Page 73 of Heat Exchange
“You need to have some manners if you’re talking about Lydia, asshole.”
Scotty scooted to the front of his chair, ready to stand. “Oh, really? You gonna give me a lesson on my own family, Hunt?”
“Enough!” Cobb leaned back in his chair and threw his pen onto the desk with so much force it slid across the paper planner and off the other side. “I won’t have this bullshit.”
Aidan sank back against his chair, shaking his head. “I don’t want to fight with you, Scotty. I never meant to hurt you and I’m sorry I lied.”
“I’m not going to swing again,” Scott said after what seemed like forever. “I’ll work with you. I’ll have your back when we go through the door. But you and me? I don’t know if we can be friends again.”
* * *
LYDIACLOSEDTHEFRONTdoor quietly, in case Ashley was sleeping. They’d had a late rush at the bar and it had taken her forever to get out of there, so the house was dark. She flipped on the light switch as she walked into the living room, but the television being on struck her as weird. Her sister usually shut it off when she went upstairs.
Usually Lydia would watch it for a few minutes, relaxing after being at work, but tonight it would take a lot more than the television to relax her. She had no idea what was going on with the guys, and it was giving her a stress headache. When she’d called Aidan earlier in the night, he’d been quiet and when she asked him about Scotty, he’d said they were still working some stuff out. Then he’d told her he was going to catch up on sleep and he’d talk to her tomorrow.
Then she’d sent a text to Scotty asking him to stop by the bar, but he said he was busy, and didn’t respond at all to her text asking him to make time to talk to her. She didn’t appreciate being shut out of whatever was going on, as if it had nothing to do with her.
On her way to shut off the TV, she tripped over something and swore in a low voice, before realizing it was a man’s shoe. That was even weirder than the television being on, she thought.
“Oh, shit,” she heard Ashley say, and she realized her sister was on the couch. She hadn’t seen her because the furniture was in some kind of conversational arrangement, whatever that meant, and the back of the couch faced the entry. “Don’t come in.”
Lydia froze, not sure what that meant. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah. But I’m...not fully dressed.”
“So?”
“I’m not fully dressed, either,” a male voice said, and Lydia realized it was Danny.
“Oh.” Ashley and her husband were partially undressed together on the couch.Okay.“I’ll, uh...be upstairs for a while. Or for a long time. Actually, I’ll just go to bed, so good night.”
“Lydia,” Danny called, “you don’t have to go upstairs. Just give us a second.”
“I don’t want to be in the way.”
Ashley’s head popped up over the back of the couch, and Lydia smiled at her. Her sister’s hair was disheveled and her face was flushed. Then Danny sat up, looking much the same. Obviously her sister and her brother-in-law were finding a way to accelerate working through their communication issues.
“You’re not in the way,” Ashley said. “And you can stay down here. We’ll go upstairs.”
Danny turned around so he could give her a reassuring smile. “Don’t worry about us.”
But she had been worried about them, and right now Ashley looked happy and in love and she needed some alone time with her husband. “You guys want to be alone.”
“I took some time off, so she and I have plenty of time to catch up,” Danny said. “If you can spare a little more time for the bar.”
“Sure, no problem. And give me ten minutes and I’ll be out of here. I’ll go stay at Dad’s.”
Ashley grimaced. “You don’t have to do that, Lydia. You know that.”
“I want to. Really. Nothing’s more hideous than being the third wheel to two people acting like newlyweds.” She grinned at them. “Trust me. Ten minutes and you guys can go back to making out on the couch like teenagers.”
She went upstairs and pulled her bag out of the closet. Taking just what was clean and necessary, as well as her toiletries from the bathroom, would save her some time. She could come back for the rest another time.
“You aren’t really going to stay at Dad’s are you?”
Lydia closed the top drawer of the bureau and dropped the handful of undergarments into the open bag. “We grew up in that house. It’s Dad. I can handle staying there.”
“You’re making me feel guilty.”
