And here she was, looking as sideswiped as me. James gestured for her to sit. Her forehead crunched but she slipped in, opposite me, against the wall.
As my cousins sat back down, I looked at anyone but her, my chest thick with pain. “What is this? Y’all said this was guys’ night.”
James grabbed a vacant seat from the table behind him, flipped it around, and straddled it at the end of the table, clearly the ringleader. “This is an intervention.”
There was fire in Charlie’s eyes, all her ire aimed at Theo. “You said you were taking me out for a burger.”
“I am,” Theo said. “And an intervention.”
“For what?” I snapped.
“For you two,” Theo said.
“Because you belong together,” Griff said, like it was obvious.
“And because we feel like we’re caught between two thunderclouds,” Bowen said with an unrepentant shrug.
“You’ve both been in terrible moods since that kiss in Anna and Blue’s pool,” Liam rounded it out.
Why had Charlie been in a bad mood?
I couldn’t help it. I looked at her then.
I shouldn’t have. She was too freaking beautiful—hair in a half up-half down style. Her beautiful eyes were glossy and wrecked, pulling me in even while trying to let me go.
My own burned with hot tears. I closed them and rubbed my temples, irritated at my well-meaning, but completely off-base cousins.
“We saw the kiss,” Liam said. “Both of them. Everyone knows you’re in love with each other.”
“So you can quit acting like you’re not,” Griffin chimed in. “No one believes it.”
“Literally,” Bowen said.
“Charlie’s not acting,” I said under my breath, staring at a scratch in the wood.
“What does that mean?” James asked.
“Nothing,” I muttered.
“It means something,” Theo barked. “Or you wouldn’t have said it.”
“Stop,” Charlie said weakly. “Leave him alone.”
“Fine,” Theo said, crossing his arms. “You tell us then. Why aren’t you together?”
“It’s none of your business,” she said, making her tone hard. “None.”
“Nah. Nuh uh. That’s not going to cut it,” Liam said with a frustrated laugh. “Maybe if we weren’t all family. But we are.”
“You’re making us all miserable,” Griffin said.
“And uncomfortable,” James added. “We feel like we’re children in the middle of a custody battle.”
“Dramatic much?” I huffed.
But it wasn’t. When Charlie came to sit with us on the back deck during Dupree Family Sunday Dinner, I’d gotten up and left. Same with our last game night. I wasn’t trying to be a douche. It was simply a matter of survival. The ache of her not wanting me was so intense, it hurt to breathe when she was around. Just like it did right then. It only lessened slightly when she wasn’t. But at least when I was alone, I didn’t have to mask the hurt.
I looked away. Only to see a table of guys oglingher. One guy was egging another to come over and talk to her. That was obvious from their gestures. And I’d have to sit here and watch it happen.
