Chapter Twenty-One Barrett
Chapter Twenty-One
Barrett
The leftover pizza had been put away; my parents and Ruby were on the couch, watching the meteorologist make dramatic sweeping gestures with his arms—a lake-effect system was moving in just after they were set to take off with the kids the next day—and me and my brother were locked in a battle of Scrabble, with my innocent children reluctantly taking part.
Maggie and I leaned our heads together so Bryce and Griffin couldn’t hear.
“I have an idea,” she whispered, pointing to our opponents’ last move, a craftily placed waterhen.
The validity had been challenged, my brother issuing a smug grin when it was upheld.
“Whatcha thinking?” I asked her.
Maggie tapped the q on our tile holder, then the t.
I gave her an unamused look. “On principle, I’m not sure I can use that.”
She giggled, then sent a mock glare at her uncle when he leaned in and pretended to listen. She cupped her hand over my ear. “Do you want to win or not?” she whispered. When she pulled back, her eyes widened meaningfully.
I did.
I really did.
“Fine,” I murmured quietly. Maggie sat back with a smirk, and I nudged her under the table. “Poker face,” I instructed.
Her expression smoothed out immediately, and we waited patiently for Bryce and Griffin to make their next move. As long as they didn’t touch waterhen, we’d win.
I’d also have to eat major crow, but we’d win.
Dinner had been fine. The addition of my parents, plus Ruby and the kids, meant that my brother and I hadn’t really had much occasion to talk. Certainly not by ourselves.
Before I set the tiles down, I looked at the board again, then up at my younger-by-two-minutes brother.
He raised a challenging brow, and I couldn’t help but wonder how on earth people ever got us confused.
To me, he looked so different. It was the slightest difference in the slope of his jaw.
Something in the shape of his eyes. Griffin always needed to shave, and today was no different; the dark stubble on his jawline was thicker than mine usually was.
I ran a hand over my own jaw. I hadn’t shaved in two days, and I supposed it was possible I looked just a bit more like him. As much tension as our relationship had held over the last decade, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t see the difference in my brother now.
He was happier. Lighter. Undeniably settled.
Throughout the evening, he’d found his way back to Ruby’s side, tucking the petite woman under his arm, leaning down for a kiss when he thought no one was looking. For the first time in his life, my restless, wild brother was at peace.
Jealousy knotted deep under my skin the longer I watched them together.
I wasn’t jealous of his relationship with Ruby, per se.
I was jealous that he knew what it felt like.
A partnership in every sense of the word.
No matter how different they were—and good Lord, were they different—they were evenly matched.
The jealousy didn’t eclipse my happiness for him. All I’d ever wanted was to see Griffin happy, even if I never quite knew how to go about it.
The curse of the oldest brother, I supposed. Which went hand in hand with the unshakable need to beat him in every single game we ever played for the rest of our lives.
Griffin said something to my son, who nodded, grabbing tiles as he leaned forward. Maggie and I held our breath, exhaling slowly as he built a different word elsewhere on the board. He counted the tiles.
“Seventeen points,” Bryce said.
Griffin wrote it down, then gave me a look. “You’re gonna lose. Might as well start your concession speech now.”
I elbowed Maggie lightly, and she made a happy sighing noise. “Read it and weep,” she said, placing the q on the triple-word score, and the t below the a of waterhen.
Bryce’s mouth fell open.
Griffin nose wrinkled. “That’s not a word.”
“Yes, it is,” I said firmly. “Trust me.”
He pointed at the board. “That’s not a word.” Turning in his chair, he motioned for his fiancée. “Ruby Tate, come look at this sh—” He paused, looking at the kids. “Crap,” he finished. “He’s cheating.”
She rolled her eyes but left the couch, sliding her arms around his shoulders as she stared at the board. “That is a word,” she confirmed.
“What? How?”
Maggie steepled her hands together and smiled. “It’s a leaf on a shrub that we don’t know the name of. Go look it up.”
Griffin was out of his chair before I could blink. “You think I won’t. Bryce, don’t give up.”
My son sighed. “It’s a word, Uncle Griffin. Just let it go.”
“No way,” my brother yelled. His voice came from the den, and I tucked my hands into my pockets and followed. He’d taken a seat at my desk and tapped my computer to life.
Panic made my chest go cold. “Why can’t you look it up on your phone?”
“It’s in the bedroom,” he said, eyeing me strangely when I tried to swipe the computer. “See? I knew you were fucking cheating.”
“Give me my computer.” I used my scariest coach voice, and Griffin rolled his eyes. I lunged forward again.
He held it out of reach. “This is just like when we were in high school, and I was trying to show Dad that one play in practice and you didn’t want me to because it made you look bad.”
“Grow up,” I snapped. “That was a million years ago. Give me my laptop.”
Ruby appeared behind me. “What is going on in here?”
“He won’t give me my computer,” I said tersely.
Griffin held it over his head. “He won’t let me prove he’s not cheating.”
Her face was frozen in shock as she glanced between the two of us. “How old are you two?”
“He started it,” we said in unison.
She held her hand out. “Griffin, give it to me.”
He scoffed but did as his fiancée asked. The screen flared to life when her hand swiped over the mouse pad, and her eyes narrowed imperceptibly. When the words registered, her gaze snapped in my direction.
I set my jaw and held my hand out.
“Right,” she said primly, then tried to hand it over to me.
Griffin got it first.
“You dick,” I muttered. “I take it back. You can’t sleep here tonight.”
“Too late,” he said absently, turning the screen in his direction. “How to flirt with a woman,” he read. His eyes flew to mine, a wide smile breaking open over his face. “You googled it? You had to google this?”
“Give me my fucking computer,” I said, snatching it out of his hands.
Griffin bent over, hands resting on his knees, while he laughed. My cheeks were red, no doubt, and even Ruby, polite as she was, gave me an apologetic look.
“Griffin, shut up,” she said, smacking his shoulder.
My brother’s laughter eased, and when his fiancée gave him a sharp look, he held up his hands. “Sorry. I just . . . I never thought I’d see the day.”
“Are you going to be good now?” she asked.
“Yes,” he promised, then tipped her chin with his finger and gave her a soft kiss. “You can go back and catastrophize about the weather now.”
“It’s not catastrophizing,” she said hotly. “I just want to get our flight out before the snow hits, okay? Up to eighteen inches, they’re saying.”
“Only eighteen?” he teased. “It’s like it’s not even trying.”
Ruby rolled her eyes and went back into the family room. With a weary sigh, I sank down onto the couch and set the closed laptop next to me. My brother moved back to the desk, the creak of my chair the only sound I heard, since I wasn’t willing to make eye contact just yet.
“Go away,” I told him.
“Nah. This is too fun.”
I pried my eyes open and leveled him with a look. “I fail to see what’s fun about any of this.”
Griffin’s face went uncharacteristically serious. “You like her. The neighbor.”
“You going to give me relationship advice now?”
He shrugged, folding his hands over his stomach, stretching his legs out in front of him. “Why’d you feel like you needed to look that up? It’s not like you haven’t been married before.”
“I’m not sure my relationship with Rachel counts for much,” I answered honestly. That was the thing I hated saying out loud. “I never had to flirt with her, that’s for damn sure.”
Silence filled the room. My brother and I looked at each other for a moment.
“We ready to talk about her yet?” he finally asked.
I winced. So did he.
“No,” I answered.
“So what’s the deal with Lily, then? Why do you feel like you need that,” he said, gesturing to the computer.
For a moment, I stared at it and tried to consolidate my thoughts into something simple, something that made sense, until I came to the conclusion that that might not be possible.
“You know what it feels like when you watch film and you break down every angle of it until you can pick it apart?”
He nodded.
I rolled my neck until it popped. “I can’t read her for the fucking life of me.
Can’t figure her out. Sometimes I think she hates me.
Sometimes she seems hell-bent on pushing all my buttons.
She’s grouchier than me most of the time,” I said.
Griffin’s eyes widened dramatically, like it was impossible to imagine.
I rolled mine, and he cracked a small smile.
“But she’s so good with the kids. There’s something about her. And I just want to know more.”
He rubbed his jaw and shrugged. “So ask her out. It’s not hard.”
“She’s leaving in a month, Griffin.” Even saying it made my stomach curl unpleasantly. “That’s what she does. She moves. She leaves. No home base. It’s not how she lives.”
“Fuck,” he muttered. “That complicates things.”
“I can’t ask her to give that up because I want to take her out on a date.”
Griffin got this look on his face. Something I couldn’t decipher. It was a little smug. A little affectionate. And it made me want to punch him in the face a little too.
“What?” I snapped.
“You have a crush,” he said knowingly.
“No, I don’t.”
“You do.” He stretched his back and groaned, settling back in my desk chair like he owned it. “I recognize these signs from when I was first dating Ruby. She didn’t know we were dating yet, but it didn’t take long for my presence to overwhelm her.”
“Yeah, I can imagine you do that on a daily basis. I didn’t miss it.”
“Yes, you did.” He leaned forward, bracing his elbows on his knees.
“Having a crush isn’t emasculating. You can adore the shit out of her.
Think she’s the most beautiful woman in the world.
Desperately want to hold her hand because it’s the prettiest hand you’ve ever seen.
Want to have serious, grouchy little babies with her, and also want to fuck her brains out because she’s hot and pisses you off. ”
I closed my eyes. “Stop talking. I can’t do this.”
Griffin let out an easy laugh. “As usual, brother, you are overthinking everything. You don’t have to ask her to give up a life she loves. But you can still show her all those things you told me. It’s not either-or.”
“Isn’t it?” I asked seriously. “I don’t .
. . I don’t do casual. I’m not wired that way.
It’s okay if you are”—I paused when he gave me a stern look, and held up my hands in concession—“or used to be, before Ruby. And I don’t know how Lily is wired.
But if I know someone doesn’t want to put down roots, how do I start anything knowing there’s an hourglass over our heads and half the fucking sand is already gone? ”
“You have time,” he said, uncharacteristically serious. “Until the moment she leaves and says she’s never coming back, you have time.”
“I don’t know how to do this. I feel like I’m going to screw it up,” I admitted. My voice came out a little tight, a little strangled, some invisible hand trying to cinch my throat shut so that words wouldn’t escape.
Griffin’s eyebrows rose incrementally. “How’d that feel coming out?”
“Awful.”
I’d never said that before. Never even felt it. Even when my career had collapsed around me, I felt so certain about what to do next. That certainty had been one of my guideposts.
And it was possible, looking back, that I’d fooled myself into thinking that being certain about something always meant it was right. One of the greatest examples of that was sitting in front of me.
I held my brother’s gaze. “I shouldn’t have tried to take care of you the way I did. Or tried to tell you what to do. And I’m sorry for that.”
Griffin didn’t ask me how the apology felt coming out. My answer would’ve been different from the last time he’d asked. Because it felt an awful lot like relief, like I’d been choking on some invisible knot that finally unraveled until it disappeared.
“It’s okay,” he said. “I forgive you.” Then he sucked in a breath. “And I’m sorry for not listening when you were giving me good advice. And . . . telling the press that you’re boring and . . . all that other shit I said.”
I smile wryly. “Forgiven. I am boring, so it wasn’t all that offensive.”
“Listen,” he said, tilting his head toward her house, “you were there for her today, right? That shit matters. Show up. Don’t tiptoe around the way you should act.
That’s your problem, Barrett. You proposed to Rachel because you thought you should, not because you loved her.
You stayed married to her even though she was a miserable snake, because you thought you should.
“There’s no list of rules in starting any relationship, because everyone’s different.
You like her? Then act like it. Do nice shit for her because it makes her smile.
And if she doesn’t like it, I bet she’ll tell you.
If you two have been sniping at each other since the beginning, don’t fucking stop. Ruby loves it when I piss her off.”
“Does she really?”
“You want to try saying that to my face, Griffin King?” Ruby called from the kitchen.
My brother laughed. So did I. And it felt good.
“When did you get so smart?” I asked him after a beat of silence.
He leaned back in my chair, folding his hands behind his head and smiling smugly. “Probably right around the time you stopped being such a stubborn asshole.”
I smiled, shaking my head. “That may be. But I didn’t cheat at Scrabble.”
“I will prove it if it’s the last thing I do,” he said.
He tried to grab my laptop again.
I kicked him in the shin.