by Darcy Burke
“For at least the next seven months,” Alaina said, laughing. “Thank you. Fair warning, I might eat everything that’s not touched, so dish up!”
The line formed for the taco bar, which was situated on both sides of the main kitchen island, and it moved pretty quickly. Liam and Aubrey were last, and by the time Aubrey had her plate ready, she realized there weren’t any chairs left at the table.
Emily looked up from her seat. “I’m so sorry! I have two more chairs on order—they’re being delivered Wednesday. For now, you’ll have to sit at the counter. Or in the dining room. Sit wherever you like.” She started to stand. “Or Rob and I can move.”
Liam waved her back down. “Don’t be silly. Aubrey and I will find a spot.” He looked over at her. “Like Mom said, there’s the island or the beer bar, or the dining room, but that’s pretty formal, or we can head downstairs to the game area. The card table has a hard top on it. Or there’s the bar down there, too.”
The Archers’ house was immense, but then, to fit a family of nine, it had needed to be. They were also a family of wealth, so they had things like game areas, theaters, wine cellars, gyms, and outdoor inground pools.
Going anywhere outside the kitchen meant being alone with Liam. “Here’s fine.” She took her plate back over to the beer tap and sat on the stool she’d used earlier.
Liam joined her, taking the stool to her right. He pulled his phone from his back pocket and set it on the counter.
They were close enough that Aubrey could feel his warmth and smell his shower gel. It would be so easy to edge toward him, to nudge her thigh against his. But friends didn’t do that.
“You know, I should be the one apologizing for the other night.” His voice was low, his attention on the soft taco he’d rolled in his hand. “I was the sober one, and I shouldn’t have . . . Anyway, I shouldn’t have.”
Wow, this was a sweet side to him. Seemed like she was seeing all sorts of different sides of Liam—aspects she’d seen glimpses of during their various hook-ups. He was turning out to maybe be the man she’d hoped he was. The man she’d started to fall for. She liked this Liam. “It’s not your fault at all. You were just trying to be a gentleman and make sure I didn’t pass out in my own vomit or something. I’m the one who took advantage.”
He laughed. “That’s quite a picture. I’d argue there wasn’t any advantage to take. I’m always game for a night of fun with you.” He flicked her a glance, and its heat was enough to scald every part of her. In the most delicious way possible. “But I get that you’re with Stuart.”
He hadn’t called him Stuart the Accountant. And she wasn’t actually with Stuart anymore. If she ever had been. She didn’t tell Liam that, however. If she could hide behind a faux relationship with Stuart, why not make things a little bit easier for herself? If Liam thought she was off-limits, he wouldn’t flirt with her or touch her. She could handle a toned-down Liam far more than a Liam who was on the hunt.
But oh how she loved being his prey.
She forced herself to focus on her dinner. Wasn’t she supposed to be starving?
His phone vibrated, and she glanced at the screen. There was a text that read: Date confirmed! Let me know when you want to practice. This was followed by a thumbs-up icon.
Liam picked it up and clicked the screen off. “That’s my friend Rylan.”
“What are you going to practice?”
“Just some acrobatics.” There was something in his tone that didn’t quite ring true.
Aubrey looked over at him. “Skydiving?”
He nodded. “Yep.”
The fact that he wasn’t regaling her with details seemed a bit suspicious, but she didn’t say so.
She managed to make it through the rest of dinner and the show afterward without thinking of Liam naked. And by the time she was getting ready to leave, she was almost convinced that they could be friends. Still, she was glad for the opportunity to walk out with Sean and Tori before Liam could offer to escort her to her car. Not that he would’ve, but it was a bullet she’d just as soon dodge.
“I’ll look forward to reading the brief,” Liam said to her as she turned to go.
“Thanks, I’ll send it soon.”
She walked out with Tori and Sean and hoped the brief would be good enough. For more reasons than she cared to count.
LIAM HAD RETREATED to his room to catch up on some e-mail before heading to bed. His mind kept returning to Aubrey. He’d had a good time with her tonight, and they hadn’t tried to paw each other. Or even flirt, really. Okay, maybe a little. He couldn’t seem to not flirt with her. How could he avoid trying to make her smile or coax that sparkle into her eye? He quite simply couldn’t. Around her, he became a boy with an infatuation.
His phone vibrated on the desk, and his pulse quickened, as he hoped it was her. But it was Whitney calling. He still hadn’t remembered to block her number.
Annoyed with himself as much as her, he answered. “You have to stop calling me.”
“Hello to you, too,” she said, all sarcasm and spite. “I’m surprised you picked up. You seem to be treating me like the plague.”
“I’d actually rather have the plague. It’s easier to get rid of than you. But I suppose until they come up with an antibiotic that cures Whitney Stalking, I’m screwed.”
Her loud laughter made him pull the phone away from his ear. “You are so funny. I’d say you’re being mean, but I actually think you’re flirting with me.”
“I’ve never flirted with you.” Not even when he’d slept with her. Not at all like he did with Aubrey. They weren’t remotely in the same league, as far as he was concerned. “Whitney, I don’t know how to be any more plain—I don’t want to see you. I don’t want to talk to you. I’d be happy pretending we’d never met.” He gripped the phone tightly and practically growled into it. “Really.”
“Too bad because we have met. And I know you as intimately as anyone possibly could.”
He regretted everything they’d done together. “You don’t know shit.”
“I know you’ve got this oval freckle on your inner thigh and that if I stroke your balls a certain way, you’ll come twice as hard.”
“And this conversation is over. I’m blocking you now.” He pulled the phone away again but heard her yell.
“Wait! Don’t hang up.” She lowered her voice an octave. Thank goodness, because he was pretty sure all the dogs in the area were on high alert due to her pitch. “I have a proposition for you. About the zoning appeal.”
He closed his eyes and exhaled. “Are you still going to pretend you have nothing to do with it?”
“My dad is completely responsible for hiring Sutherlin and filing the appeal, not me.”
He believed that much. “But I can’t imagine you mind. Or that you’re an innocent bystander. Last time we saw each other, you said you’d talk to your dad if I slept with you.”
“I don’t remember saying that.”
He rolled his eyes. “Not exactly, but I’m pretty sure that’s what you meant.”
“Well,” she said pertly, “it doesn’t matter. I’d like to propose a formal arrangement. You make yourself . . . available to me at least once a quarter, and I’ll convince my dad to drop the appeal.”
Once a quarter? What, did she want him to sign a contract or something? He might’ve behaved like a manwhore at various times in his life, but he wasn’t actually one. “Let’s be direct. Please? Do you want me to have tea with you every three months, or are you asking for something else?”
“You’ll have to spend the night with me. And have sex. At least twice.”
Oh for fuck’s sake. She was insane. “Good-bye, Whitney. I’m blocking you now.” He disconnected the call and Googled how to block her number, then did just that.
As he set the phone down, he heard a footfall in the hallway and looked toward the half-open door.
Evan pushed inside. “Hey.”
Liam turned, the stiff seat of his old chai
r creaking as he tried to maneuver it. In the end, he had to push on the edge of the desk to rotate properly. “Hey, Evan.”
Evan’s gaze was on the chair instead of Liam. “You need some new furniture.”
Liam laughed. “A chair, maybe, but I don’t spend enough time here to make it worthwhile.”
Evan walked into his room. “Are you sure? I was pretty surprised to get back from my honeymoon and find that you were still here. What gives?” He went to the double bed, which felt cramped after Liam’s king back in Denver, and sat down.
“I’m hanging out for the zoning appeal.”
“Why? From what I understand, Aubrey’s still working on her response, and then it could be a few weeks until the oral argument. Seems like you could do everything you’re doing from Denver.”
That was more than true. “I’ve, uh, been checking out The Alex, doing some skydiving, and working from here, of course.” He gestured to his open laptop on the desk.
Evan vaguely nodded, his gaze landing on Liam periodically during the conversation. “I’m surprised. It’s strange enough that I came home, but your being here defies logic.”
Liam didn’t understand what he meant. Logically, they all should have come home, at least temporarily or intermittently to help with the project Alex had laid out. But life wasn’t logical. Evan, however, was sometimes ruled by logic.
Liam rested his elbows on the arms of the chair he’d gotten when he’d started high school. “Why is that, exactly?”
“Because you’ve worked harder than anyone to establish a life outside of Ribbon Ridge that would be difficult to leave. Kyle had no strings in Florida, and Sara wasn’t that far away to begin with.” She’d been living about forty-five minutes outside Ribbon Ridge and running a successful event-planning business when Alex had died.
“Sara still had a business.”
“Which she sold, like I sold mine.” Evan had been a tech consultant with his own one-man firm. “Are you really going to sell your business?”
Right. Sell off millions of dollars’ worth of commercial real estate and the revenue that generated. “Hell no.”
“My point exactly. You’re never coming back here, and you set it up that way.”
Liam still wasn’t sure where Evan was going, but that wasn’t necessarily surprising. He sometimes rambled or just outright talked in circles. It was part of his autism. It was also what made him the brother Liam loved. “So your point is that I moved away with the intention of never coming back.”
“Yes.”
“Didn’t you do that, too?” Liam asked. Evan had moved a couple of hours north into southwest Washington.
“Yes, and do you know why? I mean, do you really know why?”
“To exercise your independence?”
Evan quirked a smile. “You could say that, too, but that’s a lame explanation, and you know it. I left because of the noise. Everyone was always hovering over me. They did the same thing to Sara. That’s why she left, too.”
Liam didn’t want to, but he couldn’t help but think of Alex. No one had endured more hovering than him. But he hadn’t been able to leave. Well, Liam supposed he could’ve, but who would’ve taken care of him when he was ill?
“You didn’t really have to go, though. You had a built-in job and everything.” Evan was referring to Archer Enterprises’ real-estate division.
“I wanted to build something on my own. You know that.”
Evan lifted a shoulder. “You could’ve taken Archer Real Estate to the next level, but you didn’t.”
“I’m really confused now. It defies logic that I came back, and yet you’re saying I never should’ve left.”
“No, I’m not making any kind of judgment whatsoever. It defies logic that you came back, because you worked so hard to leave, to escape this situation.”
Liam’s chest twisted. This conversation was edging very close to something he’d never discussed with any of them. “And what situation was that?”
He leaned forward, his gaze landing on Liam for a long, solid moment. “Alex. You hated being here. Seeing him. And that’s okay, because he hated seeing you, too.”
Holy shit. Evan had laid it out perfectly. The things that he and Alex never said to each other but were tacit understandings. I’ll do my thing over here, you do yours over there. We keep in touch, we do the sports, we don’t have to live together.
Liam’s pulse slammed in his throat. “Why are you bringing this up now?”
“Because I’m wondering if you’re ready to come home now that he’s gone. You can be here without feeling guilty, without worrying how much he resents you.”
Of course Evan, who had practically zero filter, would state things so truthfully and also so accurately.
“You haven’t talked about this to anyone else, have you?” Liam hesitated to ask him that. He didn’t want it to seem like Evan shouldn’t say anything. He was terrible at secrets.
“No, and I won’t. I think some of them get it anyway, even if they don’t really think about it. I mean, why would you think about it? It’s kind of depressing and fucked up, isn’t it?”
So. Much.
“Anyway,” Evan continued, “I’m actually really good at secrets now. When I got the job at Archer last fall, no one knew it was me for a few months.”
Liam stared at his brother. Like the rest of them, he’d changed. He’d . . . evolved or something. And now he was going to be a father. “You’re going to be a great dad, you know.”
Evan barked out a laugh. “I don’t know that at all, but thanks for saying so. Alaina’s going to be the world’s best mother, so I figure I have a little wiggle room.”
“You like being back here? Working at Archer?”
Again, Evan looked him in the eye. “I love it. I honestly can’t believe how much. The job is . . . fantastic. And Alaina and the baby . . . ” He swiped his hand through his hair. “I was pretty overwhelmed at first—still am sometimes—but I’ve never felt like this before. I never imagined I could feel like this. I mean, I’ve always been happy enough. I love the family. Things are good. But this transcends all that.” He laughed. “Listen to me being all poetic and shit.”
Liam was still trying to process everything Evan had said. What he was describing almost felt like the way Liam felt when his adrenaline rush took over, that indescribable high that, yeah, pretty much transcended everything. “I think I get it.”
Evan shook his head. “You only think you do. Until you fall in love, until you find that person who just makes everything right, you don’t really know. Sorry, bro.”
Irritation scratched at Liam’s brain. He didn’t like it when people told him he didn’t know something. But maybe Evan was right. Liam had never been in love. He had no idea what that felt like and probably never would. He’d actually have to let someone close enough, and that wasn’t happening.
And why was that exactly?
Because letting someone into his heart meant exposing himself, being vulnerable. It meant letting them see the ugly truths Evan had just revealed out loud. It also meant tying himself to something permanently. Like to an oxygen tank.
Liam jerked in physical response. He sat up straight and pulled his arms from the chair, resting his hands in his lap.
If Evan saw him twitch, he didn’t say so. He stood up from the bed. “I just stopped by to say hi. I had to pick up a few things that were still in my room. Can’t be officially moved into my new house until my stuff’s on display.” He had to be referring to his myriad of sci-fi collectibles.
“If that was you saying hi, I’d hate to see what a heart-to-heart looks like,” Liam joked.
Evan wiped a hand over his face. “Yeah, I hadn’t planned on coming in here and getting all sentimental and crap. Sorry. I’m just glad you’re here, for however long. See you later.”
Liam watched Evan go, but the sense of unease his words had generated lasted long after he’d gone. Liam was just glad Evan hadn’t pursued wanting to
know whether he was staying in Ribbon Ridge permanently. Because right now the answer was still a fat no. It was becoming evident that those who came back settled down, and he’d just established that he couldn’t do that. There was no way his future was in Ribbon Ridge.
Chapter Twelve
WAS THERE ANYTHING better than a smooth pinot gliding down your throat after a long day in court? Aubrey sat back on her couch and put her feet up on the ottoman.
Okay, maybe buttery soft yoga pants, fuzzy socks, and a favorite sweatshirt were a close second. She reached for the remote and turned on the TV, intent on checking out her DVR to see what treasures she’d missed the past few weeks while she’d been furiously working on perfecting the zoning brief along with all of her other matters. The only thing she’d kept up on was Game of Thrones, and that was only because the Archers had invited her over.
She had a great time at those Sunday dinners and would be disappointed when they stopped. When would that be? When the zoning was finalized? But she would still be overseeing Alex’s trust until The Alex was finished. That would be in a couple of months or so. Maybe then she’d part ways with the Archers.
But she didn’t see that happening. She’d become good friends with so many of them, and she had privileged access to their mudroom door. Plus, Ribbon Ridge was a small town, and she wouldn’t be able to avoid the Archers even if she wanted to.
Okay, so they were friends forever. Or something. That didn’t mean she had to continue going to Sunday dinner over there, especially when she found Mr. Right and started her own family. Game of Thrones only lasted a few more weeks, damn the short seasons anyway, so by the end of that, she could politely excuse herself from the routine.
Bummer.
She sensed it would be far easier than parting ways with Liam, although they’d made good progress on Sunday. They’d spent the entire evening in each other’s orbit without touching, and she’d kept her mind out of the gutter. Mostly.
After finally finding satisfaction with the brief, she’d forwarded it to him last night. He hadn’t responded. No Thanks for sending or I’ll get back to you soon. Nothing. She might have fired it off into a black hole. If he could keep ignoring her like that, her job of ditching him would get a whole lot easier.
