Grayson

 

I was happy for him, I was happy for him, I was fucking happy for him.

My fists didn't believe my brain.

Rather than punch my best friend — the guy whose house I was currently crashing at while I tried to sort out my shit — in the mouth, I decided to walk away. If something happened between him and Harper tonight, I wasn't going to stand in the way, but that didn't mean I wanted to stick around and see it.

I stalked away, not really paying attention to where I was walking, until I suddenly looked up and found myself in the huge kitchen. Alone.

I took a deep breath and slowly unclenched my fists. Yeah. I just needed to hide out here a few minutes, let my blood pressure go back to normal, and let the urge to kill Cal in a jealous rage subside.

"Hey, you okay?"

Her voice was soft but I still nearly jumped out of my skin anyway. "Yeah," I breathed as I turned to see her standing in the doorway in that red satin dress, "I'm great."

She grinned a little and made for the fridge. "I'm drinking too fast," she giggled, opening the door. "I need to eat something more solid than canapés." She rummaged through the shelves and then suddenly turned to look at me still standing there frozen in place like an idiot. "You want something?"

"Sure," I mumbled.

"What?"

"Um." I swayed on the balls of my feet. "I dunno." The sight of her in that dress, the way her hair just skimmed the top of her shoulders every time she turned her head, had rendered me speechless. Me. The motormouth himself.

"Well come over here and look!" she trilled, completely oblivious to my current mental meltdown. "My mom always overbuys for these parties and then gets busy socializing and forgets to put half the stuff out." She shot me a grin over her shoulder. "Makes it a bonanza for leftovers."

I moved to her. Yeah, she was spell-binding in that dress, but she was still Harper, one of my favorite fucking people in the world. "Does it count as a leftover if we're eating it at the actual party?" I asked her.

She emerged from the fridge with some kind of fancy dip. "I know where the crackers for this are. You want to share?"

I grinned at her. "I don't think there's going to be any left by the time I'm done with it," I told her, holding up my hands. "I'm a big boy." I looked down at her green eyes. "With a big appetite."

She'd dipped her bare finger into the dip and raised it up to her mouth. I watched her as she closed her lips around it, and my dick twitched in my pants. "Harper," I exhaled, not sure what the fuck I was trying to say, but needing to say something.

"Yeah, Gray?"

I twisted and grabbed my glass off the kitchen island and downed the rest of my drink in one shot. I was still feeling jittery as a junebug, as my great-aunt Hilda would say, but I couldn't let this moment pass me by. "You have to know how I feel about you," I blurted. "Right?"

She froze, finger still in her mouth. Her eyes darted to the side and I looked over her shoulder.

Rett was standing in the doorway. With Cal. They were both staring right at us.

Rett blinked a few times, like he was trying to mentally erase the image of his best friend macking on his little sister from his brain. I had no idea what Cal's face looked like because I pussied out of looking him in the eye.

"Hey guys," Rett said, clearing his throat. "Come on. It's time to open presents."

Harper turned on her heel and started following her brother. She hadn't said anything. Was she just going to pretend nothing had happened?

She paused in the doorway. There was a whole crowd, practically the entire fucking town it seemed like, there waiting for us to find our spots. I peered around behind her. For all anyone could see, I was just casually searching for a spot to sit, but her ear was close enough for me to whisper, "Sit next to me."

I couldn't see her face, not straight on, but I could see the color, scarlet, just like her dress, wash across her cheeks all the way up to the tips of her ears. If I thought I loved her before, that blush fucking cinched it. But she didn't turn and look at me like I expected. She didn't dart a quick reassuring smile over her shoulder, private just for me. And the longer we stood there, the more I wondered if I'd gone and fucked everything up. She viewed me as another big brother, always had. These feelings of mine, well they were pretty fucking perverted when you looked at them from that angle.

My heart started sinking and didn't stop until it reached my too-tight shoes.

She lifted her head, just a fraction, but it was enough to send her hair dancing around her shoulders. She walked into the room.

What else could I do? I followed her, feeling like a shitheel.

"You guys can fit," Brynn called loudly. "Right here, there's room." She slapped the bit of exposed cushion next to her, and for some reason Rett jumped like he'd been shot, but whatever, the guy always was getting startled by shit. I went and sat next to my other best friend's sister, the one who was pretty and funny but I could somehow look in the eye without feeling like the earth was opening under my feet. What the fuck was up with that, anyway?

"Thanks," I mumbled to Brynn, and sort of squirm-shimmied my way onto the couch. The McCabes were already starting to exchange gifts with some of the older crowd, and I tried to pay attention appreciatively as old Mrs. Feathergill expounded about some dusty relic from her antique shop, currently being held at arms length by Mr. Green, my old history teacher. Xavier Tully, the guy who'd bought my family's old homestead and turned it into a B&B was laughing really loudly with Cole Granger while Old Man Melton groused audibly about something to his long-suffering granddaughter Autumn. But all this was just background noise not even worthy of my attention because Harper had just sat down next to me and delicately, almost innocently, placed her hand on my thigh.

My dick seemed to be reaching for her and she had to fucking notice, but she just slammed back her drink. "Slow down there, kid," I whispered.

"I'm not a kid," she murmured back. "I'm a grown-ass woman who makes my own decisions." Her hand fluttered on my thigh a second. "I swear I come home and everyone still thinks I should be wearing pigtails. I'm twenty-five now for God's sake and I've got a really great career..."

She blinked and sort of sagged back on the couch, all the bravado draining from her stance. "Whoops," she sighed. "Sorry."

I was so busy staring at her lips that it took me a moment to realize why she thought she'd screwed up. "Oh, me? Nah." I waved my hand. "I was ready for something new anyway. Actually, I've got an interview the day after New Year's so...things are looking up."

She smiled. "That's the day my parents are renewing their vows, are you going to have to miss it?"

I shook my head emphatically. "No way, kid." Then I ducked and shot her a grin. "I mean, no way, grown-ass-woman-who-makes-her-own-decisions. I'll be there for sure."

"I'm glad," she said and sank back further into the couch, smiling happily. She lifted her empty drink to her lips. "Fuck it," she sighed. "I'm way too comfy to move. Will you judge me if I just suck on the ice cube?"

"Will you judge me if I watch?" I asked her.

Her eyelids fluttered and that beautiful rosy blush spread across her cheeks again. Then she lifted her chin slightly and tipped the glass against her lips. I watched, fucking nailed to the spot, as the ice cube slid between her lips and her cheeks hollowed as she sucked and all the while she kept her green eyes fixed right on me.

Her hand was still on my leg and I was two seconds away from leaning in and kissing her, when suddenly she and I were both jostled. "Sorry," Cal mumbled as he slid against our legs and landed at Harper's feet. "Couldn't find a place to sit, can I fit here?"

She laughed and looked down, amiably widening her stance so Cal could lean against her leg. She lifted her hand from my leg and rested it on his shoulder, her fingers lightly petting his stupid argyle sweater.

Cal murmured his thanks and then, I swear to fucking Christ, that asshole, my best friend, looked me right in the eye and grinned.