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Despite talking myself through that, I still appreciated the night with my family. They were reassuring and strengthening, but they also gave me a distraction. I took a bottle of beer out of the cooler set up a few feet away from the roaring fire and sat down next to Nick.
“How’s work?” I asked.
“It’s good. Busy,” Nick said.
“That’s good. Better to have it busy than be bored.”
“Amen to that,” he agreed, tipping his bottle of beer toward me so I could clink mine against it by way of a toast.
Nick was the only of the four brothers without an active role in the company. Vince didn’t have a full-time role the way Quentin and I did. He maintained his own businesses and was frequently extremely busy. But he still worked at the complex at least one or two days a week. Nick, on the other hand, decided to follow his own path. He did his part if he was needed, such as helping load up for races and unload when the equipment got back to the complex, or when there was an event and we needed extra hands. But for the most part, he kept to himself and his own work pursuits. As much as I loved racing and working at the complex with my family, I could absolutely understand why he would want to do his own thing and not follow along in our father’s footsteps.
I also knew he felt like he was a bit of the black sheep of the family because of it. It wasn’t easy for him to decide he wasn’t just going to fall in line the way Quentin had, or even carve out a portion of his time to work the racing business the way Vince had. He knew it was what was expected of him, just like the rest of us did, and he didn’t want to disappoint our parents or any of us. Mom and Dad would never have been angry with him or told him they were upset with him about him making that choice. They were always supportive of their boys and what we wanted for our lives. But there were still times when it was obvious they wished Nick was more involved in the family business and around us more often.
I thought maybe that was why we were closest to each other out of the four. He never got any pushback from me, and I never felt anything but understanding for him. It let us feel totally comfortable with each other and stay tight.
“So, how’s Lindsey?” I asked.
He rolled his eyes and took a deep swig of his beer. “She’s just a friend. I’ve told you that already,” he said.
“Are you sure?” I asked.
“That I’ve told you before or that she’s just a friend?”
He was having none of the conversation, and I decided to let it drop.
“All right. I get the message. You know Mom and Dad are wondering when you’re going to bring a good woman home, though,” I pointed out.
Nick let out a half laugh. “Yeah. Quentin went and ruined it for all of us. He had to find the perfect woman and get them thinking about having a gaggle of grandbabies. But at least I’m not the only one who’s still single. Speaking of which, tell me more about Kelly.”
That was seriously the last thing I wanted him to ask. I figured he would know that, but he looked at me over the neck of his bottle with raised eyebrows.
“What do you mean?” I asked, attempting to play dumb.
“Well, when I was at the bar on Saturday night hanging out with Lindsey, it just so happened Kelly was there. I introduced myself to her, and we got to talking,” he told me.
“That’s nice. She’s going to be a good addition to the team,” I said.
He clearly wanted to talk about her more. The way he was looking at me said he was brimming with curiosity and wanted me to tell him all the gritty details about how I knew Kelly and what might be going on between us. But I didn’t engage with him, and eventually he gave up and changed the subject. I was glad when he dropped it and I could just go back to relaxing and enjoying some time with my family.
The problem wasn’t that I didn’t want to talk about Kelly. The problem was that all I wanted to talk about was her. All I wanted to think about was her. But I couldn’t let myself go down that slippery slope, especially not with one of my brothers. As much as I told myself that we were both adults who were more than capable of just being friends, I was still insanely attracted to her, and there was the little voice in the back of my mind saying maybe I could eventually convince her to give us an actual try. But since I still didn’t know if that was ever going to happen, I needed it to stop there. If I didn’t know if I would ever be more than friends with Kelly, I didn’t want to put her out there in front of my family. She didn’t deserve to be scrutinized and have any of them look at her any differently because they knew about my feelings for her.
