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I went out the front door, down the two rickety steps, and was halfway across the dirt yard to the Potter Landscaping main office—also a trailer, though even smaller than ours—when Wes caught up with me.
“How funny is it that we’re landscapers and we have the most shit yard ever?”
“Less funny than the first time you said it…six years ago?”
“Nah, it’s still funny.” He chuckled, amused by his own wit.
When I didn’t laugh, he elbowed me in the ribs.
“Fuck off!” I said with a grin and shoved him in return, not that he moved much. Wes was the kind of sturdy that didn’t budge unless he wanted.
Which means he let you win that wrestling match in Vegas…
He wanted you on top of him, squirming around on his dick.
“Hey, you okay before we go in there?”
I blinked. We stood before the door to Nathan Potter’s office. I didn’t even remember the rest of the walk over. Wes was looking at me with concern, probably assuming I’d been panicking rather than overtaken by scandalous memories. I swallowed and attempted to smile. “Yeah, sure. It’s only my job, my place in the family, and my last shred of respect at stake.”
Wes scoffed. “None of those things are at stake. You’re the responsible brother.” He nudged me with his shoulder. “I’m the son who fucks up, and Dad knows it.”
But he was therealson. It didn’t matter how much talk of family not being blood that I heard, I had the scars to prove that some so-called family bonds were flimsy as fuck. I wanted to believe Nathan Potter was more loyal than my last stepdad, but there was always a little doubt lurking in my mind. And that wasbeforeI fucked his son.
Wes opened the door and I followed him inside, dread sitting heavy in the pit of my stomach.
My stepfather was an imposing man, even now when he was mostly retired. He had a full head of salt-and-pepper hair, a square jaw covered in dark stubble at all times of the day, and shoulders and arms that were still muscled enough to stretch the confines of his T-shirts—though they were considerably less tan now that he left all the manual labor to Wes and me.
He glanced up from some paperwork as we entered. “Cutting it close.”
“Close is still on time,” Wes said.
“I wanted to talk to you both before you head out for the day. You know we’re getting ready to expand Beaver Hole.”
“Oh, I’ve thought of nothing else.” Wes grinned. “We’ll fill that Beaver Hole sooooo good.”
I bit down on a smile, while Nathan glowered.
“Is everything a goddamn joke to you?”
“Pretty much.”
“And what about you?” His piercing gaze landed on me. “You’re awfully quiet, but you weren’t so quiet on that fucking video you two clowns made in Vegas.”
“I’m not laughing,” I said, gut clenching.
“Well, the rest of the damn town is. You two are the faces of Potter Landscaping, and now everyone associates that with drunken idiocy, and that’s if we’re lucky and they don’t believe you two actually got married!”
Wes took a step forward, drawing his dad’s attention away from me. “What, no congratulations? You’re ruining the honeymoon.”
Nathan’s face shifted from mild irritation to full-on anger.
“Seriously, Wes,” I muttered behind him. “You wanna poke the bear and get eaten?”
“We all know Dad’s pissed. Might as well talk about it.”
When Nathan spoke again, the words were spit from between clenched teeth. “We’ll talk over dinner tonight. Get to work. I’m assuming you can do that without making us more of a joke than we already are?”
“We’ll do our best,” I said.
