Chapter Fourteen
Nick
Sunday I woke up earlier than I ever had on a weekend. I was excited. Grabbing my gloves and hat, I went for a run up Madison Avenue. I got up to 60th Street and still hadn’t drained off my excitement so I cut over and ran through Central Park until I couldn’t feel my legs.
I headed back to the hotel, picturing Jeannie coming clean and telling me she only wanted to see me. I hated to think that my brother might get hurt, but damn, the thought of Jeannie picking me was a pretty great one. The rest of the day slogged by. I couldn’t wait to see her again. But eventually the minutes turned to hours and I was on her front porch with a bouquet of dahlias.
“Hi. Ooooh! Those are my favorite! How did you know?” Jeannie hugged me and pulled me inside. Something was off about her demeanor. I couldn’t quite name it, but she seemed different.
“So, what’s on the agenda today? Brunch? Netflix and cuddles?” I asked as the ugliest dog I’d ever seen spun in circles in front of me.
“That’s Lucifer. He’s a rescue,” Jeannie said, laying the flowers on the foyer table.
I shrugged out of my coat and put it on the coat rack on top of a very familiar looking coat.
“Huh, that looks like...” My jaw dropped as Jeannie led me to the sitting room. It looked like my brother’s coat because it was. “What are you doing here?”
“I could ask you the same thing,” Noah said and got up from the sofa. “Jeannie, what’s going on here?”
Jeannie bit her lip and took a breath. “Please, both of you have a seat.” Neither of us moved. “Sit down, both of you.” We sat, stunned she would use her T.A. voice on us.
Jeannie stood in front of us, worry and fear creasing her forehead. “Before I start please, don’t interrupt. Please just let me say everything I need to say. Can you do that?”
I nodded and my stomach tied itself in knots. This did not sound good.
Jeannie sighed and began. “First, I need you both to know I have no intention of hurting either of you but it might happen anyway and for that I’m sorry.”
“Jeannie?” Noah started but she cut him off.
“Please. Let me get through this.” Noah nodded. “You’re both so gorgeous, so unbelievably hot, I just, well I had thoughts about sleeping with both of you—um—at the same time.” Noah and I both crossed our arms and slid further apart on the sofa.
“But then you both asked me out within hours of each other and I didn’t know what to do because I thought I just wanted a night with you but it turns out I really like you both and I want us all to try and be together.” She said everything in one breath, one long painful sentence.
Noah spoke first. “Are you kidding me?”
Jeannie shook her head, tears pooling in her yellow eyes. “I’m not.”
“I’m outta here.” Noah shot out of his seat and stormed out of the sitting room.
“Noah! Wait. Please. Can we just talk about this?” Jeannie cried after him.
Numb and shocked as I was, I still had the presence of mind to go after my hot-head brother.
“Nick, please don’t leave too.”
“I’m sorry, I have to see if he’s okay. We’ve been through a lot.” Jeannie nodded, tears now streaming down her cheeks.
I grabbed my coat and left Jeannie’s brownstone. But not before I heard her tortured sobs.
Noah didn’t make it far. He paced in front of the house like a crazy man until I stepped in his way. “Did you know about this?”
I hesitated, did I? Kind of. Did knowing he’d also asked her out count? “No.”
“Liar! How could you keep this from me!”
“Calm down, Noah. Look, I didn’t know she was into both of us, okay? All I knew was that you asked her out after I did. As soon as you told me I was going to cancel on her but I didn’t have her number. So I told myself I’d just go out with her that one time and that would be the end of it.”
Noah nodded. Then rounded on me again. “Did you sleep with her?”
I didn’t have to answer. He could see it all over my face.
“You sonofabitch!” Before I knew it, Noah cold-cocked me right in the jaw. He didn’t hold back either. I was looking at the sky, back flat on the ground without much clue as to how I got there.
“Well, if I am you are, brother,” I said and got on my feet. “And for the record, I asked her first. So if anyone should have any hurt feelings about this, it should be me.”
“Yeah? Well, then why didn’t you say anything when I told you about it in the car? You had the chance right then and there.”
“I wanted to—”
“That’s right. You wanted to protect me. Well, guess what, big brother? I never asked for your protection. Got it? For fuck’s sake, this whole thing could have been avoided if you’d just been straight with me.”
“Oh really? Would you have canceled on her? Would you have given her up so easily?”
“Not a chance,” he said.
“Then we’d be exactly here, fighting over her. Exactly what I was trying to avoid.”
“Well do you want to give her up?” Noah asked.
“No,” I admitted.
“Well, what do we do?”
“Fuck if I know,” I said. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”