Page 101 of The Moment He Saw Her

“Got anything stronger to drink?” JD asked, grabbing a slice of pizza. “Now that Zoe’s gone, we can do that. She’s got me on this low-carb beer, eating-healthy diet.”

“Man, that sucks. Birdie does that to me sometimes. She’s all about celery juice cleanses and how good they are for your liver and shit like that.” Sawyer shuddered.

“Phoebe is all about cruciferous vegetables,” Brody said.

“What the fuck are those?” Dan asked.

“Broccoli, cauliflower, and Brussels sprouts contain sulforaphane, which helps the liver remove toxins,” Brody said.

Ryder and Dan studied the other three men, who were eating pizza and washing it down with beer like it was their last meal.

“You’re not selling a steady relationship to him,” Dan added, nodding to Ryder.

“I don’t even know you people anymore,” he muttered.

“It’s about compromise, son,” JD said, licking cheese off his fingers. “I love your sister, so I give in to some of her demands, and she does the same.”

“No, she doesn’t,” Dan said. “Zoe is about as malleable as Larry Limpet.”

“Which, translated, means not malleable,” Ryder added.

“Ah, but you see, she loves me back and understands that for us to be happy, there has to be compromise,” JD added.

“Like what?” Ryder demanded.

“Well, just this morning I said we should have PB&J on toast instead of the bowl of nuts, fruit, and natural yogurt sprinkled with small seeds that always get stuck in my teeth, and she agreed,” JD said.

“She’s still eating that?” Dan shuddered.

“Every damn day, but not today. This morning, we had PB&J on toast in bed.”

The Duke brothers howled with outrage, lobbing the three throw pillows Ryder had allowed to enter his home at the man.

“No bed talk in connection with our sister,” Sawyer snarled.

JD just gave them a big shit-eating grin.

“So, Ryder, what are you willing to compromise so Libby can be in your life?” Brody asked.

“I don’t even know if we want to be in each other’s lives,” he admitted.

“Liar. You’ve fallen for that girl, and that’s why it hurts so much that she lied to you. No way in hell would you be hanging onto the hurt and anger otherwise,” Dan said.

Sawyer tipped his beer toward his little brother in acknowledgement of the truth behind his words, and while the others talked, Ryder thought about Libby.

Could he have fallen for a woman he barely knew whose life was miles from his own? A woman who made him feel different when he saw her?

He knew the answer deep inside him wasyes.

Chapter30

“Finch McAllister asked me on a date,” Nina said from her position in the swinging chair in her living area. She was eating one of the chocolate chip cookies Cill had baked.

“He’s hot and has that edge to him I like,” Cill said.

“The hard-assed edge,” Nina agreed.

Zoe Duke walked in then looking pissed off. Libby was on her second glass of wine, but if you added that to the two hot ciders she’d had earlier, it was more alcohol than she’d drunk in a long time.

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