Kode’s jaw tenses as he wraps his arm around my shoulders. “Didn’t know you were here,” he says, glancing down at me, then back up at his cousin.
Maverick’s jaw is set in a hard line, and I’m sure he’s restraining something, though I don’t know what.
“Clearly,” he says acidly, then he shakes his head. “You’ve tried a lot of shitty things in the past, Kode. I didn’t think you could top the last thing. But here you are, proving you’re as stupid as ever. Rain is in love with Dane. Get the fuck over it.” He turns his eyes toward me, and frowns. “I can’t believe he’d do this to you. To Rain. Sorry, Tria.”
I roll my eyes, sick of listening to him cut Kode down. “Maverick,” Kode says in warning. “Don’t. You don’t have a clue about what’s going on here.”
“Don’t I, Kode? It’s pretty fucking obvious. How long has this been going on? A few days? A week? Convenient timing with the wedding right around the corner. How stupid do you think—”
“One month and two weeks,” I say, glaring at Maverick like I’m ready to throttle him.
His eyes widen in surprise, and he glances between us. I continue before he can. “We’re keeping it quiet until after the wedding so that no one has a jackass remark like you just had.”
His mouth hardens into a thin line, and he leans back on the wall. Kode wraps his fingers around my hip, pulling me to him.
“Go out on the deck or on the beach for a while, Tria. I think I should talk to Maverick.”
“No. I’m not letting him try to accuse you of using me to get to Rain. It’s like no one thinks I’m worth dating without there being an ulterior motive. It all has to be connected to Rain. It’s as though she’s the center of the universe, and I’m the shuttle that gets you there. I’m sick of it.”
His brows furrow as he looks at me, as though he’s trying to think of something to say, but Maverick beats him to it.
“Sorry, Tria. I didn’t even think about how insulting that must have sounded to you.”
That’s a shocking thing to come out of the mouth of Maverick Sterling. I return my gaze to him to see that he really does look truly remorseful.
“Mav, this has nothing at all to do with Rain,” Kode adds, running his hand down my back. “This is mine and Tria’s relationship. No one else has a say in it.”
Maverick pushes off from the wall he’s leaning against, and comes to stand nearby, his eyes moving down to where my hand is now on Kode’s wounded stomach. When he looks up, his eyes connect with Kode’s.
“So when you told Dane you would move Tria into one of your empty condos—”
“I moved her in with me,” Kode finishes, as though he’s helping Maverick piece together the puzzle.
“What about the pool in Vegas?” he asks, his brows arching.
Kode shrugs, and in true jackass form, says, “She was talking to some douche. Thought I’d break them apart.”
This time Maverick’s lips twitch.
“And when you went missing after that, you were actually—”
“With Tria,” Kode says to finish his sentence again.
“When did this start?”
Kode grins, looking down at me for a second. “That bar. The one where I disappeared on you guys after playing pool with the brunette.”
Recognition crosses the eyes of the other Sterling, and he asks, “Tria was the brunette?”
Kode nods.
“That’s why you were acting like a fucking weirdo,” he says under his breath.
What?
“I didn’t realize she had dyed her hair,” Kode says, snickering as though there’s a secret I’m missing.
“Damn. So all this time that you’ve been blowing us off has been to spend time—”
“With Tria,” Kode says, still grinning.
Maverick takes a deep breath, his head dropping back as all the world stops spinning in the right direction.
“Wow. Head trip. So is it cold in hell now that it has frozen over?”
Kode groans while wrapping his arms around my bare midriff, covering me as though he doesn’t want Maverick’s eyes seeing any more of me than he already has.
“Think you can keep your mouth shut until after the wedding?” Kode asks him.
“Yeah. I can do that.” He sighs like he wants to say more, but he apparently changes his mind. “So this is legit? Like you two are an actual item or whatever?”
This is actually a question I’d like to hear the answer to, so I remain silent and still in Kode’s arms.
“Definitely legit. So legit that it’s pissing me off that you’re seeing her wearing very little. Probably should go.”