“You sure you’re okay?” I said as I got dressed.
“Hm?” He looked up from where he was sitting on the other side of the bed putting on his shoes. I walked over to him and stood between his legs, then gently knocked on his head.
“Anyone home in there? What is up with you, Lucah?”
“Family business,” he said, putting his head into my stomach and hugging me around the waist as if he didn’t want to let me go.
“Your brother?”
He sighed and lifted his head.
“He’s a pain in my ass that won’t go away,” he said. “I’m lending him some money so he can get his own place and so he’ll get off my back. I also volunteered to help him get a job, which was an incredibly stupid thing for me to do. So that means that some of my time with you will be given to him, and I resent him for taking me away from you. And then I feel like a dick for resenting my brother for not having his shit together and for my parents dying and not being here to deal with it.” He seemed to realize that he just mentioned his dead parents for the first time and then ducked his head again.
“I didn’t know that about your parents,” I said, stroking his hair back.
“It was a few years ago. House fire. The smoke detectors worked, but they didn’t wake up.”
“Oh, Lucah. I’m so sorry.” I wanted to cry, but I held back.
“I know you are, Sunshine. You’re one of the only people that I know truly means that. So anyway, Tate has given up helping with Ryder, so it falls on me.”
“Family comes first, you know how crazy I am with mine. You have to do what you have to do. I’ll be fine. I’m not one of those girls.”
“You’re the best kind of girl,” he said into my stomach.
“Aw, thanks,” I said, leaning down to give him a kiss. “Okay, I have to get to that place. See you in a little while.”
“See you,” he said, making the kiss linger and make me want to call both of us in as “sick”. Yeah, that wouldn’t be suspicious at all.
He was late. If there were two things I knew about Lucah Blaine, it was that first, he was an o**l s*x god, and second, he was never late.
I called his cell phone, but he didn’t answer. When he was ten minutes late, I was freaking out and I’d called and texted and was about ready to start using skywriters or smoke signals or Morse code.
Then I got a text back from him.
Almost there. Dealing with brother. Oh thank God. My mind had gone to worst-case scenario and I was about to start calling hospitals.
Need time off? He’d never asked for any before, but if he needed it, I’d get it for him, especially for this.
No. Be there soon. Need LOTS of coffee tonight.
I typed back a smiley face and put my phone down and counted the minutes until he walked in. I motioned for him to come in my office, and he did, closing the door.
“Is everything okay?” He didn’t say anything, but came around the desk and kissed me hard. Then he pulled back and rested his forehead on mine.
“I needed that.” He backed away and sat down.
“Yes, I’m fine.” I got a smile that wasn’t quite convincing, but I couldn’t ask him about it again or else I would risk making him mad, so I just smiled and told him to get his ass to his desk.
“Coffee. You and me. Later,” I said as he closed the door.
“Yes, Miss Clarke.”
I spent the rest of the day putting out fires, looking at expense reports and wondering when the hell I was going to meet this mysterious brother. I mean, part of me didn’t want to meet him, but part of me really did. But I sure as hell wasn’t going to ask Lucah about it and bring a sore subject up.
Chloe and Marisol had come over to have dinner with Sloane, so they were all there when I got home and they had clearly been talking about me because they froze when I walked in the door like three deer in a set of headlights.
“Well, don’t stop talking about me just because I walk in,” I said before one of them could recover and make up a story about what they’d been talking about.
“I told them,” Sloane said, not looking at me. “But to be fair, they figured it out. It’s your fault for having smart friends.” Yeah, that was exactly the problem. I guess I hadn’t been as stealthy as I thought.
“It was really obvious,” Marisol said.
“What she said,” Chloe echoed. Je-sus Christ.
I set my bag down and joined them on the couch with a huge sigh.
“So you knew? The whole time I’ve been pretending and you already knew?” What a waste of time lying had been. Oh God. If they hadn’t been fooled then maybe Lucah and I were really terrible liars. What if people at the office . . .
“What’s wrong with you? You look like you’re going to pass out,” Sloane said, coming and putting her hand on my forehead like I was a kid with a fever.
“Was I that bad at lying?”
“No, it wasn’t that. We just saw the chemistry between you two and we knew that it wouldn’t be over after just one night. And honestly? Telling us he wasn’t that great in bed? Huge red flag, woman,” Marisol said, rolling her eyes.
“Amen. Plus, I knew that you had to be somewhere at night and I knew it wasn’t at the office, so you had to be with a guy and what guy would you be with that you wouldn’t tell us about? Process of elimination, really,” Chloe said. Damn. I did have smart friends.
“Okay, well now that’s out in the open, I need some advice.” I gave them the rundown of Lucah and the brother situation and the developments from this morning.
“It’s such a sore subject right now, so I think I should avoid it, but he says that he wants to be with me, and if we’re going to be together, I think I should meet his brother, right? That’s how relationships should work.”
They all agreed, but then said that it was shaky ground and that maybe I should wait until the situation had settled before I asked about it. I agreed, and then it was time for them to treat me like a Barbie and dress me up to go see Lucah.
I ended up wearing a lot more makeup than I would have, and wearing a more-flashy outfit than I normally did, and they also packed me a nightie. Most of the time I just wore Lucah’s shirt or nothing at all when we slept, but he might enjoy that, so I took it with me.
They all wished me good sex and I wished I had time to ask Marisol about any Fin developments, but I didn’t. Fin had texted me a few times, but he was off in Europe again, so the messages were few and far between. Lucah asked me if I had heard from him, but I said not really and I could tell he was happy about that.