Outside the bedroom door, the party raged on. Timothy’s house was splitting at the seams, the way it always was on a Friday night. Music blared and voices lifted above it, echoing through the thin walls. Distorted sounds pounded heavily against my skin, my eyesight hazy in the deep shadows of the darkened room.
I felt completely weightless and somehow still pinned down by the pungent fog clouding my brain.
Every elemental part of me slowly became detached. Floated away. All of my emotions. All of my thoughts. It was like they hovered somewhere overhead, just out of reach. My entire consciousness faded away, right along with my conscience, leaving me with nothing but the physical.
It’s what I craved. Needed. The relief of feeling nothin’ but skin on skin.
Even though some part of me hated it at the same time.
Slouched back on the worn-out couch in the spare bedroom, I lifted the half-drained bottle of Patrón to my lips, idly watching the dull mop of brown hair obstructing the face of the girl who was on her knees, sucking me off.
The only things I could discern were the pleasure of her hot, needy mouth and the burn of tequila as it roared through my system to settle in a scorching pool in my gut.
She looked up from under her thick veil of hair, brown eyes wide as they searched for a connection but instead met with the apathy in mine.
That was the fucking problem. I was on disconnect.
That plug had been pulled a long time ago.
Never would I allow someone to have that kind of control over me.
Not like she had.
Not ever again.
Monday morning, I rolled up in front of Jared and Aly’s house at the ass crack of dawn. I squinted against the bright rays of light burning my eyes as the sun climbed over the horizon, chasing the last of the night from the sky.
I cut the ignition and jumped from the cooled cab of my truck. Heat swallowed me whole. You’d think at five thirty in the morning we’d get a little reprieve. No such luck. Summers in Phoenix were fucking misery.
That didn’t stop the eager smile that tugged at my mouth as I ambled up their walkway.
So what if I had to leave my man card at the door every time I walked into Jared and Aly’s place. Call me a pussy, I didn’t care. My niece had me wrapped around every single one of her tiny fingers.
I rang the doorbell and rushed my hand through my hair, listening for movement inside. A shadow passed behind the draped window before metal slid as the lock was unlatched. My sister grinned at me when she opened the door.
“Christopher, aren’t you looking chipper this beautiful morning,” Aly teased as she lifted a knowing brow, stepping back to let me inside.
So yeah, I’m sure I looked like hell. Both Friday and Saturday nights, I’d been over at Timothy’s house, living it up. Funny how all that living made me feel like death warmed over. Every weekend left me just a little more hollowed out. I was pretty sure I was slowly killing myself, week by week losing just a little more of who I was, carving away more and more of what had been important to me.
Pretty soon there would be nothing left.
But there was no way to get any of it back.
Ancient-history bullshit, anyway.
I shoved all the unwelcome thoughts off, rolled my eyes as I ruffled Aly’s messy hair. “Yeah, yeah, yeah. You don’t have a whole lot of room to talk there, Aly Cat. You look like you got about as much sleep this weekend as I did. Livin’ up to your name?”
Dark bags sat heavily under her green eyes, and her near-black hair was all tangled. She was wearing an old stained-up T-shirt that had to be Jared’s, because the girl was swimming in it. Still, my sister was beautiful. Inside and out. No wonder my dumb-ass best friend couldn’t keep his hands off of her.
She groaned a little, but somehow the sound was filled with pure affection. “Ella decided she was hungry every twenty minutes last night. I have no clue how I even got out of bed this morning. I feel like a walking zombie.”
Jared suddenly appeared behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist as he tugged her against his chest. He buried his face somewhere in her neck. “Apparently Ella likes her mommy as much as I do.”
I’d just about lost my goddamned mind when I found out these two were hooking up. Not because I didn’t like Jared. He’d been my best friend since I was a little kid. Sure, we’d fought like brothers, messed with each other until one of us was crying, but bottom line, we were thicker than blood. Brothers. We were always the first to have the other’s back.
Until the day Jared caused that car accident. The one that stole his mother’s life. That accident had stolen my best friend, too.
An old kind of pain hit me, and my chest tightened. That car accident had stolen everything. Changed everything. None of us had come out looking the same.
Afterward, the guy had fucked away his life, landed himself in juvie, then disappeared for years. I never expected to see him again. When he showed up here last summer, there was no question he was still haunted. I recognized it immediately, because I recognized the same bullshit in myself.
Then he’d gone and taken a liking to my little sister, and all hell broke loose. He and I were too much alike, and I wasn’t about to let him bring my sister down. She deserved so much better than that.
Of course the guy had proven me wrong in every way. He loved her. Wholly and completely. Loved her in a way that girls like Aly deserved, with respect and care and devotion.
How could I stand in the way of that?
Didn’t mean it didn’t make me a little sick to my stomach. I took it upon myself to razz the asshole every chance I got. “Watch yourself, man. No matter which way you cut it, that’s still my little sister.”
He nuzzled her more, this time lifting his gaze to meet mine, the mischief in his blue eyes meeting the challenge. “And no matter which way you cut it, she’s still my wife. This girl belongs to me.”
Aly grinned wildly and leaned back into his hold.
My chest tightened more, because it made me happy to see her this way. Happy she got to have this. Not many of us did. Love like that didn’t come around often, and she’d snatched it up when she saw it, even when it’d seemed dangerous and impossible. But she’d known it was worth it.
I’d been the fool who’d let that kind of crazy love go. Didn’t matter that I’d been just a stupid punk kid, barely sixteen, or that the girl and I were nothing alike and the entire world was against us.
None of it mattered. Not at fucking all. The only thing that mattered was it’d been real.
Cringing, I put a cap on those thoughts, because I wasn’t about to go there. Stupid shit that I couldn’t deal with. Nor did I want to. All it did was leave me feeling pissy and sorry for myself, scorned by a girl I’d always thought would be mine.
Leaving Aly and Jared all wrapped up in each other, I headed for Ella, who was lying on her back on the cushioned play area Aly had set up for her in the family room between their huge-ass overstuffed couch and the fireplace.
“There’s my girl,” I sang as I wound around the couch and knelt down in front of her. Her blue eyes were all bugged out as she watched the lights flashing on the infant play gym set up over her. Five brightly colored stuffed animals hung down from it, teasing her. She didn’t come close to being able to touch them. Yet she had her tiny hands all balled up in fists, her arms flailing and her legs kicking as she stared, fixated, making it clear how badly she wanted to reach out and touch one.
A tiny sound escaped her pursed lips, and my heart throbbed a wayward beat.
Yep, man card at the door.
This little girl owned me.
“Don’t worry, angel… Give it a few weeks, and that monkey is yours,” I promised as I bent down and maneuvered her from under the play gym and into my arms. “Come give Uncle kisses before your daddy drags me off to a grueling day of work.”
“Grueling my ass,” Jared shot from the other side of the room. “You’re in the air-conditioned office while me and the guys are out doing the grunt work. I’d say you have it pretty easy there, my friend.”
Laughing it off because what he said was nothing but true, I brought Ella’s face close to mine. She offered me one of those little grins that I felt right in the center of my chest. She reached out, her nails digging into my bottom lip as she grabbed for me. I kissed them. “You take care of your mommy while we’re gone.”
“She always does,” Aly said, watching us with a soft smile on her face. Something shifted in her expression, and she bit at her lip and quickly turned her face to the floor.
I felt the frown crease my forehead. I knew my sister pretty damned well, and that meant I was pretty damned sure she was holding something back. “What?” I asked, my eyes narrowing as I pinned her with a stare.
She lifted her head, blinked, looked away. “Nothing.”
At the same second, Jared tensed up a little, like he knew exactly what was running through Aly’s mind.
Nothing my ass.
My frown deepened. “Nothing?” I challenged, my brow rising.
Aly shook her head and looked almost repentant. Unease slowly snaked its way through my senses. My gaze darted between the two of them. Something was up. Something they didn’t want me to know. A silent tension filled the room.
“Nothing,” she reaffirmed in what I knew was a lie. “I just…” She shrugged. “Seeing you with Ella like that makes me happy.”
“Come on, man, we need to get a move on,” Jared cut in, obviously putting an end to my questioning. He walked to the kitchen island and grabbed the small cooler he kept stocked with food, water, and sodas. “It’s going to be a busy day and an even busier week. You may just find yourself on the job. Then I’ll let you complain about work being grueling.” He tossed me a mocking wink, then sauntered up behind Aly, hugging her as he whispered something in her ear.
Below her breath, she laughed and nodded.
Three months ago, my brother-in-law, aka best friend who bagged my little sister, had somehow managed to persuade me into starting a new venture with him. I went straight from a lazy college student, one who gave little thought to what he was going to do with his life after he graduated – because the truth was, he really didn’t give a shit – to business owner in a matter of weeks.
I mean, fuck, me being part owner in the remodeling business with Jared and our other partner, Kenny? All signs pointed at a no-go. I wasn’t exactly what most would consider the ambitious type. But somehow Jared convinced me to team up with him, said he didn’t want to do it without me. Jared and Kenny had fronted the money, and now I was doing my all to live up to it. Turned out I was pretty damned good at it, too, basically running all the business shit that didn’t deal with the hard labor, all of the accounting and paperwork that needed to be dealt with in the office, although the company was growing so fast there’d been a couple of times Jared had hauled me out on a job when he was shorthanded. It was crazy going from scrimping every month to having more money in my bank account than I knew what to do with. I wasn’t loaded by any means, but it sure felt nice not to have to check my bank balance anytime I wanted to buy something.
Truth was, I liked having a reason to drag my ass out of bed in the morning. And I had two. The other one cooed, grabbing my attention. I kissed Ella at the corner of her mouth. “Stay sweet, little one.”
I passed her off to Aly and followed Jared out the door and into the approaching day. Jared climbed into the passenger seat of my truck.
Each week, we traded off driving. We figured after I moved into my new place a couple of miles away, there was no reason for both of us to hike it across town separately since Jared checked in at the office every morning before he headed out to the job sites in a work truck.
After Aly moved out, the apartment we had shared near the ASU campus had felt all wrong. Lonely. I knew it was time to make a change. Plus being so near to them gave me an excuse to stop by all the time so I could hang out with Ella.
I glanced across at Jared as I hopped into the driver’s seat of my brand-new truck, the leather already heating up with the rising sun blazing through the window. He smirked at me, lifted his chin. Guess it wasn’t so bad hanging out with him, either. Honestly, it’d been good watching him come back to life, overcoming the darkness that had plagued him since his mother’s death.
A flash of resentment twisted through me, and I quickly tamped it down. I didn’t blame him. Couldn’t. He’d been through more than I could ever imagine. What had happened wasn’t his fault. I’d made those mistakes all on my own.
I started the truck and shifted into gear. “So what was that back there?” I asked.
His face lifted in a clueless expression. “Don’t know what you’re talking about.”
I cut my eyes toward him, watching the little twitch of his jaw when he gritted his teeth. He averted his gaze to his tablet and clicked into his schedule, asshole acting like he was all too busy to look my way.
Right.
He knew exactly what I was talking about.
And whatever it was, I wasn’t really sure I wanted to know.