Page 85 of Ablaze

I open my mouth and close it again. He’s making it sound like something it’s not, and he fucking knows it. Yes, Jason and I went to dinner last night. So what? It wasn’t anything but a gesture of camaraderie between two coworkers. Bosses and employees go out to dinner all the fucking time. That doesn’t mean there’s anything going on between them.

I shove away any thoughts of the attached note I read this morning that said, “These flowers pale in comparison to the company at dinner last night. I’d love to do it again soon.”

It isn’t how it sounds, no matter how much a little voice in my head chants the opposite.

A knowing smile plays on Dean’s lips at my silence, and I read each emotion as it flutters across his face. Hurt, anger, and betrayal. And all fucking misplaced. Yet I’m still the one left feeling guilty.

“Glad you’re doing well, sprinkles. Looks like you’re moving right on past that night.”

“Dean–”

“I’ve gotta go. Have fun on the non-dates with your boss.”

Chapter Twenty-Six

DEAN

“Show off,” I holler from my seat on the barstool before taking a pull from my beer.

Garrett walks around the table and aligns himself behind the cue ball again. He’s brought his A-game today, and I wonder if it has anything to do with frustrations with his wife. In my head, I still say wife with quotes around it because, in his situation, it’s not really clear if they are or aren’t married. Technically, they are. But physically, emotionally, metaphorically? Who the fuck knows.

They accidentally married a few weeks ago when we all went to Vegas, and since then, Garrett has done everything in his power to keep her close.

He’s been in love with the woman for the past four years, but never had the balls to tell her. That fact alone had all of us scratching our heads because as much as it kills me to admit it, my twin is nothing short of a pot of honey around bees when it comes to women. So the fact that he has pined for one woman all this time without having it reciprocated by her is mind-boggling.

Garrett grunts, mumbling something about being able to kick my ass with his eyes closed, and I snort out a laugh, volleying back with my own retort.

This is how it always is between both my brothers and me. I laugh internally because our baby brother, Darian, gets it the worst from both me and Garrett. I swear, there’s a sick pleasure I get from teasing his broody ass that I get with little else in life.

Garrett lobs the eight-ball against the back wall, making it into the pocket he called and winning the game. Darian and him have some sort of stupidly smug exchange of handshakes since they were playing against me and Hudson before Darian clasps Garrett’s shoulder. “Let’s get a round of beers and sit for a bit. I’m fucking beat.”

That’s a surprise since Darian rarely drinks.

Hudson waves down our waitress and orders us another round of beers before we all take a seat around the table. Like Rohan is to me, Hudson is one of Garrett’s closest friends, but he and I get along well, too.

He’s slightly older than us, in his early forties, but one of the most regimented and disciplined people I know. Though none of us are lightweights when it comes to pushing our bodies in the gym, I doubt any of us could hang with him. The man is a fucking machine and built like one, too.

He’s had one hell of an interesting life, making a pretty big name for himself as a world-renowned geologist–or Earth scientist, as he formally calls himself–even after having to raise a daughter practically on his own since the age of seventeen.

“Fuck, if you’re asking for a beer, you must have had a rough night. I haven’t seen you drink anything but water, ever,” Hudson says in astonishment to Darian.

“Or milk,” I offer with a smirk. “Preferably in a sippy cup, with chocolate mixed in.”

Darian flips me off before we’re all laughing. Everyone in this crew knows the story of how Darian was addicted to chocolate milk as a kid because that’s the only way his mom, Karine, could get him to drink it. I still laugh when I see our old family photos where he’s holding his sippy cup in one hand and his blanket in the other.

It should make me feel terrible, but some of my favorite childhood memories are of Garrett and me being total jackasses to Darian.

I still remember how Garrett and I would hide his beloved blanket–something he was attached to until he was almost ten–all the fucking time and use it as ransom, making him do stupid shit to get it back.

Like one time he had to respond to anything Karine or my dad said with, “I poopied my panties.”

“Darian jan, why aren’t you eating your lamb kebab? Do you want more lavash?” Karine asked, looking concerned at Darian’s pout, mistaking his annoyance with me and Garrett for his disinterest in the food she’d cooked.

Darian gave us another pleading look, and I kicked him under the table to assert the point silently–say you poopied your panties or wave goodbye to your precious blankie.

“I poopied my panties,” he gritted out.

Garrett and I turned beet-red, holding in our laughter. I swear, my stomach was cramping because I couldn’t breathe.

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