Anti-Stepbrother(72)
“Were you following me?” My mouth hung open.
“No!” He looked disgusted. “I was telling the truth. I really am here to see Caden. I was getting out of my car when you walked past me on the sidewalk. That’s it.”
Okay. That made more sense, but— “You’re protecting Caden?” Bombshell number one. “From me?” Bombshell number two.
“Don’t fuck with him, okay?”
“What are you talking about?”
“You know what I’m talking about.”
I honestly didn’t. “Huh?”
He jerked his head to the door. “Go see your bitch brother, but don’t go from his bed to my brother’s. Got it?”
“Caden told you?”
He didn’t answer. He just shook his head, shoved his hands in his pockets, and glared one last time before heading down the hallway that led out the back door.
I gulped. Everything was swimming inside of me. Did Caden like me? Is that what Marcus was implying? But I was the one who had feelings for Caden. He was going to hurt me, not the other way around.
I lifted my hand to open the basement door, but let it fall back to my side. I had to know what Marcus meant. Before I could turn, going to find Caden, the basement door swung open.
It hit me in the forehead as I stepped back.
“Ouch!” My hand pressed to my head.
“Oh, hey!” Kevin squeezed through the door. “You were coming to see me?”
Worst. Timing. Ever.
I scowled. “Who is it?”
“What?”
I didn’t have time for this. “The new girl. Who is it? Is it me?”
He had a bright smile on his face, but the more questions I asked, the more it dimmed.
His Adam’s apple bobbed up and down. “What are you talking about?”
“You never break up with one girl unless you have another one in mind. You dumped Maggie, so who’s the new girl? I just want to know.”
“Um…”
I rolled my eyes. “For the record, I don’t want it to be me.”
“You don’t?” He looked pained, the lines around his mouth growing tight. “Well, it’s not you.”
“It’s not?”
“No.” He still looked pained.
“So who is it?”
He lifted a shoulder. “No one.”
“No one?” I motioned to my mouth. “This, right here. You don’t see it, but it’s on the floor.”
“Come on.” He glanced to the ceiling for a brief second. “I’m not that bad.”
“You are that bad. You’re the six-monther, remember? #Sixmonthguy.”
“Don’t start doing hashtags.”
“#Sorry.”
He let out a breath, sliding his hands in his back pockets. “Look. Truce, okay? There really is no girl. Ever since you said something about my pattern, it’s been bugging me. It’s not healthy, you know? To always have a girl with me? So I figure I should try to do something about it.”
“Like what?”
“Like—” He motioned between the two of us. “—what we’re doing here. We’re just talking. Nothing else. No flirting. No sexual innuendos, no signals being sent about hooking up later.”
“You do that sort of stuff?”
“Don’t you?”
I couldn’t even figure out my signals to myself. “No. You do all that in a regular conversation?”
“More or less.”
I had things to learn. “Wow.” So much to learn.
He grinned, seeming to relax. “It feels good. Refreshing.”
“What is?”
“A conversation that’s just about what we’re talking about.”
I felt a headache starting. “Okay. I can’t wrap my head around the kind of conversations you usually have, so let’s let it go.”
“Okay. Good.” His grin went up a notch, and his hands came to rest on my shoulders. He squeezed. “This is what being normal is like. Huh.”
I tensed and looked at his hands. “Not in the slightest.”
“What?”
I bounced my shoulders up. “Those.”
“My hands?” He let go and backed away, his palms spread out toward me. “That wasn’t a normal thing to do, was it?”
“Nope. That’s totally normal to do,” I paused. “If I were your girlfriend.”
“Right.” He backed away another step and slid his hands back into his pockets. “I might have some things to learn.”
“Don’t think about sex when you’re talking to a girl.”
“Well, don’t get ahead of yourself.” He grinned ruefully at me. “No guy can do that.”
“Then I’ve got nothing for you.”