Clayton
I left Emelie’s place before she was even up. I’d climbed straight out of Jay’s truck and into my own when we got back to Gainesville last night, unable to wait any longer to see Em and Ethan. I didn’t have a change of clothes and needed to shower before our class. I figured she’d forgive me if I showed up with a coffee and muffin to butter her up.
Corbin had left me a message that he needed to talk to me, but since he was still in bed by the time I was ready to leave, I figured it could wait.
I made a quick stop at Starbucks and picked up Emelie’s mocha, two muffins, and a black coffee before rushing to my ten o’clock class. As I was climbing up the stairs, I heard my name being called out and I looked up to see Xavier walking toward me with a few other guys.
“You late again?” He looked down at my hands and smiled knowingly. “Emelie pissed at you again and you needed some form of bribery?”
“Not late, and no, she ain’t pissed.” I looked around at the guys he was with and knew none of them. “Just left before she was awake this morning and thought I’d offer her something that would make her forget.”
I noticed one particular guy kept watching me, no trace of a smile on his face. He was tall, light shaggy hair, his arms crossed over his chest, his lips pressed in a flat line.
“She should be thanking you for sparing her from seeing your ugly mug first thing in the morning,” Xavier regained my attention. “That right there is a gift in itself.”
“Is that why Morgan wears one of those face masks at night? So she can imagine you’re someone else?”
He reached out and flicked my forehead, knowing my hands were full and I wouldn’t be able to stop him.
“Dick.” I swept my foot out and hooked his leg, making him laugh.
“You better get moving before Emelie’s muffin gets cold.” The guy liked to tease me, and even Eli about being whipped by our girls, but fact was he was just as bad. Morgan had him by the balls and he’d jump through hoops if he had to just to make her smile. The guy was a sunken ship right beside the rest of us.
As he stepped around me and they all started walking away, the one guy lingered back a bit and just gave me that same fucked-up look.
“You need something?” I asked him, feeling myself grow a little irritated by his actions.
“We met yesterday,” he finally said after watching me for a few seconds longer.
“Sorry, bud, wasn’t me.” He didn’t seem to believe me. “You probably met my brother.”
“So you expect me to believe that you have a brother that looks exactly like you.”
This asshole was really starting to piss me off.
“What’s going on?” Xavier asked from behind me, but I didn’t turn away from the guy still giving me the evil eye.
“What’s going on is that your friend here seems to have an issue with Corbin yet wants to insist it’s with me. Which in a way I guess he’s right, because any prick that has an issue with my brother, I have one with by default.”
I remained squared off with the guy as he stared back at me too. At one point he did look over my shoulder, my guess is to weigh out Xavier’s reaction.
“So you have a brother?” he asked and I nodded. “Apparently a twin.” Again I nodded. “And what, the both of you are sharing Emelie?”
“What’d you fucking say?”
Xavier instantly got in between us and held us apart. “Hold up.” He gave me a warning look, knowing I was hanging on the edge. “What the fuck are you talking about, Mark?”
“This guy, or his brother, who the fuck knows, got up in my face yesterday. I was talking to Emelie about my son and—”
“Your son?” Xavier asked before I could, but I didn’t really need his answer to figure out the rest. Suddenly my stomach felt sour.
“Ethan’s my son.”
I think I may have growled, and by Xavier’s reaction, I’d say that was a safe assumption. “You talked to Emelie yesterday?” It was fuckwad’s turn to nod. “And my brother?”
“Yeah,” he stated. “He didn’t seem to like the idea that I wanted to see my son.”
“What I find funny is that you keep calling him your son, yet you signed him away without ever meeting him.” Mark tensed his jaw a few times, like that shit would intimidate me.
“I think that’s a matter that is between me and Emelie.”
“And me,” I said, stepping toward him a little further, only to be once again held back by Xavier. “Since she’s my fucking girl, and that makes Ethan mine too.”
The guy grinned, yeah, fucking grinned at me.
“Playing daddy to my boy make you feel like a man?”
“No,” I said, finally dropping everything I held in my hand to the ground, “but this does.” I swung, and though Xavier kept me from hitting the prick like I wanted to, I still connected, forcing him to stumble back. “Stay the fuck away from them both.”
People around us paused, and I knew staying here was only gonna get me arrested, so I grabbed the only salvageable item I could and walked toward the building behind him. I was seething, my hands shaking, my legs feeling like a thousand pounds each.
When I stepped into the room, I zeroed in on Emelie and watched as her smile faded. Her eyes brows crinkled up and she started to stand. With purpose I walked toward her, placed the bag of now smashed muffins on the table before her, and leaned in near her ear. “Here’s your breakfast. There was coffee too, but I dropped it when I was forced to punch your friend Mark in his fucking mouth.”
I heard her intake of breath as I leaned back and looked at her now widened eyes. The professor announced class was started and I walked away from her without letting her say a word.
Throughout class I couldn’t sit still, my leg bouncing, my fingers bending my pencil to the point where it would almost break in half. Each time Emelie would look back at me, it only managed to piss me off more.
I didn’t even gain one fucking thing from being there because I couldn’t concentrate. In fact, I couldn’t tell you a thing the professor said. My head was spinning, that fuck’s words rolling around in my mind over and over.
The second class ended, Emelie was up and moving toward me.
“I was gonna tell you.” She’d left behind all her things and stood in front of me to block me from leaving.
“That’s funny, because you had plenty of chances.” I stood from my chair, staring back at her. I couldn’t remember ever being as pissed at her as I was right then. “Before we had sex last night, or after when we took a shower. Even when we were lying on the couch watching a movie. Instead you played it all off like nothing ever took place, so why don’t we just be honest now and admit that you weren’t gonna tell me at all?” She didn’t reply. “That’s what I thought.”
I stepped around her, and when she reached out for me, I shrugged away.
I thought we were past shit like this, like we were solid. Him being here wasn’t her fault, but her choosing to lie to me by omission was.
***
My phone rang a hundred times since I left class, but I chose to ignore it. Avoiding her was best because I was pissed and jealous, which never played well when I needed to hold my tongue.
I entered the house and found Xavier was already home, and by the looks on Corbin’s and Isaac’s faces, I would say that he’d already told them about today.
“We need to talk,” I said, looking directly at my brother. I wanted to see if he was gonna attempt to lie to me too.
“I messaged you and told you that we needed to talk,” he said with a shrug. “I wanted to give you forewarning of the asshole before you had a run in with him yourself. I knew she wasn’t going to.”
“What do you mean? She wasn’t gonna tell me?”
“She didn’t ask me to lie,” Corbin seemed suddenly sympathetic, “but she did ask me to keep the topic hushed unless you asked.”
“And?”
“I told her that I didn’t hide shit from my brother.” It was true, we didn’t. The idea that she wanted to hide this only made it all seem worse. If there was nothing there, no old feelings or wants, then why keep him being here quiet?