“Pea, what’s wrong?” he asks concern thick in his voice.
I shake my head harder, unable to form words. I’ll lose him. He will be someone else I lose in my life now because I’ve led him on. I must’ve done, he wouldn’t be about to tell me he loves me if I hadn’t.
“I don’t love you,” I blurt out as I stand quickly stand up.
“What?” Complete and utter confusion crosses his face.
“I mean as a friend, yeah, but I have a Con and he has a love and it’s in my thing that’s in here,” I mumble incoherently while stabbing myself in the chest over my heart again and again.
He laughs at me.
Laughs!
“What? What? The laugh?” I’m still mumbling, this just makes him laugh harder.
“Pea,” he says through laughter. “Pea! Oh my God, you are so funny,” he laughs doubling over with his arm across his stomach.
Now I’m pissed. I have no idea what is going on, but Dane thinks it’s funny and I feel like a complete idiot, and I’m not even sure why I feel like an idiot. It’s like there’s some secret joke and I’m the only one in the dark.
I stop talking and wait to see what he’s going to say next. Once he’s finally finished laughing.
“Sorry Pea,” he says through deep breathing, obviously trying to not start laughing all over again. He waves his arm and points his finger up at me telling me to give him a minute. I, in turn, cross my arms over my chest and start tapping my foot.
“This shit isn’t funny anymore, Dane,” I state. I’m starting to feel like a complete fool. I mean he obviously knows I thought he was going to declare his undying love and it scared the shit out of me. What? I don’t get it, why that’s so funny?
“Is it that funny? The idea of you being in love with me?” Shit, I said that out loud.
Dane sobers up pretty quick and narrows his eyes at me. “Sit down,” he says while gesturing to the stool I’d just gotten up from. I sit not wanting to argue with this mood change.
“Are you Bipolar?” I blurt out. Fuck! What’s wrong with my filter today?
“What?” he asks biting his lip. I’m not sure whether he’s confused or trying not to laugh again, but at least his mood seems to have changed.
“Sorry, ignore me,” I say shaking my head to myself like a complete moron.
“Pea,” he whispers and he kneels down in front of me. What the fuck?
“I didn’t want to do it like this.” I open my mouth, but he holds his hand up to signal for me to shut up. “No, I’m not going to ask you to marry me!” I pull my lips in and bite them both, he knows me far too well and he obviously notices me doing that as the corner of his mouth twitches.
“Listen, there’s a lot for me to tell you. A lot to explain. I want you to know before I tell you my secret that you need to hear me out. I don’t want you freaking out on me. I need a chance to talk to you about this?” He gazes up at me like I’m his saviour.
“Dane, for the first time since I’ve met you... you’re kind of scaring me,” I admit.
He grabs my hand which makes me jump, but then he starts rubbing the back of it with his thumb and it soothes me.
“Pea,” he takes a deep breath in then releases it all at once. He pauses for a moment looking into my eyes. “You were right, kind of... I do love you, but not like you think. Pea... I’m your brother.”
My whole world stops spinning right in that moment. I still, like my body has forgotten how to move, how to blink, how to breathe. As if in slow motion my senses come back to me and I shake my head, no. I don’t understand. How could he be my brother? How could I have a brother? Nobody told me... did they know? Did they keep this from me? Who knows? Why would they leave me feeling like a fool when they all knew?
I slam my hand over my mouth as tears spill over my eyelids and down my cheeks and the sobs I didn’t realise I had in me until this second take over my body.
“I’ve been so alone!” I wail and Dane must hear the pain as he winces. “I’ve been so alone,” I say again in a whisper this time.
“Why... why wouldn’t anyone tell me? Why would they let me think I was on my own?” I ask. Even as I say it I know realistically I had Soph, Con and Saul, but all these years I thought it was just Gran and me. I knew she wasn’t going to be around forever and I’ve had to prepare for that. As a child, that thought was soul destroying. Knowing when your gran dies you will be truly alone. All this time I did have someone. How long had he known?
“Did you know all along?” I question with a snap as I draw my emotions back in.
He rubs the back of his neck. “I knew about a year ago. I mean I always suspected I had family, just... well... I didn’t find out about you until then.”
“So why now?” I narrow my eyes at him.
“I never wanted to barge into your life. I found out about you from afar and you seemed happy. I wasn’t sure if my secrets would’ve been welcomed or not,” he answers and I see that same sincerity on his face that I did the first night I met him.
“Wait! So the night we met... you knew my name?” he nods his answer.
“So the whole taking the piss out of my name thing was a joke for you?”
His eyes widen. “No, I mean, yes it was a joke. It was always meant to be, you know, to break the ice, but yes, I did know your name already.”
I put my elbows on my knees and hang my head in my hands. I don’t know what to ask. I don’t even know where to begin.
“Thank you for not running off,” Dane whispers breaking me out of my thoughts.
“There’s still time,” I reply not looking at him and I hear his humourless chuckle.
I don’t even know where to start with my thought processes, but Dane must realise this as he talks for me, answering all my unasked questions.
“I wasn’t wanted as a baby.” At this, I snap my head up and watch him tell me his life story. “I was an embarrassment for my mother.”
“Wait!” I shout making Dane rock back on his heel. “Who?” I ask and he squints his eyes in confusion.
“Who what?” he asks.
“Which parent... or both?” I ask horrified at the thought of my mum giving her child away. His face clears as he realises the question.
“Dad, we have the same, Dad,” he clarifies and I nod. Sitting up slightly straighter and giving him his time to carry on with his story. He gets up and moves to the bed to sit down.
“My mother was rich... high society... huh!” he stops and shakes his head. “She didn’t mean to get pregnant with me, our dad was a typical bad boy. I guess she was sewing her oats or whatever. I don’t think her parents even knew she was pregnant. As far as I can gather from the limited information, she told them she was going to Paris for six months and instead she came to London and stayed with a friend. The only person who knew apparently apart from our dad, after she gave me away, was the man who would become her husband. They went on to have another kid three years after I was born. Me, she kept as her dirty secret.” He works his jaw, obviously trying to get his anger under control.
“Anyway I bounced from foster home to foster home. None of them treated me badly, but none of them actually loved me. Still it could have been worse.” I want to interrupt him, I want to tell him that he needs to talk about his upbringing. That he doesn’t need to brush it under the carpet and just because some people have it worse, doesn’t mean he shouldn’t acknowledge the shit he’s had to deal with. But I sense this isn’t the right time.
“I became a model when I was sixteen. It meant I could earn money, and before I knew it I was actually earning pretty well. Well, enough to get my own place and start my life. My real life.”
He stops and gazes out of the window. “Those years, Pea... those years, they were all the same. All lifeless, colourless. I worked, I earned, I screwed, and that was about it. I made more and more money, then I got bored with modelling. I wanted to try something different so I set up the company.”
“You own that company?” I but
t in.
He smiles, it’s genuine this time. “Yeah, it’s the only other thing I’m proud of in my life,” he states.
“Other thing?” I ask.
“You Pea, I’m proud of you. I was before I really knew you and even more so now.”
At his words a couple of happy tears escape me. He’s proud of me. Proud. Of. Me… Me! I don’t stop to think about why, I just relish the warm feeling it coats me in.
He starts up again, “The company got bigger than I’d ever imagined and running it was taking up too much of my time. So I handed over the reins and instead took on another role. I go in when I feel like it, and I still have overall say of anything obviously, but day to day... been there, done that.”
“That’s how you met Soph? I question, even though I know the answer.
He nods. “Soph was someone I met through the company. At the time I met her I was investigating my life. At that point, I didn’t know who my family were. I was spending time with Soph.” He must see my raised eyebrow as he goes on to say, “All right, we were screwing. The problem with that was that I was beginning to like her,” he says rubbing his chin.
“Why was that a problem?” I ask.
“Well, because around that time I realised my feelings were growing, I found out who I was, and more importantly, I found out my dad had another child, a sister... you.”
I furrow my brows at him. “Why did that stop you liking, Soph?” I ask irritated.
“It didn’t,” he answers immediately. “I mean, I didn’t stop liking her, but I knew if I ever wanted to get to know you, and at this point I didn’t know whether I was going to or not, I couldn’t do it hanging off Soph’s arm. Imagine when it came out, she would assume I had used her. So I had to break it off.” I nod in understanding.
Soph would’ve totally assumed that.
“I already knew quite a bit about you all. Soph had chatted about you all a lot, about how you were a family. I didn’t want to spoil that. I looked into your life further and found out about your mum and that you were pretty much raised by your gran.”
I nod. “I miss her,” I whisper.
“I know you do sunshine. That’s part of why I decided to finally tell you.”
“What?” I question confusedly.
“Your gran knew about me.”
I jump up off the stool, the force of my movement knocks it to the floor. Dane jumps up with me.
“Pea, calm down it’s not what you think.”
I breathe in and out, in and out and rasp the word, “Explain.”
“I wanted to meet you almost as soon as I saw you but didn’t want to upset your equilibrium. You seemed happy, content at least. I didn’t know if me coming out of the woodwork would upset that or not. Anyway, I went to visit your mum’s grave one day.”
I raise my eyebrow at him and narrow my eyes.
“Look… ” He holds up his hands. “There was no agenda, it was just… I don’t know, I guess I couldn’t say the things to you I wanted to and I have no parents to mourn, they are both still alive—”
“They are?” I interrupt while slowly lowering myself back onto the stool that Dane has turned back up the right way.
A flash of anger crosses his face. “Yeah, our daddy dearest is an alcoholic and drug user and he moved somewhere up north when he kept being arrested for stealing in London.” He must see the sadness in my eyes. “I wouldn’t worry, sunshine, you’ve been better off without him in your life. Trust me.” I think that may be a discussion for another time, say in a year or maybe even five.
“Anyway, I wanted to talk, about what was going on. I don’t trust therapists and I didn’t really have many friends. The people I spent time with... well, I wasn’t going to share my life stories with them. So as stupid as it sounds, I used to visit your mum’s grave. It somehow made me feel closer to you, and I used to be able to talk about everything that was going through my head. That was where she found me.”
“Gran,” I say.
“Yeah, your gran. She found me there one day, chatting away like a crazy person. She asked me who I was of course, and there was something about her that meant I couldn’t lie.”
“Yeah, she had some sort of truth bacteria that she emitted from her pores,” I say with a chuckle and he grins at me.
“I told her. Everything.”
“What did she say?” This answer is important to me. Gran knew me, she knew what I’d want.
“She said I must tell you and that she would help me. She said you can never have enough family.” He’s smiling and looking up lost in thought before he adds, “That was my first real evidence that family can be good. Your gran, she made me want to know you more just because she was so special.”
We’re both quiet for a few minutes.
“So what was the plan?” I ask.
He looks down. “There wasn’t one. I mean, we’d agreed to meet up in two weeks. We exchanged numbers, although I already had her number.”
“Because you had been spying on me?” I ask with a smirk and he looks up worried, then when he sees my face he smiles back.
“Yeah, because I’d been stalking you,” he says and winks.
“Anyway a couple of days before we were due to meet she died,” he goes quiet.
“It’s so sad. I feel like there are so many things I didn’t get to tell her. Things I wished I’d done, and here I find out she had a major secret that she never got the chance to tell me about. It kind of makes me feel better that I wasn’t the only one,” I say. I stand up and stretch, walking over the French doors, I say, “So you decided you wanted to tell me then?”
He walks over and stands next to me. “No, I mean, not exactly. I knew with one conversation with your gran that I wanted to tell you, but after your gran had died it was even more important, I wanted you to know you still had family, but I was scared.”
I look over to him. “Scared of what?” I ask.
“Scared of more rejection. Your gran found me by accident and she didn’t dismiss me, so I had a good chance that if nothing else, she would make you hear me out. Without her, well, I didn’t know how you’d feel and I didn’t know if you’d cope with this news. So, I bided my time and made sure, from afar, that you were as good as could be expected. Then you had that accident and you seemed to spiral, obviously I know why now. I was worried so I decided it was time to inject myself into your life so I could be here for you. Right here,” he repeats while pointing to the spot next to me.
“Everything else is just... history. I worked at the party to try to meet you. I wanted you to get to know me, without being romantic which, believe it or not, isn’t as easy as it sounds. I was terrified that you would get the wrong idea,” he says wincing.
“Ewww!” I say sticking my tongue out.
“Yeah, you say that now, but seriously it was a concern,” he chuckles then he adds,“ But it was okay because you have a Con, and he has a love thing, that’s in there remember,” he says pointing to my heart and throwing his head back with laughter again.
“Git!” I state giggling.
“Isn’t that what big brothers do?” he asks with a wink.
“Brother... brother,” I say reverently.
“Uh huh,” he replies.
I look at him and smile. “I love it. I’m so happy. I wondered why I felt so peaceful when I was around you? Why I let my walls down? And now I know.”
He slings his arm around me. “Sunshine, you don’t know how happy it makes me to hear you say that. I have loved you from afar and up close for so long. Now I have family.”
“I love you too, brother,” I say, then add, “I can’t wait to tell the others. They’ll be so happy for me.”
He stiffens. “Yeah, about that.” I look up at him worried.
“The mother who had another child a few years after me... that child would be Saul.”
It’s been two days since the bombshell. I almost haven’t let Dane out of my sight. I feel sorry for him really, he’s go
ne from having no family to not being able to get rid of me.
“Sorry,” I say again.
“Sunshine, seriously, stop saying sorry. I have no problem spending the evening with you, I keep telling you I love spending time with you.”
“Yeah, but I know you wanted to go out tonight and I ruined that by being poorly,” I moan.
“Did you plan on being sick?” he asks.
“Well, I did purposely eat that hot dog from the market,” I whine.
“Yes, this is true,” Dane says while scrunching his face into a look of disgust.
We’re quiet for a few minutes, I’m lying on the sofa with a sick bowl on the floor and Dane is sitting in a chair. We have the television on, but it’s more of a noise in the background, both obviously caught in our own thoughts.
“Is it everything you imagined?” I ask.
“What?” Dane looks over raising his eyebrow.
“Having family… is it everything you imagined?” I hitch my breath and realise I want him to say yes. I want to be able to fill that gap that he has always had.
“You remember when you asked why I called you sunshine?” I nod my head at his question. “I told you it was because you are like a little ray of sunshine in my life. Nothing’s changed, you are still that ray of sunshine, it’s just your rays aren’t so little anymore, you fill the darkness with your light.”
He’s a blur as I look at him, my eyes filled with tears, I always wanted a sibling, now I have one and for me it really is everything I’ve ever wanted.
“Dane, can I ask you something else?” I question broaching a subject I’ve wanted to for days, but he keeps dodging.
“Mmm huh,” he mumbles back.
“If you're happy being my brother… happy to have a family… then why haven’t you spoken to Saul yet?”
His eyes instantly go hard. “Pea, I’ve told you I don’t want to talk about this.”
“Well, maybe I do!” I counter.
“Ahhh!” he growls.
“Don’t you growl at me, Dane Matthews! I’m your sister and I demand to know!” I fold my arms across my chest, which doesn’t have the intended fierceness seeing as I’m still laying on the sofa. He looks at me and his lips twitch as his eyes go soft.
Love Reflection (Entwined Hearts #1) Page 21