“Nice!” Brody smacked me on the back. “I was worried this would be a dry party since it was at your house.” Though it hurt, I knew he meant the gesture as a compliment of sorts. “And Mom helped with this? Our mom?”
I nodded. He sounded shocked, and I can’t say I blamed him. I didn’t even know she had anything to do with it until she told me after the fact. It’d surprised me more that the rule could be overturned so quickly, but I wasn’t a stranger to money buying more than material possessions.
I didn’t exactly think my mom or the other legacies had paid anyone for the amendment, but the pressure of knowing some of its biggest donors thought the regulation was sexist had probably been enough to change some important minds. There was no harm in that. Well, other than Gina’s impending alcohol poisoning.
“Hey, Brian,” Emma said as she walked into the kitchen. Looking at her phone, she barely chanced a glance at Brody. She was clearly trying to be casual but seeming anything but. At least to those of us who knew her. I’d forgotten the other girls had even seen Brody before, much less that they thought his name was Brian.
Brody’s face contorted into full confusion. “Who’s Brian?”
That got Emma’s attention, pulling her focus from whatever she was pretending to be busy doing on her phone.
“Um, you?” Then she looked to me. “You said Brian, right? With an i?”
“Why’d you tell her my name was Brian?”
Aamee chimed in with, “I think I was actually the one who said that. I must’ve been mistaken.” I appreciated her taking the fall for this, even though it had been me who said it.
Brody’s eyebrows pushed together in a way that made him look like a dog that had just been surrendered at a shelter. “You forgot my name?” he asked Aamee.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” I said. “She didn’t forget your name. You’re such an idiot.”
Emma’s gaze darted back and forth between Aamee, Brody, and me. “Can someone tell me what’s going on?”
I sighed loudly, raising my palms to my face so I could rub my eyes. This had gone on long enough.
“Yes,” I said. “I’ll tell you what’s going on. I’ll tell everyone, actually.” I went to the living room so I could call up the stairs and ask the remaining girls to come down. Gina was still in the living room, now lying on the couch and playing with her hair above her face. “Can you all come down for a minute? I have to tell you something.”
I waited for everyone to arrive before I took a deep breath. I’d lied to them for a semester, and I’d felt guilty as hell doing it. But I’d done it for my brother, which seemed like the right decision, even if I couldn’t stand him most of the time. But now there was no reason to lie. Brody was home and hadn’t re-enrolled, and Drew, well…Drew was not related to me, and I couldn’t deny I was a bit excited to tell people that.
Once everyone was in the room and I seemed to have their attention, I said, “There’s something I need to tell all of you, and I hope you’ll forgive me.” I intentionally avoided eye contact with anyone except for Aamee, who gave me a little nod like she was encouraging me to continue. “Last semester, I lied to all of you,” I said, ashamed. “The person I told you was my brother Brody was really a guy impersonating him because my real brother is a cowardly moron who took off for Europe instead of staying here like a responsible adult.”
I looked to Brody, who didn’t seem at all insulted by the comment.
I extended a hand toward him. “This is the real Brody Mason. The guy who was pretending to be him is named Drew Nolan. He’s the one who got into the horrible motorcycle crash, and he’s also recuperating at Brody’s apartment. He’s on the mend now, but I moved back to help him.”
A few of the girls exchanged glances with each other during the silence. I tried to decipher the meaning of them but couldn’t.
“I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you the truth. All of you deserve better than that.” Giving them a small contrite smile, I said, “You’re my sisters.”
There was a long moment of silence, which I was now scared to fill, before Macy spoke.
“So you weren’t fucking your brother?”
“No!” I practically yelled.
Brody laughed but seemed equally disgusted.
“Okay, I’ll make a note of that.” She got up from her seat on the couch and reached over to grab her computer off a bookcase. “Excuse me. Sorry.”
“You’re writing that down?”
“Of course,” Macy said. “I’m sorority secretary, and I plan to keep that position until I graduate next year. I can’t have information that is incorrect.”
“You put on record that I was fucking my brother?” I shook my head, confused. “When? Why?”
She seemed a bit flustered as she woke up her laptop and began to click around. “We had a meeting about it when you weren’t here. I can tell you the exact date if you give me a minute.”
“Oh my God! Never mind. Just make sure the record reflects that information is incorrect.”
Macy nodded and quietly typed.
“So is that it?” Sam, the vice president, asked. “You just wanted to let us know that this guy is Brody and the other guy wasn’t?”
“Yeah, um, I guess.”
“Okay, so can we go back to getting ready? People will be here soon.”
“Yeah, um, I guess,” I said again.
The rest of the girls muttered to each other, and some introduced themselves to Brody before returning to whatever they’d been doing before I’d called them to the living room.
Once most of the room cleared out, I headed back to the kitchen with Aamee, Emma, and Brody.
“Well, that went well,” I said slowly. “I wasn’t sure how everyone would take it, but it seems like they don’t really mind that I lied to them.”
“Yeah, I’m not surprised,” Aamee said, tossing a bag of pretzels to Brody to pour into a heart-shaped bowl. “I’ve told you before no one gives a shit about your personal life, Mason.”
“Right,” I said on a laugh. I wondered when people were going to start arriving so I had something to focus on besides my disaster of a life.
Chapter Fifteen
D R E W
“Isn’t there a better way to do this?” As I cross-checked the online orders against the handwritten list I’d created in a notebook, I scrutinized the spreadsheet on the iPad Brody had put in front of me.
“Like what?”
It was a good question and one I didn’t have an answer to. “I don’t know. Just seems like there should be an app or something that does this automatically.”
Brody’s eyes lit up.
“Don’t even think about it,” Sophia said. “We should focus on one venture at a time.”
“Fine,” he replied, obviously disappointed.
Carter, Toby, and Aniyah seemed oblivious to our conversation as they opened Prime Pantry boxes and attempted to organize household items, food and drinks, and toiletries, among other things that had recently been ordered in due to special requests from some of the recurring customers.
Impressed by our success, Cody asked to come by to see the process in action, and I’d given him the task of putting together the orders that were scheduled to go out next.
We’d been in business less than a month, and word had spread quickly that we were running a customizable delivery system. The first few days, we fielded a few calls—food and beer mostly—although one guy asked us to bring condoms and offered a twenty-dollar tip if we could get them there in fifteen minutes. He was too drunk to drive but apparently not too drunk to realize he shouldn’t be procreating as a sophomore. A few people had even asked us to pick out Valentine’s Day gifts for their girlfriends.
Unsure of the most efficient and economically sound way to purchase items, we originally treated each order as an errand—going to drugstores or convenience stores as needed. But we quickly realized that not only was that a complete waste of time, it was a huge money suck.
&
nbsp; It didn’t take us long to begin ordering most items in bulk online and picking up some specialty goods at local stores, like the bakery below Brody’s apartment and the vape shop a few blocks away. And though we were completely overwhelmed, we weren’t complaining, because business meant money.
The idea was so good, it was hard to believe it’d been Brody’s.
“You know what you should do?” Carter asked, but it was clear he didn’t expect anyone to actually take a guess. “Create theme packages. Like Hangover Helper or Sexual Success or something. You can just have a bunch of them ready to go. Then you don’t need to worry about customizing them as much. Like you could just have Tylenol, Gatorade, ginger ale, stuff like that.”
“That’s actually a really good idea,” Sophia said, looking up from her computer.
“Thanks,” Carter said, sounding almost as surprised at her compliment as Sophia had been at his idea.
“What would you put in the Sexual Success package?” Aniyah asked.
“I don’t know. I didn’t think that far ahead. I’ve never really had trouble getting laid, so I don’t actually know what you’d need.”
“I think we should call it the Sexcess Package,” Toby said. “It’s catchier.”
“It’s a good idea no matter what we call it,” I told him. The fact that this could really turn into something surprised me, even though we’d already begun making money. “I bet we could come up with another theme or two and get a good amount of orders from those alone.”
“Soph’s gonna have to start delivering soon,” Brody said, his eyebrows raised at his sister.
We both knew that would never happen. Neither one of us was going to let her show up to random houses and apartments by herself, especially late at night, which was when a lot of the orders were placed. But maybe with the theme box idea, we’d be able to get a more solid routine going so that we could get ahead of the orders instead of throwing shit together as it came in.
“No way,” she said, probably knowing she wouldn’t have to put too much effort into resisting.
“I’ll do it,” Cody said. “If you’re serious about needing another driver.”
There was no way I’d let him take on another job when he was already struggling in school.
“You can’t keep your grades up with one job,” I told him. “No way I’m letting you take another.”
“I’ll quit my job at the Donut Dive.”
He spoke like the idea was a foregone conclusion and one that I didn’t have much say in. Cody was like me in that way. Once he got an idea in his head, there wasn’t much, if anything, anyone could do to stop him. But I’d try anyway.
“No. It’s out of your way, and it’ll be a gigantic waste of gas. You’d have to work late—”
“I work late now. And that’s what they make gas stations for.”
Rolling my eyes, I said, “You know what I mean. We’re just starting out, and we can’t pay you much. Most of what you’d make would go to gas money.”
“Maybe at first. But if this thing takes off, we could all be millionaires.”
“I think millionaires is a stretch. Especially since there’ll be four of us by that point.” I had to hand it to Cody; he knew how to dream big, and he didn’t let anyone crush those dreams. “Maybe just tens of thousandaires,” I said, letting my words concede the argument.
Cody’s smirk shifted into a genuinely happy grin. “This is gonna be big. You guys watch.”
“You said that when you tried to get Mom to sell cupcakes with pot in them for your freshman football fundraiser.”
Carter laughed. “Seriously? That’s awesome.”
“Hey,” Cody said, a finger pointing in my direction, “it would’ve worked if you hadn’t warned her. I was ahead of my time. That was before edibles became super popular. I could’ve been a trendsetter.”
“You could’ve been a felon. Children bought food at that fundraiser.”
“Whatever,” Cody said, brushing me off with a wave of his hand. “I didn’t think it all the way through. And it probably would’ve been Mom who went to jail anyway. It’s not like it would’ve been her first time.”
“You’re horrible.”
Brody finished tagging the box he’d just packed before he stood. “I think you’re awesome. We could use an innovator like you,” he said, extending a hand as he walked toward Cody. “Welcome to the team.”
S O P H I A
With our brothers out doing deliveries, Drew and I had been in the apartment for a few hours together. I wasn’t used to having this much alone time with him, and it seemed neither one of us knew quite how to fill it.
We’d begun the night by catching up on some of the order sheets, and since the two of us made a good team, the task didn’t take more than a half hour before we’d done just about everything we could do for Nite Bites.
“Now what?” Drew asked, flipping the case of Brody’s iPad closed and setting it on the coffee table.
I shrugged, trying to think of a suggestion that seemed normal. I wasn’t exactly sure what normal was for two people who used to be together but were now business partners who were currently trying to ignore the sexual energy charging between them. I wondered if Drew could feel it too.
How could he not?
But it was hard to tell. Drew was calm and collected while I was all alert and tingly whenever I was around him, like I was hyperaware of his every movement and breath. It reminded me of the time Taylor and I had Four Lokos for breakfast during our senior trip after graduating high school.
“Netflix and chill?” I asked.
Drew laughed, making me feel even more uncomfortable in my skin.
“What?”
“You know what that means, right?”
“Yeah. Hang out and watch movies.”
“It means hook up.”
“Oh” was all I could get out. Not wanting to make eye contact with him, I stared straight ahead at the TV and rubbed my hands over my thighs nervously. Why was I always so awkward?
“Netflix is good, though,” Drew said.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him smile, though I wished I hadn’t. His smile did things to me that I’d been trying exceptionally hard not to think about lately. It was something about what it did to his eyes…and really, the rest of his gorgeous face. His smile lit his entire aura until he seemed like he was glowing. And then I’d feel all warm and antsy again.
Drew leaned behind me to grab the remote from the back of the sofa, his arm grazing the back of my neck so lightly that I almost didn’t feel it.
I wondered if Drew could tell what he did to me, especially when we were alone, which, thankfully, wasn’t that often. I wondered if he could see my face heat up when his eyes locked with mine or see the goose bumps on my skin when we were close.
I wanted him to touch me—fantasized about him touching me. But he’d made it clear that even though he wanted the same thing I did, now wasn’t a good time to act on those desires.
“What do you wanna watch?” he asked.
You without any clothes on.
“Oh, um, whatever. I’m not picky. Any movie’s fine.”
“Thriller? Comedy? Horror?”
“Comedy’s good.” I figured maybe laughing at something other than my own life might be cathartic for me.
Drew turned on the TV guide channel, and it didn’t take us long to decide on Step Brothers. We’d both seen it numerous times, but we also both agreed it never got old.
After a few minutes, Drew turned to me. “You know what this apartment needs?”
“Another bed?”
Chuckling, he said, “Well, yeah. That’d definitely be nice. I’m sure Brody’s getting tired of sleeping on the floor.”
Most of the time, Brody never even made it into the bedroom to the makeshift bed he’d created for himself out of extra pillows and a sleeping bag. Sometimes he passed out on the love seat, and other times he must have sweet-talked some unsuspecting girl into letting
him stay with her, but I hadn’t really bothered to think about it much until now.
“I was thinking a drum set,” Drew said.
“That will never happen.”
“I can play, though.”
“You can?” I raised an eyebrow skeptically.
“Why do you look so surprised?”
I shrugged, unsure myself. “I don’t know. You never told me.”
“Never came up. I guess I was too focused on being your gay brother to let you know who I really was.”
He laughed after he said it, but I couldn’t help but hear the truth in it. So much of what we knew about each other had been overshadowed by the lie we’d been a part of. Sure, somehow living together now—even with Brody nearby most of the time—had allowed us to find out more about the other person without that knowledge getting clouded by all the sorority and school bullshit.
But it became suddenly clear to me just how little we actually knew about each other. All the small details had been pushed aside for more major concerns at the time, and now that those concerns didn’t exist, I wanted to know Drew Nolan like I’d never known him before.
“Well, you’re not my brother anymore,” I said quietly.
There was a silent moment between us before a smile spread across his face. I’d tried to suppress my own, but I felt myself failing miserably.
“I swear I didn’t mean for that to sound as creepy as it did.”
We both laughed loudly, and when we calmed down, Drew said, “I didn’t think you did.”
“Try again?” I asked, heat radiating up my cheeks.
“Go for it.”
The way he stared at me, his eyes fixed on mine like they never wanted to look anywhere else, had my pulse speeding up.
I swallowed hard, clearing my throat before I said something stupid again.
He waited patiently, his body square with mine and an elbow propped on the back of the couch.
Truth or Dare You (The Love Game Book 2) Page 11
