Page 83 of Deputy Brand Gets Her Man
“Yeah, I do,” Ethan drawled with a grin.
“Yeah, you do,” Jeremiah said.
“Newlywed?” Elena asked.
“This summer. She’s expecting a baby in early spring.”
“You work fast.” She smiled, but her voice was getting softer, her eyes less wide. “I already know you’re a country singer. My parents have been fillin’ me in. You met them, right?”
“All three of ‘em.” Ethan said.
“And what do you do, Jeremiah?” she asked, shifting her gaze to his. The way her eyes moved over it made him feel exposed.
“For the moment, I’m a bouncer at Ethan’s honky tonk.”
“He’s been busy romancin’ my cousin, Willow, and tryin’a keep it secret,” Ethan said.
Jeremiah sent Ethan a quick look that must’ve shown the knife in his heart that statement had just twisted. Ethan’s smile froze and faded, while his eyes asked what was wrong.
“I know Willow. You have good taste,” Elena said. “Gosh, I never imagined…my birth father was a criminal. I don’t know how you deal with it.” Her eyelids fell closed but popped open again. “And I never imagined I had brothers. I’m so happy…about that.” Her eyes fell closed again.
The brothers exchanged a soft smile, then walked quietly back into the hallway, where Jeremiah let his smile die. He kept on walking, but Ethan stopped, grabbed his shoulder and turned him around.
“You don’t believe her mothers, do you?” he asked. “You think she really was the one fighting you for the inheritance.”
Jeremiah shrugged. “I’m ready to breathe some air that’s not antiseptic-scented.”
Ethan gripped his forearm and dragged him down the hall. Elena’s three parents were still in the waiting room. Jeremiah pasted a smile on his face, and waved as they passed. Willow was nowhere around, and maybe she’d left already. He wondered what she’d done with Beans.
Ethan didn’t slow down until they were outside on the sidewalk, then a few yards down it, where a wood-and-metal bench sat under a light on a pole with a halo of bugs.
Ethan let go of his arm and faced him. “Why would she pretend not to have known we existed? Why would she even think of deception on the worst day of her life?”
“I don’t know.”
“And Willow? You’re not giving her the benefit of the doubt, either.”
“You want me to give her the benefit of the doubt? After all her snooping and withholding information?”
“Yes, that’s exactly what I want you to do.”
“Why? Why the hell would I do that, Ethan?”
“Because she’s done the same for you. You’ve been sneakin’ around and keeping secrets, don’t tell me you haven’t.”
“I had cause.”
“Too freakin’ bad. Forgive her anyway. You love her, you idiot.”
He could have punched him in the face and stunned him less. Jeremiah rocked back on his heels as if he had.
“And she loves you back.”
“She does not?—”
“And I know for a fact she loves me, and she had a damn good reason for keeping quiet about Elena. She thought she was doin’ the right thing, or she wouldn’t’ve done it.”
Jeremiah didn’t know if he could argue with that line of logic.
