Page 164 of Keeping Kasey
He lifts his hands in surrender. “I just came to check in on you.”
“A job well done. Get out.”
My brother gives me a knowing look, and I decide I don’t have the energy to keep this from him.
“We went to dinner,” I say through a sigh, sinking into the chair behind my desk. “When she got back to the hotel, she was hungry, so we went to get burgers.”
“And that’s… bad?” he asks, clearly not knowing how to interpret my mood.
“She agreed to come to dinner tonight, and she traded telling me where she spent the last four months for getting her gun back.”
“Did she tell you what happened?”
I shake my head. “Just where she went.”
“None of that explains your mood.”
I lay my head back and close my eyes.
After a few seconds, James asks, “Do you want to marry Isabella?”
This is the last thing I need right now.
“I’m not in the mood, James. We can do this another time.”
“You have a proposal scheduled for next week. You’re out of time.”
“Until there’s a ring on her finger, I have time.”
“Logan.” Something in how my brother says my name prompts me to open my eyes. His face is notably absent of smugness. Instead, he looks concerned.
“I have a duty to this family.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
“James—”
“Do you want to marry her?”
“I’ll do what I—”
“Do youwantto marry her, Logan?”
“No,” I snap. “No, I don’t want to marry Isabella. I want nothing to do with Isabella. The only woman I want—the only woman I haveeverwanted—is Kasey. Kasey, who hates me and won’t ever forgive me for the things I’ve put her through. Are you happy now? Because saying the words out loud doesn’t changeanything. I still have to marry Isabella, and I still have to let Kasey go.”
I regret the words the second I say them.
They’re true, but so much easier to deal with in silence.
Now, it’s all out in the open, and my brother can see just how screwed up my head is over the woman I want.
Because I can never have her.
James’s blank expression cracks, revealing a pained thoughtfulness, as if he could ever understand the war my logic and desire have been waging inside me since Kasey walked into my life.
“Don’t marry her,” he says, almost as a request.
“It’s not that—”
