Page 65 of Say You Will

Janessa laughs. Her long, dark hair slid forward when she worked on my leg, and she pushes it over her shoulder now. “We’d be the grumpy/sunshine trope. Franki needs a cinnamon roll hero.”

“I think I could go for the sexy professor type,” I venture, offering up a ginormous hint to feel out what they might think about me potentially hooking up with Henry.

They both look doubtful.

“Maybe,” Sydney says, “if he’s also got golden retriever energy.”

“Definitely no grumps, alphas, or anyone with even a hint of morally gray.”

Bronwyn emerges from her bathroom. “Who is morally gray?”

“No one. We’re just discussing Franki’s type.”

Her expression clears. “That’s easy. You need someone who will treat you like the queen you are. Likes to cuddle. Is emotionally intelligent. Recognizes how funny, capable, and talented you are. Worships the ground you walk on. Likes dogs. And has a huge d—”

“Bronwyn,” her mother warns.

She winks at her mother. “I was going to say ‘has a huge duck call collection.’”

Charlotte rolls her eyes.

I snort.

Janessa nods. “As long as he’s sweet enough to give the rest of us a toothache. That’s what you need. One of those himbo, sunshine boy types.”

twenty-one

Henry

Brother | Kodaline

Ipull the visordown to look in the mirror. The blood splatter isn’t that bad. At least there’s no arterial spray. It’s not as though I killed Louis. A little light torture, nothing more.

“That was a waste of time, but I can’t say it wasn’t fun,” Gabriel says.

I frown at my brother. “Torture isn’t fun. It’s something you do when it’s necessary.”

“Are you seriously telling me it didn’t feel good to hurt the man who hurt our sister?”

“That’s not why we did it.” Not that there turned out to be much more information to extract. The man had already confessed to several crimes before we even took him to the garden shed. The idiot was bragging.

“We should have let Dean have him,” Gabriel says.

“Dean might have killed him. His emotions were too involved. It’s never wise to do something like that because youwantto vs.needto.”

I don’t pretend to myself that my soul isn’t painted with tar, but I have lines I don’t cross. That’s one of them. I let my emotions get in the way earlier when I considered murdering Jonny Lennox, but I don’t need to physically harm the man to make him live a life of regret.

Gabriel reaches into the backseat of my SUV and pulls a duffel forward to rest in his lap. Unzipping the bag, he sorts through the items and hands me a couple of baby wipes. I lift a sardonic eyebrow.

“Yeah, yeah. Obviously, you need a shower, but you can’t walk back in the house looking like that. What if one of Bronwyn’s friends is downstairs looking for a glass of water or Phee needed a bottle or something? You’d scare the girls.”

I don’t think Phee still drinks from baby bottles. She uses cups with spouts on them, but his point still stands. I snatch the wipes from his hand and clean my face. I should have taken the time to find a splash guard and gloves, but this was impromptu information collection, not planned. “Did I get it all?”

He pulls out another wipe and rubs vigorously at a place near my ear that I couldn’t see in the mirror. “Come here, little man. Let Mommy get you all cleaned up.”

I huff a laugh. For a moment, it feels like my brother is here.

He sobered up after dinner, for starters, which is rare lately. He tried to flirt with Sydney Walsh, and she told him the smellof alcohol made her want to vomit. Several of us heard the exchange. She wasn’t exactly subtle about it.

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