by Lauren Layne
“When?” she asked grumpily.
“How about when my parents aren’t in town?” he asked with a slight smile.
“Good point. Okay. In the meantime, I’ll try to teach myself.”
“That promises to be delightfully dirty.”
She laughed. “Not like that. I mean I’ll do some thinking. Try to figure out what makes me feel sexy and what doesn’t.”
“Can I watch?”
“Hunter!” She laughed again, softly.
“Right.” He opened his eyes, his smile disappearing as he studied her. “You probably wouldn’t discuss such things with a brother.”
Her eyes met his. “You say that like it’s a bad thing. Like it bothers you.”
He smiled and forced himself to be honest because with Brit, he was always honest. “I guess I know what you meant. But it felt like a dismissal somehow. You know, like, Oh, him? Just a brother figure.”
“No,” she said quickly, her hand reaching out and touching his wrist gently. “It wasn’t like that. It was just your mom . . .”
“Yeah, I know,” he said. “She still dreams I’ll turn you into her daughter-in-law.”
“It was the easiest way to put her off the topic,” Brit said.
“I get it. But I’ve gotta say, if you’ve got all these brotherly vibes, it’s gonna get real weird if I’m supposed to teach you the art of seduction.”
“I promise to push aside brother vibes while school is in session.”
“Perfect. But for tonight . . . remember that I’m like your brother, and you are to think of me as such.”
“Okay?” she said, a question in her voice. “Why?”
“Because tonight I’m sleeping riiiiiight here.” Hunter rolled to his back, stacking both hands behind his head. “Hands to yourself.”
“You know, right, that adult siblings don’t generally sleep in the same bed and act like it’s normal.”
He reached out, picked up yet another one of the extra pillows, and placed it between them. “There. Perfect.”
He heard the movement of her hair against the pillow as she shook her head.
But he knew she was smiling.
Chapter Thirteen
Sexy is a state of mind. Sexy is a state of mind.
Brit had been repeating the mantra to herself over and over all night, but as Ross Alford walked her home, she began repeating it with more and more frequency, hoping that thinking about being sexy would make her feel like it.
So far, no luck.
She hadn’t had a bad time. In fact, she was fairly certain the date had gone well. Conversation hadn’t lagged. Ross’s sense of humor bordered on dorky, but at least he had a sense of humor, and they’d had a couple of shared laughs.
And he was good-looking, with thick curly black hair and friendly dark-brown eyes. Fit, good height, all that.
Granted, he didn’t eat gluten, which, for bread-loving Brit, felt a little unfathomable. He did eat oysters, except ordering them had made Brit think of Hunter, and, well . . .
There. That was the problem. She’d been thinking of Hunter when she should have been thinking of Ross.
Wondering if Hunter had had a fun day with his family, wondering what he’d say when he learned that she’d accepted Ross’s last-minute invitation to dinner.
She’d met Ross at a fundraiser a couple of months ago when she was between relationships and given him her phone number. He’d mentioned that he had some travel for work coming up but that he’d call her when he got settled back in the city.
Which had been tonight, apparently.
At the time, it had seemed like as good an opportunity as any to embrace her new sexy state of mind, yet she was feeling anything but.
Clearly she needed more than Hunter telling her that sexy was a state of mind. She needed him to tell her how to get there. To get to that point where she wanted to invite Ross up or at least practice her new move of securing the first kiss.
Instead, as they started the final block to her apartment, Brit knew she’d be practicing the other move. The one where she left it open for a second date without ending this one with a kiss, much less sex.
“Well, this is me,” she said, nodding at her building as they approached.
Ross glanced up. “Damn. Fancy.”
Brit nearly explained that a fancy apartment on her budget also meant a tiny apartment but realized that might be construed as an invitation to see said apartment, so instead she gave a noncommittal smile.
What had Hunter said came next in the polite brush-off with option for more? Not a handshake, that much she remembered.
Oh yes . . .
Brit stepped closer and touched Ross’s arm just briefly before looking up at him. “Thanks. I had a really nice time tonight.”
“Me too,” he said, already dipping his head toward hers.
Whoops, nope. Obviously she’d done it wrong.
Brit quickly stepped back and bit her lip.
“I’ll see you around?” She said it with a smile to soften it. The smile she’d been practicing in the mirror. The one that was friendly but not too friendly.
Or so she hoped.
She pivoted on her heel, liking the way the full skirt of her dress whirled around her legs, adding a little extra something to her walk.
She smiled, a real one this time, knowing full well that Ross was watching her walk away.
Hey, maybe she could do this after all.
Brit skidded to a halt as a man stepped out of the shadows. Hunter.
“Hey!” she said with a grin. “What are you doing here?”
He didn’t grin back. “Thought I was staying here tonight.”
“Well, sure, of course. I just didn’t think you’d be home so early.”
His eyebrows lifted. “It’s ten-fifteen, and my parents are sixty-two. You thought clubbing was on the agenda after our dinner at Sardi’s?”
“No, I guess I didn’t realize it was so late,” she said as they walked into the lobby. “I’m sorry. I’ll put your name on the list so you can get a key if I’m not here. How was it? How was your day?”
“Chaotic, but not bad. Possible highlight was finally coaxing my mom onto the subway, only to have her use an entire bottle of hand sanitizer the second she got off.”
Brit laughed, but he didn’t laugh with her.
“Okay, what’s up?” she asked, punching the elevator button to her floor.
“What?”
She waved a hand over him. “This doom-and-gloom vibe. What happened?”
Hunter shrugged. “Tired, I guess.”
Tired my ass. She knew this man and knew when he had something on his mind.
Though she also knew he could be brutally stubborn. The more she pushed him to spit it out, the more recalcitrant he’d become.
This called for a change in strategy.
Brit deliberately changed the subject to something inane, chattering nonstop about the weather as they walked down the hall to her apartment. He hated talking about the weather; surely he’d change the subject to shut her up.
He didn’t.
Brit upped the stakes as they shrugged out of their winter coats, telling him all about a recipe for a delicious-sounding kale salad she saw on Pinterest that afternoon.
“You know, I’d never have thought of putting grapes in a salad,” she mused. “But combined with the pistachio, doesn’t that just sound delicious? And they suggested topping it with—”
That broke him, as she’d known it would. Most men could handle only so much discussion of salad.
“Who was the guy?” Hunter asked.
Brit looked up. “What?”
“The guy. You were on a date.”
“Oh, right.” Weird how she’d nearly forgotten all about Ross in the span of five minutes. “Just . . . this guy. We met a couple months ago, pre-Lenny, and I gave him my phone number but didn’t hear from him. He texted me this afternoon, asked if I’d be up for a last-minute—”
&nbs
p; “What kind of asshole asks a woman on a last-minute first date? Did his first choice cancel?”
Ouch.
Brit stared at her best friend for a moment, in shock at the uncharacteristically mean comment. “Um, who are you right now?”
Hunter dragged his hands over his face. “Forget it. I’m irritable.”
“No argument here, but that didn’t sound like an apology,” she said, crossing her arms.
“Sorry,” he snapped.
“Very sincere, Hunter.”
“Well, what do you want me to say? I had the day from hell, and then I come home to . . . that, watching you fluttering around some dude.”
“Fluttering?” she asked. “I’ll have you know that that fluttering was straight out of your playbook. You know, the whole no, you’re not coming up, but maybe some other time move?”
“You can’t seriously be thinking about going out with him again. The guy stared at your ass the entire time you walked away.”
“Maybe I want someone to stare at my ass!” she shouted.
Her exclamation seemed to bounce off the walls, then hung awkwardly between them.
Finally, Hunter shook his head, looking tired. “Whatever. That’s your business. I’m going to bed.”
Neither of them spoke as they went about the process of settling in for the night. This time, there was no shared toothbrushing experience. He waited for her to finish in the bathroom, then went in himself, shutting the door with a click.
Brit crawled into bed, listening to the water run, staring at the ceiling and trying to figure out why she felt so off. Why they felt so off.
He wasn’t acting like himself. And instead of talking about it, he was doing a typical guy thing, all broody and weird.
She wasn’t loving it. Just like she wasn’t loving the fact that, as with her experience at dinner, instead of thinking about Ross, instead of thinking about her date, she was thinking about Hunter.
“I don’t have to go to brunch tomorrow,” she said when he came out of the bathroom.
He flicked off the bathroom light and looked at her. “Why wouldn’t you come to brunch tomorrow?”
“Um, because you’re being a jerk?” she said. “You actually insinuated that the only reason a guy might ask me out on a Saturday night would be if his first choice canceled.”
“I didn’t mean it like that,” he grumbled, hauling his duffel bag up onto the couch and digging through it.
“Well, how did you mean it?” she asked, sitting up in bed.
Sitting up was a mistake, she realized immediately.
Having figured that she’d be safely under the covers before he came out of the bathroom, and planning on beating him to the shower tomorrow, she’d worn one of her usual sleep shirts. A strappy tank top.
A thin strappy tank top that didn’t leave much to the imagination.
Hunter’s gaze dropped to her chest for a split second before he seemed to drag it back up to her eyes. “I just meant that you deserve better than a last-minute, spur-of-the-moment invitation.”
“Maybe he was just trying to work up the courage to ask out someone as fabulous as myself,” she said with a smile, trying to break the strange, unfamiliar tension between them.
“I’m sure that was it.” He smiled back, but there was a strain to it.
She turned off the light; there was no joking, no laughter in the darkness.
And he definitely didn’t suggest sleeping in her bed again.
Chapter Fourteen
“I’m surprised you’re not out there,” Hunter’s father said, jerking his chin toward the Central Park ice rink. “You used to love to skate.”
Hunter smiled. “It’s been a few years since my hockey days. Plus, I think Malik much prefers his first ice-skating experience to be with a pretty girl than with his adult foster brother.”
Hunter, his family, and Brit had opted to take a post-brunch walk through Central Park. Malik had seemed fascinated by the ice-skating rink, but the second Hunter’s mom had suggested he and Hunter rent skates, Malik had deemed ice-skating lame.
Brit, however, had seen the longing on the kid’s face and, under the guise of begging for someone to skate with, had coaxed the kid onto the ice.
She knew what she was doing, Hunter had realized, the second she stepped onto the ice. She knew how to skate. How had he not known that?
He and his father were silent for a moment, watching as Brit and Malik slowly, awkwardly, made their way around the outside of the rink, where the beginner skaters were. The two of them had linked arms, which allowed the new-to-skates Malik to cling to Brit rather than hug the wall.
She was saving the kid quite a bit of his macho-teen pride. But, then, that was Brit. She knew exactly what to do to make people feel good. To make them comfortable.
Isn’t that what she’d said at the start of all this? That she made people too comfortable and that’s why men never saw her as girlfriend material?
She was wrong.
Hunter had felt anything but comfortable last night. First, watching her lean in to that blah-faced guy whose name he’d already forgotten. Then their fight.
Her in a tank top that had clung to what seemed to be rather perfect breasts.
Hunter stifled a groan at the memory.
His dad looked over at him as he shifted uncomfortably on the bench. “You bored? We can collect your mother, call Malik in.”
“Nah, I’m good,” Hunter said. “Besides, I don’t think we could drag Mom away from her fascination with that artist.”
They both looked over to where Gail had joined a small group of spectators gathered around a lanky woman set up behind an easel, apparently painting the scene on the ice in front of her.
“She’s been big into all kinds of art since you kids left,” Hunter’s dad said. “Watercolors, mostly.”
Hunter nodded, and they lapsed into silence for a few moments.
It wasn’t that he was awkward around his father, but things had been a little tense between them over the years. His father had never said so outright, but Hunter suspected it bothered him that Hunter had opted to chase his dreams to New York rather than stay in Missouri and help with the family business.
Hunter’s grandfather had started a boutique furniture service years ago. Woodwork, mostly. Coffee tables, desks, that sort of thing. They did good business, especially in an area where Ikea reigned supreme.
Hunter’s older brother had taken over a lot of the product design, and Hunter knew his dad had hoped the technology-inclined Hunter would be the one to take the company into the e-commerce realm.
And maybe someday Hunter would. The idea held plenty of appeal. But he’d needed to branch out on his own first, develop a name for himself separate from the family business.
Hunter was pretty sure his dad understood that, even if he didn’t like it.
“Say, son,” his dad said, clearing his throat and not looking at Hunter. “Your mother and I have been meaning to bring this up . . . it’s actually part of the reason we came out. We wanted to talk to you in person. . . .”
Hunter immediately tensed. “Is everything okay? Is everyone okay?”
Immediately, his brain went to the worst. Cancer. Alzheimer’s. Heart problems.
“No, no, we’re good. So good, in fact, that we’ve decided we’re too young to just sit back and join the geriatric set at the retirement home.”
Hunter laughed. “I can’t even picture that.”
“Right. Well . . . your mother and I think we still have some parenting in us yet. We’ve applied to adopt Malik.”
Hunter glanced over in surprise. “Seriously? That’s great.”
His dad’s smile was relieved. “Yeah?”
“Yeah, of course. I couldn’t be more thrilled. He’s a great kid. He’s already my brother; might as well make it official.”
Dennis nodded. “Your brothers and sister agreed, but your mom and I wanted to make sure it was a family decision. Adding a new family
member is a big decision. An important one.”
“Does Malik know?”
His father shook his head. “Not yet. We want to get further in the process, make sure it’s a go. Then we’ll sit down, ask if he wants to join the family. His decision’s more important than all of ours.”
Hunter nodded, then lifted his hand in a wave as Brit and Malik made their way around to the part of the rink closest to the bench where he and his father sat.
He was too far away to see if Brit’s happy smile reached her eyes. It probably did. After all, she’d been nothing but smiles for his parents and Malik all day.
She seemed a far cry from the angry, hurt Brit of last night, or the slightly frosty Brit of earlier this morning when it had been just the two of them.
He wasn’t used to her being anything other than happy around him, and he didn’t like it. He liked even less that he was the one responsible for her unhappiness.
“There’s another thing,” his father said slowly. Hunter turned toward his dad, grateful for any topic that would keep his thoughts away from whatever was happening between Brit and him.
“Shoot,” Hunter said.
Dennis sighed. “Look, son, you’re doing well in New York. Really well. We couldn’t be prouder of the life you’ve created for yourself, but your mother and I can’t help but wonder . . . we just want to know . . .”
“If I’m ever coming back to Kansas City?”
His dad’s shoulders slumped a little in relief at not having to be the one to say it out loud. “Yeah. Just wondering. We respect your choice no matter what, but—”
“I don’t know,” Hunter interrupted, his gaze on Brit and Malik. “I really can’t say for sure one way or the other. I like it here. I love it here. My job’s great, I’ve got friends, a great apartment . . . but.” He exhaled. “I think about it. I’ve always sort of figured I’d go back someday. Be near the family. Not have to get on a plane for Thanksgiving. Have my kids grow up near their cousins and grandparents. That sort of thing.”
His dad nodded, and Hunter saw the hope in his eyes. It killed him a little not to give his parents a solid answer, but for now he could give them only the truth.