Page 25 of Breathtaking

I tap my glass to his bottle of beer. “I mean, to each his own, man. But why the hell are you off in a corner, sulking?”

“Thought you werethe all-knowing,” he calls me out, looking down at the floor below us filled with our family and friends. Everyone having a good time. Care-fucking-free.

“I know you’re a fucking idiot,” I laugh. Maverick and I are two years apart, but we’ve been tight our whole lives. Our moms are sisters, and our dads are brothers. This whole damn town is a little incestuous, and sometimes our family is a prime example.

Mav grins. “You’re unsurprisingly not the first person to tell me that today. Might want to ask Jamie how it went for him.”

I ignore the comparison since Mav’s roommate is as big a dumbass as my brothers. “Want to talk about it?”

He lifts his bottle to his mouth, stalling. “Not even a little bit.”

Rumor has it there’s something going on with his neighbor. Might as well go on the offensive before he starts asking me questions I don’t feel like answering. “So it’s a woman, huh?”

“You heard me say I didn’t want to talk, right?” The crowd below us screams as the band pulls Lilah onstage to sing with them, and Mav acts like it’s the most riveting thing he’s ever seen so he can ignore me.

I get not wanting to talk about something, but there’s no way I’m letting him off that easily. “Get your shit together, or don’t. That’s on you.”

“Thanks, Yoda,” he grumbles.

I’ve been called worse.

“You ever want something you know you shouldn’t have?” he asks.

Damn. Talk about a direct hit.

“Every day for almost a year,” I answer honestly. I can pinpoint just about the exact date. “But I want something Ican’thave. Pretty sure you’re torturing yourself over something youcanhave. There’s a massive difference.”

“Has anybody ever told you the way you have of knowing everything is unsettling? Because it is.”

My chest shakes with silent laughter.

Touché, cousin.

“I watch. It’s what I do. You’ve always acted. It’s what you do. Or it sounds like what you used to do.” I look out over the crowd and shrug. Everyone underestimates the power of observation. “You’ve always been the first one to jump into shit, Mav. You got me in so much trouble growing up because you had to do everything I was doing, like a little dickhead. It didn’t matter that you were younger. You were fearless. Act first, think later. How many times did our moms get on us about that shit?”

We both laugh because it’s true.

I got in more trouble than he ever did because Mom and Aunt Lenny always said I was older and should know better.

They didn’t care that we told him not to do it.

They just cared that he did it and I let him.

“Wanna tell me what’s changed?” I push as the band transitions, and the beat of one of Lilah’s biggest hits starts bouncing off the rafters.

I think about that question.

What’s changed?

I know what’s changed for me.

Pretty sure I know what’s changed for him too.

“Rosie.” His kid... yeah, that’s what I thought he’d say. But that’s not the right answer. “She changed it all. My life. My priorities. Rosie changed everything. Her happiness and her safety trump everything else.”

“Bullshit,” I call him out. “I’ve watched you hook up with plenty of people since Rosie was born. You didn’t stop because of her, you just became more discreet. But rumor has it the new nanny has you tied in knots.”

“Since when do you believe everything you hear?”

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