Chapter 5 #2
The bickering washes over me, familiar and warm, and I let myself sink into it. This is good. This is normal. This is everything I was trying to protect when I broke Everett's heart eleven years ago.
Roman says something to Caleb—probably an insult, based on Caleb's indignant squawk—and I nod along like I'm following. Smile like I'm present. Make the appropriate sounds at the appropriate moments while my brain runs a completely separate track in the background.
I glance at the window seat.
Just for a second.
Just long enough to remember the way he'd caged me in, hands braced on either side of my face, kissing me like he was trying to punish me and worship me in the same breath.
You tried so hard to get over him.
And with one stupid, devastating, earth-shattering kiss, I’m right back where I started.
Smokey and intense.
Aged to complete domination since my last sip.
The forbidden love letter wrapped in a warning label keeping me from letting anyone else all the way in.
After all, what’s the point when I already know what the real thing feels like?
God. I'm pathetic. I’m every unresolved feeling I’ve ever had parading around in hiking boots.
And I had done the thing dammit. The thing. The one I thought would save us all by killing this endlessly thrumming connection.
I dated someone else. Someone safe.
Justin.
Bland, beige, perfectly-nice-but-utterly-forgettable Justin.
For a month… the longest year of my life.
I smiled. I went through all the motions, checking off relationship milestones like the most tedious twelve days of Christmas of what he-who-could-never-be-my-true-love gave to me to prove to Everett I’d moved on.
That we were impossible.
That Everett Morgan was just a chapter, not the whole damn book.
On the twelfth day of fake love, Justin gave to me…
Twelve words in a break-up text.
Not a single one spelled correctly.
On the eleventh day of fake love, Justin gave to me…
Eleven Snapchat streaks—until his mom found out he had social media apps. She snatched his contraband fast.
On the tenth day of fake love, Justin gave to me…
Ten-minute phone calls—he breathed loudly. I folded laundry.
On the ninth day of fake love, Justin gave to me…
Nine turkey sandwiches—he called them “our thing.” I was unaware we had a thing.
Also… no mayo. Who does that?
Serial killers. That’s who.
Then there were the…
Eight invitations to group events—all under the watchful eye of his youth pastor.
Seven conversations about video game updates—in the spirit of matching energy, I said “cool” seven times.
Six texts with emojis— followed immediately by a Bible verse.
I prayed it was a type and replied with .
It wasn’t.
I eventually came up with a Christian version—kinda.
hot in my tie
this sermon is bangin’
that holy water tho… am I right?
If I’m going to hell, at least it’s not because I sent the sweat emoji after John 3:16.
I had to Google the verse. Either he was professing eternal salvation or just really into me in a Jesus-y way.
The line was blurry.
And moist.
Five lukewarm side hugs—all of which managed to increase in duration, but not warmth.
Four shared silences—none of them intentional.
Three texted “heys.” All oddly at 10:42 p.m.—probably something to do with another bible verse. Not sure since I’d reached my self-determined quota of bible exposure.
Two playlists—both Christian—Songs 4 Worship, which he referred to as “bangers”. The other, a Spotify shrine to Josh Groban.
I didn’t ask questions.
I feared the answers.
On the first day of fake love, Justin gave to me…
One nod in the hallway at school.
He missed.
By the end of it, I’d stopped pretending. Not that anyone noticed.
Justin broke up with me via text.
I thanked him.
He thought I was joking.
I wasn’t.
And that was the moment I knew I’d rather be single forever than watch another boy eat a plain turkey sandwich with no condiments and call it ‘a treat’.
Everett had left town by then. Left me.
And I'd wanted that. I'd wanted him to leave because it was easier.
Easier than seeing him everywhere.
Easier than wanting what I couldn't have.
Only he’d stay gone for nine years.
Nine years of silence that made it painfully clear we’d meant more to each other than I ever let myself believe.
Turns out easier wasn’t the same as better.
Easier just meant I was dying slower.
“You've grown, Shutterbug.”
That. That right there. That’s what I broke us for.
Roman’s voice, the sound of a lifetime of growing affection tugs a smile out of me. I take his handsome face in my hands—something our mother used to do with him—something he confessed to missing the most.
Naturally, I adopted the ritual, doing everything I could to give it back to him. Even if it’s not quite the same.
There are just some things a picture can’t replace.
“You always say that.” Lines frame his eyes, just a bit deeper than the last time I saw him. Before I can examine him too closely, his massive arms wrap around me and he lifts me clean off the floor like I'm still twelve and easy to toss over his shoulder.
I'm not.
I'm five-ten, twenty-eight years old, and every nerve ending still vibrating from the threat made by one devastating kiss.
“Haven’t I gotten too old for this?”
“Nope.” He squeezes tighter. “Haven't seen my baby sister in four months. I get at least thirty seconds.”
And despite everything—the kiss, the panic, the fact that Everett is standing six feet away pretending to be fascinated by bourbon labels—I melt into it.
Because it’s Roman. My most loyal protector who put the fear of God into anyone who dared mess with me and still calls me every Sunday to see how I’m doing before listing all the ways he misses me.
“You smell like coffee and Slim Jims,” I mumble into his shoulder.
His deep chuckle rumbles through him and into me. My eyes sink shut and I hold on tighter despite my earlier demand to put me down.
“You smell like dust and old books.”
“Historical preservationist doesn’t mean mildewed card catalogs and stale tombs.”
The rumble turns into a laugh—that big, warm Roman laugh that makes everything feel a little less catastrophic.
When he finally sets me down, my toes barely meet the floor before Caleb swoops in.
“Shutterbug!” Caleb shoves Roman aside with zero grace and yanks me into his own hug, rocking me side to side while he squeezes with his signature overeager energy. “Did you miss me? Tell me you missed me. Roman said you probably didn't miss me, but he's a liar and I'm the favorite.”
“You're nobody's favorite,” Roman and Nolan say in unison.
“Bullies. The both of them. Sierra, defend my honor.”
“You have no honor to defend,” Everett mutters, just sliding right into that honorary fourth brother spot they’d given him when I was seven.
“Wow. Okay. I see how it is.” Caleb releases me just to clutch his chest like they’ve mortally wounded him. “I’m telling Dad. At least he cares about my feelings.”
“Not this week,” Nolan says from behind us. “He’s on his honeymoon. I’m pretty sure there’s only one feeling he cares about.”
Caleb winces and clenches his teeth. “Nope. I didn’t hear that. I didn’t picture it either. Christ.”
Nolan’s eyes find mine—striking, dark-rimmed hazel, streaked with green and copper—that don’t miss a thing.
“Hey.” His smooth voice cuts through the chaos. Quieter than the other two. Steadier.
He doesn't barrel into me like Roman or tackle me like Caleb. He just opens his arms and waits.
That's Nolan. Patient. Watchful.
“You okay?” he murmurs against my hair. “You look... flushed.”
ABORT. ABORT. ABORT.
“Long day.” I pull back with what I hope is a casual smile. “Twelve hours in the archives. You know how it is.”
He doesn't look convinced.
Nolan never looks convinced. But he doesn’t push.
Roman settles onto a barstool, the suspicion in his gaze wiped clean as he takes a long pull of bourbon, and sets the glass down with a satisfied sigh. “Damn, that's good.”
“Should be. It’s top shelf.” Everett grips the neck of the bottle giving the label and appreciative once over. “Aged longer than Caleb’s attention span,”
“Asshole.” Caleb covers the word with a cough, grabs his glass without hesitation. “Valid, though.”
The hand wrapped around that heavy glass was under my sweater. That hand in particular, cupped my breast like it had every right to be there.
The thought slices through every comfort their presence brings.
All it took was hot hands with no boundaries, a demanding thigh ready to ride, lethal lips fused to mine and I was two seconds away from climbing him like the mountain of a man he is front of God and the snowman display and—
Suddenly there's a glass in my hand. I stare down at it knowing I sure as hell didn’t pick it up.
When I glance up, Everett gestures to the glass with a flick of his gaze before aiming his attention at my brothers like this is any other reunion. Like we weren't just pressed against each other in the window seat. Like his tongue wasn't in my mouth thirty seconds before they walked in.
He doesn't look at me.
Not once.
And somehow, that's worse.
Because now I'm standing here, surrounded by the three people who would absolutely commit fratricide if they knew what just happened, holding a bourbon I don't remember accepting, and my brain is finally catching up to the full scope of this disaster.
Everett Morgan kissed me.
After eleven years of nothing—of silence and distance and that horrible, hollow ache I pretended I'd outgrown—he put his mouth on mine like no time had passed at all.
And my body remembered.
The bickering washes over me, familiar and warm, and I let myself sink into it. This is good. This is normal. This is everything I was trying to protect when I broke Everett's heart eleven years ago.
Roman says something to Caleb—probably an insult, based on Caleb's indignant squawk—and I nod along like I'm following. Smile like I'm present. Make the appropriate sounds at the appropriate moments while my brain runs a completely separate track in the background.
I glance at the window seat.
Just for a second.
Just long enough to remember the way he'd caged me in, hands braced on either side of my face, kissing me like he was trying to punish me and worship me in the same breath.
You tried so hard to get over him.
And with one stupid, devastating, earth-shattering kiss, I’m right back where I started.