Page 33 of Forced to Share
“What the hell was that for?” I grumbled, rubbing at the spot where she’d hit me.
“You’re the guy.”
“He’s the guy,” Austin confirmed. He shifted from side to side, his arms tucked behind his back, while I wanted to be mad that he didn’t try to stop his sister from hitting me, she’d probably been waiting years to do that. The reality was that a punch in the shoulder was pretty small compared to some of the other damage she could have done. I’d seen her get into a few catfights back in college, and it hadn’t been pretty. The girl could hold her own.
She stared dumbfounded for a moment.
“You two let me parade around here like you didn’t already know each other. Why would you do that?”
Austin shrugged his shoulders, but I had the answer. “I had no idea that you two were even related until we got here. You brought me to meet your family over Christmas, and forgive me if I didn’t want to cause waves over a major holiday.”
“I agree. There was no reason to cause problems. We could have talked about it later...”
And then Leah looked horrified. “I made you kiss him. Oh, my God. Austin? I’m so freaking sorry. You must still be so hurt, I made you do that, I’m such a terrible sister—”
He held up a hand to stop her rambling.
“That’s the other thing we need to talk about.”
When Leah froze, the little bit of ease I’d been feeling over the entire situation vanished. This was the part we were unsure of. She hadn’t seemed upset, but this could quickly change things. It was one thing to tell her that we’d known each other in the past; it was different to say that we’d jumped right back into bed together the second things had ended between us.
She knew.
We didn’t have to say anything because she knew. With a shaking hand, she tugged at her ponytail before swallowing thickly.
“I think I need a drink.” She brushed past us and out of the room, rushing down the stairs to the kitchen.
I looked at Austin because I didn’t know whether we should follow her or not. Their parents were still in the kitchen, if we followed, it meant sharing this with everyone, and that wasn’t where I was at mentally.
Turns out, we didn’t need to worry about following Leah, because a few minutes later she came marching back up the stairs with a full wineglass,the rest of the bottletucked under her arm. The second she saw us waiting for her in her doorway, she took a large swig of the wine in her glass before thinking again then chugging back the rest of the glass. We were back to the binge drinking that she’d been doing over the last few days.
As she entered the room, pulling the cork out of the wine bottle with her teeth. She took a large swig from the bottle before sitting on the edge of her bed to glare at us.
“So what I’m hearing is... I ended things, and since you conveniently had to stay with my brother, you took the opportunity to climb back into bed with him?”
I raised my hands in surrender, because obviously Austin had told her about us hooking up. It had to hurt knowing I couldn’t do the same with her. She’d spent years with me, and while I loved her deeply, it was more on a platonic level. I didn’t want to sleep with her.
“That’s not—”
She took another swig of the wine, and I gulped because, at the rate she was going, she wasn’t going to be feeling very good soon. If I had been in her shoes, I would have been just as upset.
This wasn’t what anyone wanted to hear.
“Leah, to be fair...” Austin sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. This whole conversation was extremelyuncomfortable. “…we didn’t intend for any of this to happen. But—but knowing what happened, I don’t know...”
Leah set the bottle and her glass on her nightstand before she stood and hugged her brother. It was a complete one-eighty from where she’d been a moment ago. All I could do was stand there as the pair hugged it out. Like she understood him without him saying anything.
The emotions in this room were giving me whiplash.
Out of nowhere, Leah let go of Austin swung around to face me, sticking her pointer finger in my face, right between my eyes, causing me to go cross-eyed.
“Now, you…” Oh yeah, she was feeling her alcohol. “I love my brother very much. If you so much as ever think about hurting him like that ever again...”
What was even happening here? See, so much emotional whiplash.
Leah had gone from pissed off to lecturing me about not harming her brother so quickly. “I promise. I wouldn’t dream of it ever again. It was stupid to do it back then, and I should have known better.”
She jammed her finger into the bridge of my nose. It hurt, but I didn’t flinch because she was obviously trying to prove a point.
