Page 73 of The Mating Game
“How did she end up the boss of this operation anyway? Is she the oldest?”
Thomas shakes his head. “Nah, I am. Then Kyle, then Tess, then Chase.”
“None of us really have a sense for business,” Chase tells me.
Kyle shrugs. “We’ve always been better at taking orders than giving them. It just kind of happened that way.”
“And it doesn’t feel weird? Working for your sister?”
“Nah, she’s a good boss,” Thomas tells me. “She’s got a great eye for that side of things.”
“That’s really cool of you guys to be so supportive,” I tell them. Deciding it’s best to extricate myself from the conversation before I say too much, I clap Thomas on the shoulder. “I’d better get inside. I have some paperwork to go over.”
“Sure, man. If you change your mind about tonight, we’re leaving at seven. We’re all going to pile into my truck.”
I can’t pretend that the thought of Tess in a bar with other men doesn’t leave a sour taste in my mouth, but I remind myself that it’s none of my business what she does. She doesn’tbelongto me. No matter what we’ve been doing. Still, the surge of jealousy hits me so strongly that I almost cave right then and there.
“I’ll think about it,” I tell them.
“Cool,” Kyle answers with a grin. “Might be nice to have another guy there whose sole focus isn’t bedding the locals like these two.”
A chuckle nearly escapes me, and I’m gathering that Kyle is a lot more like Tess than he is his brothers.
“Oh, hey, Hunter…”
I turn back, finding Thomas looking at me with narrowed eyes.
“Yeah?”
He lowers his voice. “How do you feel about garlic?”
It takes everything in me not to burst out laughing, the seriousness of his expression making it even harder.
“You know, it’s always burned my throat. Never really could stand the stuff.”
Thomas’s eyes widen, and when I turn away to reach for the door, I swear I hear him whispering, “See? Are we sure he isn’t actually a—”
I leave them on the back deck, where I can already hear Kyle berating Thomas, and a quick sweep of the great room reveals it to be empty, no Tess in sight. When I reach the front desk in the foyer, I glance at the stairs, feeling that same urge to go and check on her but unsure whether it would be weird or not. I worry thatshemight feel weird after last night, and I worry that seeking her out might make it worse.
I tell myself that I should leave it in her hands as I settle on my stool behind the front desk, trying to distract myself with the bank statements I’ve been going through. There’s plenty of stuff for me to do, and not thinking about a certain omega with big brown eyes and a mouth that literally haunts my dreams should be easy enough, given that.
Still doesn’t stop me from glancing at the top of the stairs every five minutes. I also tell myself that I should shut it down, try to put some distance between us when I’m not…helpingher—otherwise I’m just setting myself up for heartache.
I glance at the stairs again.
God, I am so fucked.
17
Tess
I think thefatal flaw of avoiding someone is that the universe always seems to want to be a bitch about it. Because of course when I come down the main staircase to meet the boys to head to the bar, Hunter is waiting at the front desk, flipping through a notebook of some sort. I pause at the last stair right as he looks up at me, not missing the way his eyes travel from my knee-high boots to my red sweaterdress, all the way up to my face.
“Hey” is all he says.
I try to appear casual even though my heart rate has quickened considerably. “Hey. Hanging out?”
“Just going over some invoices,” he tells me.
