Stepbrother Dearest(69)

I lifted my brow. “That we didn’t get along.”

Her jaw tightened, and her eyes never left mine as they silently warned me not to push it.

Finally, she said, “We had our moments.”

My voice lowered to a gentler tone. “Yeah, we did.”

Her face was turning red. I’d pushed it. I tried to do damage control by lightening the mood. “What was it you used to call me?”

“What do you mean?”

“‘Stepbrother dearest,’ was it? Because of my glowing personality?” I turned to Chelsea. “I was a miserable fuck back then.”

I was for a while…until Greta made me want to be a better person.

“How did you know about that nickname?” Greta asked.

I laughed to myself, remembering how I used to snoop in on her phone calls to her friend.

It was good to finally see her crack a smile as she said, “Oh, right. You used to eavesdrop on me.”

Chelsea was looking back and forth at us. “Sounds like those were some fun times.”

I wouldn’t take my eyes off Greta. I wanted her to know that those days were some of the best of my life.

“They were,” I said.



***



The only good thing about focusing on my unresolved feelings for Greta was that it took my mind off of Randy.

When I escaped to be alone in the backyard after dinner, though, the fact that he was gone started to hit me.

He and I would never have a chance to make amends now. It was interesting how making amends never seemed to matter when he was alive, but in his death, it was haunting me. At the very least, I’d wanted to prove him wrong, make something of myself. Now, he was somewhere in another dimension possibly coming face to face with Patrick.

Thinking about it without distraction for too long fucked with my mind. I grabbed a cigarette and tried to just meditate. It didn’t work because my emotions had only gone from sad to angry.

I heard the glass door sliding open and footsteps behind me. Don’t ask me how I knew it was her.

“What are you doing out here, Greta?”

“Chelsea asked me to come talk to you.”

What the fuck were they talking for? It just rubbed me the wrong way. Chelsea could not find out about what happened between Greta and me. I let out a sarcastic laugh. “Oh, really.”

“Yes.”

“Were you two comparing notes?”

“That’s not funny.”

It wasn’t, but my classic protective mechanism of acting like a bastard in times of stress had come out in full force. It was too late. And dammit, I wanted her to acknowledge us.

I put my cigarette out. “You think she would have sent you out here to talk to me if she knew the last time before today that you and I were together, we were fucking like rabbits?”

The color drained from her face. “Did you have to put it like that?”

“It’s the truth, isn’t it? She would freak the fuck out if she knew.”

“Well, I’m not going to be the one to tell her, so you don’t have to worry. I would never do that.”

Greta’s eye started to twitch, which proved I was having an effect on her. Old habits die hard. I was addicted now.

“Why are you winking at me?”

“I’m not…my eye is twitching because—”

“Because you’re nervous. I know. You used to do that when I first met you. Glad to see we’ve come full circle.”

“I guess some things never really change, do they? It’s been seven years, but it seem just like—”

“Like yesterday,” I interrupted. “It seems like just yesterday, and that’s fucked up. This whole situation is.”

“It was never supposed to happen.”

My eyes somehow landed on her neck, and I couldn’t pry them away. I knew she noticed it. I felt possessive all of a sudden, something I knew I had no right to feel. I still needed to know what the fuck was going on.

“Where is he?”

“Who?”

“Your fiancé.”

“I’m not engaged. I was…but not anymore. How did you know I was engaged?”

I had to look down. I couldn’t let her see the effect hearing this news had on me. “What happened?”

“It’s kind of a long story, but I was the one who ended it. He moved to Europe for a job. It just wasn’t meant to be.”

“Are you with anyone now?”

“No.”

Fuck.

She continued, “Chelsea is really nice.”

“She’s wonderful; one of the best things that’s ever happened to me, actually.”

She was. I loved Chelsea; I did. I could never hurt her. I needed to convince both Greta and myself that Chelsea was it for me. It was still fucked up that hearing Greta say there was no other man had now riled me up.