”
“I don’t know what happened between you two after the wedding, and I don’t want to know.”
I pressed my fingers to my eyes and willed back the sting of tears.
The most amazing day of my life had happened. And I was being selfish to come in here and think I deserved any more of his time. One night or six—in the end, I was still leaving.
I had a life in Manhattan.
But did I really?
I pushed down that little voice. I’d upended my life for men—or my family—all my life.
