CHAPTER 43 BENNETT
BENNETT
I can still feel her perfect fucking pussy clenching around my cock.
I can still taste her on my tongue.
I can still smell her all over my goddamn body as I open the door, Bower on my mind…and my sister’s face comes into view.
Smiling.
Excited.
Looking for a surprised reaction.
Well, she’s fucking getting one… Because what the actual fuck?
“Gabby…what…what are you doing here?”
“Good to see you too,” she says with a grin. “Surprise!”
Yeah, you can fucking say that.
“You could have waited for me,” I hear Ryland say as he walks up to us in the hallway, luggage in hand.
Fuck.
FUCK!
“Hey, dude,” Ryland says as he looks me up and down, taking me in. “Rough night?”
“Uhh…” I scratch my chest, trying to figure out a way around this, because they’re going to want to come in, and I can’t even remember what the apartment looks like at this point. Did Bower leave anything laying around?
“Oh my God.” Gabby presses her hand to her mouth. “Is she here?”
My eyes widen, because…what?
“Is that girl you’ve been seeing here?” Gabby pokes her head around me, or attempts to, but I quickly stand in front of her, preventing her from seeing anything.
“Umm, no,” I answer, not wanting her to think anyone is in there. “No one is in here, Gabby,” I say a little louder, hoping that Bower can hear me. “Just, uh, just surprised is all.” I scratch the top of my head, still not letting them in. “I thought you were coming in tomorrow.”
“We were, but Hattie and Hayes said they would take Mac for a long weekend, so we came in early. Isn’t that exciting?”
“Yeah,” I say, realizing that I’m being so fucking awkward. At this point, I should have given her a hug, brought her into my place, and sat her down, but I smell like fucking Bower. I don’t want Gabby anywhere near my apartment, and the last thing I want to do is sit down and chat.
But I have to get her out of here. I need to give Bower a second to remove herself from my apartment.
“Are you okay?” Gabby asks, sensing how fucking awkward I’m being.
“Yeah, sorry, your knock just woke me up, startled me. Now I’m, uh…I’m hungry,” I say, an idea forming in my head. “Can we grab something to eat?”
“I’d love that.”
“Great. Let me grab a shirt and some shoes and then we can get going. Be right back.” I go to shut the door, but Ryland stops it and gives me a look.
“You really going to make your sister stand outside and wait for you?”
“Oh, no.” I chuckle nervously. “Come in.”
I turn around and do a quick scan of the living room, grateful that I don’t see any of Bower’s things, and then I rush to the bedroom, where I shut the door and whisper, “Bower?”
“Closet,” I hear her whisper back.
I move toward my walk-in closet where she’s huddled up, wearing one of my shirts, looking terrified.
“Does she know?” she asks, practically shaking.
I pull her into a hug and shake my head. “No. She doesn’t have a clue. I’m going to take them out to breakfast to get them away so you can slip up to your place.”
“What if she wants to have breakfast with me too?” Bower asks, looking so terrified that it actually hurts me to see her like this.
“I’ll tell Gabby that I want it to be just her, me, and Ryland so we can catch up.” I lift her chin and whisper, “I promise it will be okay. I have your back, beautiful.”
“I know.” A tear falls down her cheek.
“Please don’t cry.”
“I’m sorry, I just…I wasn’t expecting this.”
“Me either, but I have it handled, okay?”
She nods and then I lean down and press a kiss to her lips. “I have to go. Wait until we leave and then you can sneak out, okay?”
“Okay.”
I give her one more kiss and then find a shirt, a hat, and some socks. I slip on my slides, throw on some deodorant, and then I head out of the bedroom, where Ryland and Gabby are waiting in the living room.
“Ready?” I ask.
“Do you have a place in mind?” Gabby asks, following me, Ryland trailing behind her.
“Yeah, there’s a place around the block that’s good.” I guide them out of the apartment and shut the door. “Maybe like a two-minute walk. Serves pancakes and French toast, all that shit.”
“Great.” Gabby pulls me into a side hug and then says, “Oh, wait, I need to go to the bathroom.”
Alarm bells ring. “Ah, just go at the restaurant.”
“What?” She laughs. “No, don’t be weird. I’ll just go in your place.”
And before I can stop her, she opens my door and barges in, only to stop flat in her pursuit. I know the minute Gabby sees her, because it’s as if a knife of betrayal is stuck right into my sister’s back…metaphorically held by Bower.
She’s silent for a second and then she says, “Are you kidding me?”
“Gabby,” I say, rushing into the apartment, where Bower is standing still in the middle of the living room and dining room—in just my T-shirt and nothing else—looking both freshly fucked and terrified at the same time.
Ryland follows me in, takes in the scene, and then whispers under his breath, “Fuck.”
“Is this why you were trying to usher us away?” Gabby asks, pointing to Bower but looking at me.
“Listen,” I say in a calm, mature voice, but it doesn’t click as Gabby starts to get incredibly emotional.
“You promised me,” she says to Bower. “You promised you wouldn’t go there with him. You looked me in the eyes and said you would never. You lied.”
“Gabby,” Bower says, tears spilling down her face now. “It wasn’t planned. I didn’t…I wasn’t…”
“I don’t want to hear it.” Gabby shakes her head. “I knew this was going to happen. I just knew it. We’re supposed to be each other’s person. Is that why you’ve been avoiding me, because you were fucking my brother and knew it was wrong?”
More tears from Bower as she nods.
“So you’re not even going to deny it. You broke our relationship all for what? A quick fuck?”
“Hey,” I snap, stepping in. “That’s not what—”
“Yeah,” Bower says. “That’s what it was, Gabby. A quick fuck. Because that’s all I’m ever good at, right? No relationships, just fucking? I ruined an almost-decade relationship for a quick fuck with your brother.” She moves toward the entryway, blowing past me as my heart hammers in my chest.
Gabby lets out a sob and Ryland is by her side in an instant. “I begged you to watch over him, protect him.”
Bower, looking stoic now, just shrugs and says, “Guess having him spread my legs was far more important than protecting him.”
“Bower,” I say as I go after her before she can leave. “What are you doing?”
“Leaving.”
“Why are you saying that when you know it’s not true?”
“Isn’t it, though?” she asks, making me step back. “In her eyes, that’s all she’ll see.”
“That’s not true,” I say, but when I turn to look at Gabby, Bower slips out of the apartment without another word, stealing my heart along with her.
There’s no fucking way I’m letting this happen. I’m not going to let her walk away like that. But before I can go after her, there is one thing I have to fix.
I turn around and face my sister, who is looking at me as if I just betrayed her in the worst way I could imagine.
“Bennett, why?”
Wetting my lips and trying to not let my anger get the best of me, I say, “Because I love her. Because I’ve loved her for a long goddamn time.
And when she finally saw me as more than her best friend’s little brother, when she saw me as a man who would do anything for her, she let me into her heart.
And I took advantage of it, because I refused to let the woman I love go.
” I point to my chest. “I took advantage of the situation, Gabby. Not her. I pushed her to be with me, to break your trust, because I’m a selfish prick who didn’t care that she broke a promise with you, despite how much she agonized over it.
I didn’t fucking care, because I love her and I wanted her. ”
“You don’t—”
“I do,” I say with all the conviction I can muster. “I have from the moment I first met her.”
Gabby rolls her eyes, actually rolls her eyes, and when I say that my sister is the sweetest, most protective human I’ve ever known, I mean that. But to see her like this, dismissing my feelings, it cracks and breaks me. I don’t want to be the man she taught me to be.
“That’s infatuation, Bennett. There’s a difference.”
Taking a step forward, anger brimming from every surface of my body, I say, “Do not fucking tell me what I feel for her is infatuation, because I know the goddamn difference. Infatuation is what you felt for Ryland when you two first started fucking.”
“Watch it,” Ryland growls, but he doesn’t intimidate me.
“Love is what I feel for Bower. It’s buried itself into the marrow of my bones, where I itch to see her, where I feel at ease when she’s in my arms, where I’m content and satisfied knowing that I’m the one she’s going to bed with and I’m the one she’s waking up next to.
This is not a fling. This is not a one-night fuck.
This is real. This is love, and she feels the same way.
” Gabby’s eyes widen. “And for you to insult her, to her fucking face, without giving her a goddamn second to explain…” I shake my head.
“That’s not the sister I grew up with. That’s not the sister who raised me.
You’re better than that, Gabby, and I’m disappointed that you would treat someone you love in such a manner, angry or not.
Broken promises and all. She deserved more than that. ”
I head toward the door, ready to chase after Bower just as she walks through the door, tears still streaming down her cheeks, but with some bravado in her face.
She walks right up to me and places her hands on my chest. Looking me in the eyes, she whispers, “I’m sorry. You know I love you. This isn’t a quick fuck to me. You were never that to me. Ever.” She cups my cheek. “I love you so much.”
Fuck.
Talk about a way to make my heart nearly fly out of my chest.