Page 8 of More Than Pen Pals

“Don’t touch me,” he says through gritted teeth. “Don’t talk to me.”

“Ash, I’m sorry, okay? Please let me explain.”

He crosses his arms over his chest and finally meets my eyes. “You had four years to explain. Why do you think I’d want your explanation now? Why are you even here?” His eyes narrow. “How did you find me?”

“I didn’t find you. I work with Wendy.”

“No, you don’t.”

“Pretty sure I do,” I retort.

“I know everybody who works at Carter-Jenkins, and you’re not one of them.” He sticks a finger two inches away from my face.

I move my head to the side to get away from his finger. “I started last week.”

The light changes, and he shoots across the street.

I chase after him again. “Ash, let’s please talk about this.” I have to jog to keep up with his long stride. “Can we meet for dinner?”

He stops so abruptly I’m two steps beyond him before I can come to a halt. I turn to face him.

“No,” he spits out, “we can’t meet for dinner. No, we won’t talk about it.” He jabs a finger at me. “You deceived me. That’s all I need to know.” He continues down the sidewalk, giving me a wide berth as he passes.

I want to reach out to him again, but I know that wouldn’t go well.

“Please, Ash.”

“No,” he throws over his shoulder. “We’re done.”

four

Ithrow open the door to Murphy, Hamilton, and Walker so forcefully it ricochets off its backstop and almost smacks back into me. The receptionist lets out a screech from behind her desk.

“Sorry, Annette,” I mutter as I march by.

I want to slam my office door, but I don’t need anyone else wondering what I’m so worked up about. I pride myself on my ability to stay calm in any situation, and I’m currently anything but composed.

I sink into my leather desk chair and drop my head into my hands.How? How is this real?

The one person I’ve ever felt completely safe opening up to in my life is a fraud, which fills my throat with bile. Unlike my brother, I’ve never had many friends. In fact, I don’t want many. I do want some, though, but I’ve always had trouble keeping them. They always complain about my pragmatic way of looking at the world. They tell me it brings them down. And in high school, college, and law school I was a year or two younger than everyone else in my class, which didn’t help matters. I wasn’t even of legal drinking age until after I started law school. Not that I had much interest in partying, anyway. I mostly kept to myself and focused on getting all my work done so I could graduate and get out into the working world where I could make a difference.

A knock sounds on my office door, and it opens. I know it’s my brother without looking up. Nobody else would dare to come in without me giving permission first.

Randall closes the door and drops into one of the dark blue wingback chairs in front of my mahogany desk. He props an ankle on the opposite knee, links his hands behind his head, and peruses me.

“Want to tell me what happened back there?” he asks.

“No.”

“Of course you don’t.”

My shoulders tense. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You never talk about anything important.”

“This isn’t important.”

“It’s not?” He puts his hands on his knees and leans toward me. “You sure?”

---