Page 14 of Locking Down Qetesh

"Not really. She started calling me Captain Snowpants after that."

"What did you call her?" I asked as I speared the last of my goat cheese and beetroot starter with my fork.

"Ella-Tella, because she would blurt out every secret anyone ever told her. She got much better at keeping them to herself as she got older, but I pretty quickly learned not to trust her with anything too important."

"Oh, I think I've met Ella-Tella," I joked. "She really doesn't know when to not share sometimes." I smiled at the thought of my best friend, knowing that she wasn't the kind of person to mean anything by it. She was just overexcited and had very few boundaries.

"That's my sister." The way he smiled made it clear that he held a lot of affection for her, which did make sense. Everything she'd ever told me about him made it sound like the two of them were close, even if she hadn't actually shared his name with me.

And everything she said seemed to be true. He had a good feel about him, something that made me want to open up to him, which wasn't exactly something I could say about anyone.

It was making me look forward to Ella's pre-wedding weekend celebration more. I didn't know many of her friends, but if I did know Jacob, then at least I'd have someone to talk to when Ella was busy.

Chapter 6

JACOB

I pulled into the car park of the small hotel that Ella had hired for the weekend. Or more accurately, Nadia had hired. My sister was often generous with the people she loved, but there was no way she could afford this. Luckily for her, her fiancée didn't seem to mind.

I spotted the two of them waiting at the entrance, giggling away to one another. A strange feeling passed through me that was somewhat akin to jealousy, but wasn't at the same time. It wasn't that I resented Nadia for taking my sister from me, it didn't work like that, and Ella and I had been messaging even more than before since the two of them got together.

It was because there was a part of me that wanted something like that. Someone who understood me so completely. And someone who didn't want to celebrate something without me, even when people would expect them to celebrate separately.

A car door slammed shut, and I automatically looked over in that direction to find Tesha getting a suitcase out of the boot of a tiny blue car. The wind caught her hair and blew it into her face, causing her to sigh and push it away from her eyes.

I raised my hand to wave at her, and she responded immediately, making me glad that I hadn't imagined how well lunch had gone between us. I wasn't sure what had possessed me to ask her to join me, there was just something about her that made me want to get to know her better.

It took me a moment to realise that I was lingering in the car park weirdly, and headed towards my sister who seemed to have noticed my arrival.

"Hey," she said, pulling me into a hug. "I'm so glad you came."

"You know I wasn't going to miss it," I reminded her. "I'm always going to want to celebrate my little sister getting married."

She grinned. "I am." She reached out for Nadia's hand and gave it a squeeze.

The other woman smiled at me. "Hello, Jacob."

"Good to see you again, Nadia," I responded.

"Oh, and Tesha," Ella said, a twinkle in her eye that couldn't be ignored. "That's good, we can send the two of you in to explore together."

Nadia chuckled. "You're not being very subtle."

"I'm not trying to be," Ella sing-songed.

I turned my attention to the approaching goddess without acknowledging my sister's clear attempts to try and set us up.

"Afternoon," she said as she reached us. "This place looks beautiful."

"And it's all for us," Ella said. "Reception is right inside. You just need to tell them your names, and they'll give you a key."

Nadia smiled and held out a packet to each of us. "That's got everything you need to know. Meal times, events, information on the spa and amenities. It's all fair game, but we do ask that everyone is on time for meals."

"You'll have more of a problem with Ella being late than either of us," Tesha joked.

"I'm going to be doing what I can to keep her on time," Nadia said, giving my sister a stern look.

Ella just shrugged. "It's our weekend. So what if we're late because we're..."

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