“No, no. Not an ex-lover.”
“A current lover then?” Lucy waggled her eyebrows.
“No, no. Not a lover…”
“That sounds like a boyfriend to me,” Penny said, laughing. “A boyfriend no one knows about. How exciting.”
“No, to be expected,” Lucy said, shrugging. “If Jack and Dax were my brothers, I’d keep my boyfriend a secret too. Way too stressful.”
“Hey. Jack’s not that bad,” Penny defended her better half. “He doesn’t mind you using Tinder, for example. He thinks Dax needs to chill.”
“Oh, in principle, he has to,” Lucy agreed, grinning. “But his high energy has its upsides.”
Anna grimaced. “My brother, Lucy! My brother.”
“Well, shut me up and tell us about your mystery man!”
Anna sighed.
She wanted to be honest, simply be honest after all these years of never having any girlfriends to confide in because her parents or her entire living situation had been too embarrassing. And, after all, she didn’t need to mention any names.
“Okay, there’s this man…”
“I knew it!” Lucy thrust her hand in the air triumphantly. “For more than a few months, right? Because I could have sworn I found some shirt buttons on your couch, and every time you checked your phone, when you were about to kick us out, you had that look on your face…the look that didn’t exactly screamI can’t wait to get back to studying.
Shit. She and Lucas hadn’t been that cautious after all.
Anna was surprised no scouts with marshmallows were gathering around her because her cheeks were a campfire. “Yeah, okay. I’ve been seeing him for a while,” she capitulated.
“Goodness.” Penny nodded, impressed. “Your family’s really good at keeping secrets, aren’t they?”
Oh, she had no idea.
“How do you know him?” Maddie asked.
“I met him on Tinder,” she lied hastily.
“And you’re together? Really?” Penny looked at her hopefully. “And things are getting serious, and you want to tell your brothers so I don’t have to keep it a secret? I hate keeping secrets!”
She grimaced. “No, not exactly.”
Penny groaned and Lucy leaned forward. “Why not?”
“Well, we were actually enjoying something purely physical, but we both agreed that it was not getting us anywhere right now and…” She sighed. “I don’t know, do you think it’s possible to stay friends with an ex-lover?”
“That’s your plan?” Penny asked, frowning. “From fuck buddies to just buddies?”
“Yeah, something like that.”
“Hmm,” Lucy said. “Do you like him?”
Dumbfounded, Anna opened her mouth. The question was simple, but if she was honest, she hadn’t given it much thought.
Sure, she was obsessed with him, but did she like Lucas? As a…person? Not just as a sexual partner who made her laugh and groan, but as a person?
She liked his dry humor and that he used few words but still expressed himself clearly. She liked that his body spoke only to her. She liked that he had accepted his niece into his life without thinking twice, and obviously loved her very much. That he could apologize, even if it sometimes took a while. She liked that he saw her as Anna, not as Jack and Dax’s sister. That he made her feel like the most beautiful woman in the world. That he…
“Okay, she likes him,” Maddie interrupted her train of thought. “In that case: No, don’t stay friends with him.”
