Chapter 30
“Wahdoomeeahca,” Noel rapid fire mumbled into my palm before her eyes went cartoon character angry and she licked me. I yanked away from the impressive assault of saliva, wrinkling my nose.
“Breathe,” I instructed, as she opened her mouth, her eyes flying wide. There was nothing subtle about Noel—she was big, bright, animated, and currently, her passion was directed at me.
“What-the-fuck-do-you-mean-I-can’t-say-anything?” she trilled so quickly it took a hot fucking second for my brain to catch up. I blinked as it buffered, but evidently not fast enough, because she immediately popped a hip, hand hitting it as she glared Broderick’s direction. “You know Jameson and I don’t do lies. I’m not lying to him. Don’t ask me to do that—you’re both better than that.”
“We’re going to tell them,” I said, hands raised defensively as her brown eyes narrowed.
“When?” she demanded, eyes flicking from him to me.
“Soon,” Broderick promised, voice low and soothing, even to my frenzied brain.
“When is soon?” She barked back with a bit too much enthusiasm. All three of us nervously eyed the door, and she flinched like she was also remembering how hard she slammed it.
“Is everybody out there?” I redirected the line of questioning.
“Yes! We came back to go carol for the neighbors, and Rhyett and Pax broke out champagne, and then everybody is gonna watch A Knight’s Tale, and cuddle the puppies and what do you mean by soon?”
“How do you do that?” Broderick muttered as I just blinked back at her. “Do you take micro inhales or something?”
“Stop changing the fucking subject and tell me what the hell is going on or I’m really going to show off my lung capacity.”
“We’re going to tell them,” I repeated, glancing over my shoulder to Broderick. “But we’re navigating the logistics and want to be prepared with well thought out answers on how we’ll make this work before we tell the guys.”
Broderick stepped in closer, settling his hand at the low of my back in silent reassurance. “I’m sure all three of us can agree going out there before we’re ready to answer all their questions is as good as stepping in front of a firing squad.”
“Can you understand why we don’t want the family to know yet?” I added pleadingly.
“Maybe. Maybe a bit.” She immediately seemed to think better of her statement. But then you shouldn’t be boinking in the bathroom at Christmas fucking dinner.”
“Boinking?” I barked right as Broderick busted out laughing.
“I mean, dinner was over hours ago, and we thought you all were at the festival for a while yet.”
A little furrow pinched in her brows, brown eyes flicking between us, and then down to where his fingers had slid across my back to hug my hip, pulling me into his side. “How long?”
“I’m going to New York tonight?—”
“Tonight!?” she yipped. I just continued; tone dulcet as if soothing a panicked animal.
“And then Broderick and I will talk and make some decisions. We’ll present this to them together once we have a strategy.”
“No. Not how long before you two tell them. How long have you been doing this?” She pointed an accusatory finger between us before crossing her arms over her chest and rocking back on a foot.
Not sure how to summarize an eternity of pining, I opted for the simple truth. “Just since the conference last month.”
“Sweet baby cheeses! I knew something was going on!” she squeaked before her hands flew up to cover her mouth. When she threw her fists down to her sides, I got the distinct impression of a ginger Tinker Bell throwing a tantrum. This time in a stage whisper, she said, “At pie night! I knew! I knew you were there for him.”
I scratched at the back of my head, brows winging up as I slowly smiled over my shoulder at him. But Noel’s mouth had popped open, and she danced in place.
“You weren’t writing at the coffee shop at six in the goddamn morning, were you?” I shook my head, grimacing at her volume as she barked, “This whole time?!”
“Shhh,” Broderick and I both hissed together, stepping toward her, although what either of us would do to shut her up was beyond me.
“No, no. No shushing me. You don’t get to shush me when you’ve been lying to your brothers—your best friends,” she added, leveling Broderick with a glare.
“I know. I know, and I’m sorry. We want to tell them ourselves; we just want them to know we’ve put a lot of thought into this whole thing. That neither of us is taking this lightly.”
She blinked before saying, “Why on earth would either of them think that? You two are obviously made for each other.”
“Jameson certainly won’t see it that way,” Broderick spoke up, his anxiety dripping from the words.
“He might surprise you, you don’t know,” she argued. “But either way, don’t you think he has a right to react however he’s going to react?”
“Yes,” we answered together.
“Just let me solve the where I’m living part, so Broderick can weigh his options.” I reached out, grabbing both her shoulders, and holding my ground when she turned her face toward the door, as if she could peer through it back to her fiancé, clearly uneasy with the whole concept. “It was important to me that Broderick didn’t lose his friendship with the guys if things didn’t work out between us. I only wanted them to know once they wouldn’t feel like they had to protect me.”
“And now?” she asked, voice softer, gaze still on that steady rotation.
“Now we’re…”
“Figuring things out,” Broderick summarized. “I was just offered tenure back in Mistyvale. El’s possibly moving to Manhattan. There are a lot of factors at play.”
“Factors Rhyett and Jameson will expect answers for,” I emphasized. She sucked down a hard breath, blowing it out with just as much gusto before giving us one curt nod and turning for the door.
“Twenty-four hours, El. I want an update tomorrow, because I’m not keeping this from James. We don’t lie. We don’t keep secrets. I won’t tell him tonight, but if he puts it together somehow—if he asks me?—”
“You won’t lie for us,” I surmised. She shook her head, eyes somehow heavier for it. “That’s totally fair. I’m not asking you to lie for me. I’m just asking for more time.”
“You both deserve each other. Seriously. One—” she held up a finger, “I called it. Two—” her voice lowered when that second digit went up. “Our family deserves the truth. Let them make their own beds, and deal with it then.”
“We will. I promise, we will.”
“James and Rhyett have been my ride-or-dies since we were kids,” Broderick added. “I swear, we’ll tell them everything.”
Noel sucked in a pained sounding breath before giving us a blunt nod and turning for the door.
Only… when she opened it, Jameson and Rhyett were both standing outside like a couple of predators about to pounce. Noel startled back a step, her hand flying to her chest. Broderick automatically positioned himself between my body and their looming frames. A muscle in Jameson’s jaw flexed as Rhyett leaned forward to brace a forearm on the doorframe, lips rolled between his teeth. It was Rhyett to break the loaded silence.
“Uh… You got something to share with the class, teach?”
Broderick
“Tell us what?”Jameson demanded through a stiff jaw. And here it was. The reason I hadn’t wanted to keep this to myself in the first place. If a man could light another on fire with his eyes, Jameson would have turned me into a kabob on the spot.
“Don’t be mad,” El said from where she wrapped her hands around my bicep. ‘Don’t be mad’ was basically the male equivalent of ‘calm down’. Light a match and pour some kerosene because shit’s about to go up in flames. I didn’t miss how quickly Noel skirted out of the space to stand behind Jameson’s back, her allegiance in this firmly established.
“Tell us what?” Jameson repeated.
“Look, you guys were never supposed to find out like this,” I hedged, not sure where to look. At Jameson, whose face looked dauntingly like it had before he beat Noel’s ex within an inch of his life. Or at Rhyett, who looked…rocked. “We planned to sit you down and talk to you tonight, so we could do it with the whole family.”
“Alright, so let’s talk,” Rhyett instructed.
To my chagrin, Axel’s bulky form appeared behind his brothers, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, looking particularly displeased. “I’d kinda like to hear this conversation myself,” he added.
Oh good, because the two of them weren’t enough.
“What the fuck did Noel just stumble in on?” Jameson demanded. “It takes a lot to rile my girl up like that.”
“We’ll explain everything,” I reassured, pointing back toward the main living area. “Can we go sit down?”
“Hey, guys! What are we—” Maverick’s lanky frame appeared beside Axel, peering around Rhyett’s shoulder but hesitating as he read the space. “Uh. Who died?”
The guys’ stern gazes all landed firmly on me.
Swallowing, I repeated, “Let’s go talk. Might as well head to the living room.”
“I think this is as good a spot as any,” James countered, grinding his teeth as he leaned back into the wall. Like he wanted us caged in. Noel turned into his side, looking torn as her eyes darted between all of ours. Deciding it was Jameson’s gaze I needed to meet, I lifted my chin and held it, reaching down to grab El’s hand. Was he pissed? Yeah. But the part that sent my gut churning was the pain there. Honesty had always been our number one.
“El and I are seeing each other,” I announced softly.
“When?” Jameson demanded, not dropping his gaze.
I felt El shift uneasily behind me but held his stare. “We kicked things off at the conference.”
“Last month?” Rhyett asked, his even voice drawing my attention. Where Axel and Jameson’s anger rolled off them in waves, only his pinched brow gave away his frustration. I nodded.
“Oh shit,” Mav said before skirting away from the impending storm. Smart kid.
“This whole time?” Jameson growled, looking past me to his sister. “He’s why you came back. For Thanksgiving. You didn’t want to leave.”
“Yeah,” El said softly. “Long distance isn’t easy.”
“No shit,” Jameson said, pushing off the wall and beginning to pace in the tight space. I couldn’t help but think of a prowling lion before they struck. “So, you’ve been lying to me for what—six weeks?”
“Look, man?—”
El cut me off, stepping out from behind my arm, where I’d tucked her behind me. “I asked him to keep it quiet. If things weren’t going to be serious, I didn’t see a point in riling up the family or putting him in the position to be ostracized by our siblings if things didn’t work out. I didn’t want him losing that home away from home.”
Rhyett quirked his head, a fierce scowl carving his features as he glared down at her. “What the fuck, El?”
“His friendship with you meant too much,” she added, shaking her head and straightening her spine.
“So fucking lying was the solution?” Jameson asked in blatant disbelief, glaring back at her.
“We never lied,” she argued.
“Bullshit,” Jameson muttered, running a palm over his hair.
“A lie of omission is still a lie,” Rhyett countered coolly. Jesus, hadn’t she told me that once?
“So, what happened? You just jumped at your first chance to get her alone? It is Vegas. Could’ve just sprung for a hooker. But you took advantage of a woman we’ve all watched pine for you for years.” Axel’s rapidly hurled accusations earned the first visceral reaction in my body—heart ratcheting up, hair on end, muscles bristling, vision zeroing in on his pissed-off face. It was the glassiness of his eyes and pink in his ears that told me he’d had one too fucking many. The feral smirk curling one side of his mouth said he wasn’t just drunk, but looking for a fight, and knew he’d hit his mark.
“Listen up, kid. I love you, so I’m going to tell you this once,” I said, my voice low as I squeezed her arm where I held onto her beside me. “Watch how you speak about my future wife, or I won’t hesitate to knock that smile off your face—trashed or not.” My snarled words had the desired effect. El straightened against me, her fingers tightening on mine. Noel’s head snapped to me so fast she popped her neck. Jameson stopped his feral prowl as Axel straightened off the wall, anger and confusion muddling their faces.
Rhyett’s brows winged so far up they nearly merged with his hairline. “Uh, I’m gonna need you to say that again.”
“El! We gotta get going,” Paxton came sauntering around the corner, his pace slowing as he surveyed the testosterone filled space. “Sooomebody gonna tell me what’s going on?”
“Brod’s been?—”
Before Axel could say something especially stupid, Jameson clamped his hand over that angry smirk, yanking him against his chest and growling, “Ax, shut the fuck up and go walk it off,” before shoving him down the hallway. Axel glared over his shoulder, but complied, muttering epithets as he vanished into a bedroom.
“That’s enough.” Milo’s resonant timbre brought everyone’s attention to him as he stepped out of his bedroom. “For Christ’s sake, I raised you boys better than all of this.”
Rhyett started, “Hey dad, we’re just?—”
“Go sit down,” he barked, pointing toward the living room. Milo was just a grayer, older compilation of his boys. Like he really had whittled a layer off his metaphorical block for each of them. But his voice was just an aged version of Jameson’s. “All of you. Now.” As El and I inhaled in unison, making to follow Rhyett and James as they led the march to what would be an inevitably uncomfortable conversation, Milo’s hand came down on my shoulder. “I think we both could use a drink for this, don’t you?”
With tempers quieted and seats taken, everyone gathered in a tense silence in the living room. Axel was still absent, but I couldn’t say I was mad about it. He’d always been an angry drunk. He’d feel like shit tomorrow. Come around with his tail between his legs. Always did.
“Mr. Allen,” Milo started, leaning back in his armchair to cross an ankle over a knee, resting his glass on his leg as he rotated it. Thirty-five years old, and I felt like a teenager all over again. “I believe you were trying to share something with the family before my boys started behaving like Neanderthals.”
I cleared my throat and gave El’s hand a little squeeze. “Elora and I had planned to talk to you all during the holiday but didn’t quite get the chance. We started dating while at the conference in Las Vegas.”
“It wasn’t planned, but it wasn’t… unexpected, either,” El added. “I’ve had feelings for Brod for years.”
“I don’t understand. This feels like it came out of nowhere,” Rhyett argued, while Jameson remained silent, his eyes on his hands where they hung between his knees.
“Oh please,” a chorus of feminine voices echoed from the kitchen where Brex, Noel, Juniper, the twins, and Quinn were all staring at us.
“Even I knew that,” Brex said, rolling her eyes. I couldn’t help but smile.
“Look, I love you both, but are you really that dense?” Noel’s eyes were pleading, but Jameson didn’t bother to look up and meet them. “I picked up on the sparks between these two idiots my first week on the island.”
“Hey,” El protested, but I was smirking.
“Don’t hey me, Miss, straighten my hair and skirt when he enters a building,” Noel quipped back, pouring herself a generous glass of wine. Rhodes gatherings were always chaos, but this one was…insane. Dogs were barking in the yard. Juniper was watching me with pain in her eyes as she came to sit with Milo. Pax was nervously glancing between El and his watch, where he still leaned against the arch of the hallway. Mav perched on the back of the couch with headphones on, although I suspected they were silent. Every pair of eyes was rotating to us and then whoever was talking. And I found it very, very hard to breathe.
“Look, I hate to do this,” Pax cut in. “But El and I booked the last flight into Manhattan tonight, and odds of anybody getting off the ground tomorrow are slim to none.”
“You’re leaving!?” Rhyett asked, whipping his head to El.
“I didn’t exactly have family intervention on the calendar tonight,” she explained.
“What about Christmas?” Jameson bit back. Fuck, it wasn’t just the sag of his shoulders, but the gravel in his voice that said he was hurting. This whole dumpster fire could have been avoided with a phone call. “Did you have Christmas on the calendar, sis?”
“I will not argue with you guys about this. I’m sorry to bail early, but this is a once in a lifetime opportunity, and I will not miss it for the sake of one holiday movie night.”
“What time’s your flight, baby?” I asked before anyone else could protest.
Pax grimaced as he checked his watch for the millionth time. “We’ve got just over an hour and a half until boarding.”
“Fuck,” El muttered, planting a kiss on my cheek. “I’m so sorry. Do I stay?”
I shook my head as her pleading eyes caught mine. “No, I got this. Nobody flies on Christmas—you should get through security fine.”
Nodding, tears springing to life in her eyes, she said, “We’ll talk?”
“We’ll talk,” I reassured, threading my fingers through her hair, and pulling her lips to mine in a desperate plea that this wasn’t goodbye. When we came up for air, she made a beeline for Pax, who already had their bags by the door. Everyone else was staring at me.
I assumed this was what it felt like to be a fish inside a tank and leaned back onto the couch. As the door slammed behind them, Rhyett cleared his throat.
“This… this isn’t like a casual hookup kind of thing.”
“It is not,” I confirmed.
Jameson didn’t look up as he asked, “When?”
“In Las?—”
“No. When did you catch feelings for our sister?”
Well, fuck it. I ran my tongue over my teeth, sucked down a breath, and began. “I thought it was just some kid crush I’d grow out of. I was… I think, seventeen, when I knew she would be something special. Eighteen, when I knew I was in love with her. But she was…too young.” I shook my head, raising my eyes from where they’d settled on my hands, unsure of whom to look at. Landing on Milo, I added, “And you trusted me to protect her.”
“Jesus Christ,” Jameson growled, barely audible as he palmed his face.
“Why didn’t you say anything?” Rhyett asked, his voice soft but heavy.
“So, I wasn’t crazy,” Leighton said, more to herself than any of us. A dozen siblings, a dozen unique voices—and a dozen hearts I needed to mend, when all I wanted to do was run out that door after her. But I’d told her I had this. So, I’d handle it. It was long overdue, anyway.
“No, you weren’t crazy,” I said, shaking my head. “I’ve loved El since before I understood what it was to love a woman.”
“Answer my question. Please, Brod,” Rhyett asked again, as Brex came to settle into his lap and stroke her fingers over his jaw. For the first time, I was aware even Finn had wandered into the room, silently observing as he picked up Quinn. And just like that, I remembered exactly why she’d put this off. I wasn’t just chasing Elora for the rest of my life. I was committing to all of them, too.
With a defeated shrug, I said, “The pact, man.”
“The what?” he asked, quirking his head.
“The fucking pact!” I snapped, rising to my feet. “Fuck the pact, guys. I love you. I really do. But the love of my life just left for New York City, with a blizzard rolling in, and I should be with her. We should make these decisions together. Should have told her I’d follow her anywhere under the sun. That so long as I draw breath, my heart is with her.” I palmed my jaw, blinking back the burning at the bridge of my nose. “That’s what I was working up the courage to tell her. That I’d leave home, turn down tenure, find a job at a school in Manhattan. Follow her to the end of the fucking earth and back.” I brushed an angry hand over my short hair. “But we got swept up in each other again, and then Noel walked in?—”
“Sorry,” she grimaced before chugging her wine, but I couldn’t stop now that the words were all coming out.
“And now I’m facing down the Mistyvale Brady Bunch when all I want to do is tell her I love her. That I’d do anything for her and I’m so damn proud of how hard she’s worked. That I love you both, but if a stupid high school pact is more important than our friendship, I choose her. If that means I’m no longer welcome here, I understand. I’ll respect that. But I. Choose. Her.”
Teeth audibly grinding, Jameson glared at me before standing abruptly, crossing the room in a few aggressively long strides, throwing open the front door and slamming it behind him.
“I got him,” Kaia said softly, hustling to grab sandals and follow him outside. With that outburst fizzling away, I collapsed back onto my spot on the sofa as Noel pursued her in a rush, shutting the door at a much more acceptable volume than her future husband.
“I gotta be honest, B. I don’t even remember the pact,” Rhyett said, shaking his head. “I’m just…bummed you didn’t think you could come to me. All this time?” When I just nodded back at his question, he said, “Brod, you’re the best man I know. El is a lot. A lot of strength. A lot of opinions. A lot of control. If you love her after seeing all of that for the last thirty plus years…”
“Agreed,” Finn piped up as he humored a grinning, babbling Quinn, who was shaking his fist around by the thumb. “If our sister has to land somebody, I’m glad it’s you.”
Well, that brought an unexpected wave of warmth to my chest. I turned my attention to their parents, where Juniper had perched on the arm of Milo’s chair, her hand working the ends of his salt and pepper hair.
“I’m so sorry I didn’t come to you first. I owed you both that. And that was a misstep that I don’t expect to be forgiven.”
“Broderick Allen,” Juniper scolded—her tone almost… insulted?—as a truck engine roared to life out front.
“Son, I say this with all the love in the world, but you’re an idiot,” Milo said, shaking his head. Leighton, Brex and Finn burst out laughing while I tried to numb the hit to my ego. “Do you think a father could watch a man defend his daughter’s honor, have her back when she went rogue, and then boldly declare his intentions in the face of a house full of pissed-off, fully grown men who brawl for fun… and not be grateful for him?” When I raised my eyes, he smiled in that fatherly way of his. The same one he used when we messed up as kids. Kind, but firm. “You’ve always been a son to me, Broderick. If you want to make it legal by marrying the most bullheaded of our daughters…I couldn’t think of a better fit.”
I would not cry in front of Milo Rhodes. The lump in my throat begged to differ, but I reached for the whiskey glass closest to me on the table and knocked it back, just in case.
“That’s uh…a hell of an endorsement, sir.”
“You’re a hell of a man, Mr. Allen.”
The front door banged open, and Jameson took two long strides before huffing a harsh breath. “Let’s go.”
“What?” I asked before he leveled me with a glare.
“Come on. Get in the truck.”
“If you’re going to bury me in a swamp, the one at the back of the lot will do.”
Jameson dead panned, the sigh sagging his shoulders speaking to years of exhaustion. “Get in the fucking truck, Brod.”
“Now, James,” Milo started, but Jameson rolled his eyes, pointing an aggressive arm out the door.
“I’m not gonna kill him,” he scoffed, rolling his eyes before looking at me with expectation on his face. “We’re gonna go catch his fucking girl.”