22. Kyle
KYLE
Kyle shifted the truck into park, then flicked his gaze in the rearview mirror. Somewhere between the frozen yogurt shop and Elle and Quinn’s, Tara’s nonstop chatter had started slowing, her head bobbing.
Now, she was fully asleep in her car seat, little chin lolled against her shoulder, a dark curl across her forehead.
Exhaling slowly, Kyle loosened the seat belt across his chest. He’d never expected seat belts to become an annoyance in his life, but after having his collarbone plated, they bugged the hell out of him.
His hands came to rest on the steering wheel for a few moments as he sat in the silence of Tara’s soft breathing, the low tick of the engine cooling.
Sloan.
He turned her name over in his mind like it was on the tip of his tongue.
Whatever he’d expected out of today, she had not been in it.
God, she looked good.
The Sloan he’d seen today . . . wasn’t like the one he’d known in high school. Neither was she like the polished blonde he’d run into in Vail, or the vulnerable runaway bride he’d driven with from Breckenridge.
She was different in a way he couldn’t quite put his finger on.
And maybe that’s what’s so fucking terrifying about her being here.
He wasn’t stupid enough to think he wasn’t attracted to her anymore, that she didn’t affect him. She did. Always had.
But she was unpredictable.
One minute with her and he could start thinking about every minute with her for the rest of his life—only for her to throw a wall up between them that caught him off guard and left him with a black eye.
And you were foolish enough to promise to see her again tomorrow.
He swung open the door to his truck before his thoughts led him somewhere he didn’t want to go.
Going to the back seat, he unhooked Tara’s harness, then slid her out and lifted her onto his right side. Strictly speaking, he probably should let Quinn or Elle handle this for the sake of his shoulder, but he didn’t love the limitation.
Before he’d even gotten to the front sidewalk leading up to the porch, though, Elle was already opening the door and slipping out barefoot, her long blond hair in a messy bun piled on her head, loose sweater, and leggings for the cool mid-July evening.
“You moron,” Elle said, hurrying toward him. She took Tara from his arms and transferred her to her shoulder. Tara didn’t stir but snuggled into her mother’s shoulder. “You really have to stop carrying heavy things. You can always call Quinn or me if you need help.”
“She weighs less than a sack of flour.”
“Which you also shouldn’t be carrying. And unless you’ve suddenly taken up baking, that shouldn’t be a problem.”
“Yeah, well, you’re about to give birth, so you shouldn’t be carrying her, either.”
Elle grinned at him. “How’d she do?”
“She was a perfect angel, as always. Discovered the hard way that gummies get hard on frozen yogurt, though.”
“I’m going to have to wake her up to brush her teeth.
” Elle motioned back toward the house. “You in a hurry? Quinn and I were just cracking open a bottle of wine. For him, of course,” she added at Kyle’s look at her burgeoning belly.
“I’m just eating the cheese and crackers.
But he would probably love someone to have a glass with. ”
He hesitated. His left shoulder was sore from PT and lifting a few things he probably shouldn’t have at Walmart with Sloan.
But he’d also been trying to do a better job at being present and spending time with his family since he’d found himself suddenly unemployed and back home.
Living with his parents for the time being made that easier.
“Sure, I’m down,” he said.
“How’s the job search going?” Elle asked, immediately going into older-sister mode before he’d even crossed the threshold. “Mom said you had an interview at some tech company in the city two days ago?”
Kyle shut the door behind him. “Yeah, it was all right.”
“That means you hated it.” Elle gave him a look.
“Hated what?” Quinn’s voice came down the hall, then he appeared, wine bottle in one hand, corkscrew in the other. Even dressed down after work, Quinn still looked like he was ready to go to work.
“The interview for that job he went to the other day,” Elle said. She frowned at Kyle. “You know, you’re never going to be gainfully employed if you keep going to job interviews and hating every place where you step through the door.”
“It just . . . is lacking a lot of the things I’m looking for in a job,” Kyle said, shoving his hands in his pockets.
Elle tilted her head. “Like what?”
“Trees. The sky. A nice sandy beach. Motorboat or two.”
Giving an exaggerated sigh, Elle waved at Quinn. “You talk some sense into him. I’m going to go put Tara in bed.”
Quinn gave him a grim look as Elle went up the staircase. “Come on in.” He gestured back toward the kitchen.
“You don’t have to give me the lecture,” Kyle said, following him.
“I’ve heard it a million times from Elle, Liddy, my mom, Isla .
. . hell, even Callum called me. Pretty sure Liddy gave him a script to read, but it was still the same messaging: go back to a desk job where I can develop a vitamin D deficiency and a bad coffee habit. ”
Quinn chuckled as he set the wine bottle on the counter and started twisting the cork out. “Just give it some time. Once the accident is a few more months behind you, they’ll relax.”
They might relax, but in the meantime, he was eating through his savings to pay for his cell, his car . . . food. Quinn had never experienced what it was like to live paycheck to paycheck— let alone when there was no income coming in— so he probably wasn’t the best person to listen to.
He watched Quinn pull a wineglass out from a cabinet, thankful for the reprieve.
“Care for some cabernet?”
Kyle nodded and settled against the counter. Elle and Quinn’s house always spoke of domestic bliss—a charcuterie board set up on the white marble, a baby monitor turned on beside it with a view into Charlotte’s nursery, family pictures on the wall that had gone out in last year’s Christmas card.
Something about it had always made Kyle feel equal measures of comfort and discomfort.
He was happy for his sister, of course, but the contrast between them made it clear why his family thought of him as the loose cannon.
Living with his parents had been necessary after the accident—he needed help, and the lease on his apartment had expired while he’d been in recovery.
But now it meant he’d opened himself up to literally everyone in his family deeply involved in his business.
Quinn brought a glass of wine over toward him, and Kyle sipped it, watching the legs run down the side of the glass. “Thanks,” Kyle said. “I think it’s probably time I start looking for my own place again. Maybe that’s what I’ll do tomorrow morning—go apartment hunting.”
“Elle and Liddy are just worried for you,” Quinn said, slicing into a thick block of aged cheese on the board in front of him. “But that will probably help you. It can’t be easy going from total independence and a carefree existence to living with several mother hens fussing over you.”
“We are not fussing,” Elle’s voice came as she came back downstairs. She shot Quinn a look of disapproval. “We’re concerned. That’s different.” She helped herself to a slice of cheese.
Kyle held his glass by the stem and swirled the wine.
“Look, I’m not saying it’s realistic for me to get back into something like Pathways —I know that.
Being on the non-production end makes it much harder to get it back up and running.
But I just think there are more options I should consider before committing to a job in computers, even if it’s safer. ”
“Like what?” Elle lifted the charcuterie board and gestured for them to follow to the adjoining living room.
“I don’t know,” Kyle admitted and sank onto a comfortable sofa with large, pillowy cushions. He let the glass settle into his palm. “But not an office. I honestly don’t think I can go back to corporate America.”
Elle glanced at Quinn and reached forward for a small bunch of grapes. Quinn’s sharp look made her slow. “All right,” Elle said. “I won’t push. And I get it. I really do. It’s hard enough figuring out your own life without having to deal with everyone else giving their opinion.”
“Good girl,” Quinn said with a chuckle, sitting beside her.
Elle gave him a mock glare, but curled comfortably against him anyway, legs tucked up on the couch cushion.
She glanced back at Kyle. “Speaking of what we’re filling our time with, the farmers’ market is tomorrow.
I want to grab some flowers for spring.” She batted her eyelashes prettily.
“Do you think I could borrow you and your truck?”
Quinn gave his head a small shake, acknowledging his wife’s conversation redirection.
“I might be apartment hunting tomorrow morning, but I’ll need to see what’s out there before I commit. Sorry, Elle,” Kyle said.
“Oh, that could be fun.”
Not.
“What about in the afternoon?” Elle asked hopefully.
Kyle grimaced, hoping this wouldn’t lead to something he didn’t want to talk about. “Uh, actually, I have plans in the afternoon. PT and then I’m helping a friend assemble some furniture.”
“Who?” Elle quirked her brow.
And this is exactly where I was hoping it wouldn’t go.
He sucked in a breath through his teeth. He didn’t want to tell Elle about Sloan’s sudden reappearance in his life again. But if Sloan was in town permanently, it might eventually come up. Better to tell her now than to make problems later.
“Sloan.”
The room went still, the air between them hanging heavily as Kyle’s words registered with both Quinn and Elle.
This time, Elle didn’t attempt to hide her annoyance. “Sloan Carrington?”
Quinn set his hand on Elle’s knee.
Kyle held his sister’s gaze. “She just moved back to Nashville, apparently. Today. And, uh, came to find me.”
Elle crossed her arms. “Find you? How?”
This wasn’t going to sound good. “Her friend hired a PI—”
“Kyle!” Elle sprang to her feet. “Oh my God. You can’t be serious. You can not be serious. That woman is completely unhinged.”
“Elle . . .” Quinn said, a warning tone to his voice.
“No, don’t Elle me.” Elle scowled down at Quinn, then set her hand over her belly. “Or blame it on me being a hormonal pregnant woman.” She pointed at Kyle. “Sloan practically destroyed my brother. Twice!”
Kyle raked his hand through his hair, then swallowed some wine, heat flushing his neck. “I knew you wouldn’t get it, but listen—”
“No!” Elle stamped her foot. “No, no, no! Kyle, no. Just . . . no.”
“Yeah, I got that part,” Kyle said dryly.
Quinn shifted with discomfort, sinking back onto the couch.
Elle crossed the living room and sat beside him, then clasped his free hand. “She is a menace to your life, Ky. She hurt you so badly. A-and then she does, what? Moves back to Nashville and immediately comes and finds you on the day she moves?”
Fuck, it really doesn’t sound good when she says it that way.
Elle drew a shaky breath. “You’re not thinking straight. You’ve never had your head on straight where Sloan is concerned. She will take and take and take whatever she wants from you, when it’s convenient for her, and then ruin you—stomp all over your heart without a backward glance.”
“It’s not like that,” Kyle said, disentangling his hand from Elle’s. “It hasn’t been like that at all since we ran into each other in Vail. We’re friends. That’s all.” The words tasted like a lie coming out of his mouth, but they weren’t untrue , either.
Elle closed her eyes, her fingertips trembling. “I never thought I would find myself saying this to my baby brother, but can you just . . . go out there and have a few one-night stands or something? Have some fun, wild sex with strangers to get this woman out of your system?”
“First of all, no thanks, we don’t need to go there.” Kyle narrowed his eyes at Elle. “And second, we talked today. She wasn’t avoiding me the last few months after all, there were just a lot of complications. She’s had a lot on her plate and—”
“And you’re already defending her.” Elle threw her hands up and stood. She gestured to Quinn. “Will you say something? Talk some sense into him?”
Quinn looked as though Elle had just asked him to eat a living slug. His blue eyes met Kyle’s, and he grimaced. “It’s his life, Elle.”
Swallowing back tears, Elle looked from her husband to her brother. “You’re both so . . . infuriatingly frustrating.” Sniffling, she hurried out of the room.
Kyle palmed his face. “That went well.”
A few beats of tense silence hung between them as Quinn got to his feet. “I should go after her.” He gave Kyle a chagrined smile. “It’ll be fine. She doesn’t want to admit it, but those pregnancy hormones are a nightmare. Pray for me.”
Kyle returned his smile grimly and drained his glass. “I’ll just let myself out.”
Quinn was already on his way after Elle.
Sighing deeply, Kyle stood, staring at the board of cheese and fruit. He hated that he’d taken a sledgehammer to what could have been a nice evening by telling his sister about Sloan.
But as he made his way toward the door to leave, he couldn’t get Elle’s words out of his head. Couldn’t stop from turning it over, bit by bit, and wondering, what if she’s right?