“I've been his sister for twenty-eight years.” I peer at her through my fingers. “I know it's bad. Spill.”
“He told me my beginner slope rotation was ‘inefficient.’” Dixie's air quotes are so aggressive they nearly splash water. “Inefficient. I’ve been running that program for four years. He’s been a partner for ten months, doesn’t even live here, and there’s not even snow on the damn ground yet. But please, Roman—tell me more about how to do my job based on your limited experience playing with your specialty log.”
Charlie goes human sprinkler and spits hot chocolate across her blanket.
“You know what I meant!” Dixie snaps, cheeks flushed hotter than the tub. “His craft. His woodworking. His—” She sees the faces around her and groans. “Oh, shut up. All of you.”
“I didn't say anything,” Eve manages, shoulders shaking.
“Yeah, because you also have a boner for wood. Well, professionally speaking.”
Eve’s face shifts—lips pinched, one eyebrow cocked like a loaded crossbow. Her drink hovers mid-air, steaming slightly in the winter air. She’s clearly calculating whether to let that slide or drown Dixie where she sits.
“Wait. That didn’t sound right.”
“You think?” Eve says, finally sipping, voice so dry it could sand down a two-by-four.
I make a mental note to give Roman absolute hell about this later. My brother, Mr. Smooth Operator, getting under someone's skin this badly? After barely knowing her a year?
And yet somehow not charming his way out of it?
Interesting.
“Can we go back to interrogating Sierra?” Dixie demands. “I was enjoying that.”
“Fine.” Holly turns that laser focus back to me. “You were saying. Everett's pushing. You're 'strategically retreating.' And?”
“And nothing.” I drain my champagne. “We're going to survive this week, the festival will end, and everything will go back to normal.”
“Normal being...?”
“Him in his life. Me in mine. Pretending we never happened.”
The silence that follows is even more pointed than before.
“That sounds healthy,” Charlie says finally. “And not at all like a recipe for dying alone surrounded by cats and regret.”
“I like cats.”
“Everyone likes cats,” Charlie says. “That's not the point.”
“What is the point?” The words come out sharper than I intend. “What am I supposed to do? Walk up to my three overprotective brothers and say, 'Hey, remember your best friend? The one you've known since you were kids? I've been secretly in love with him for eleven years and oh, by the way, we were together before he left. Really together. Looking for my virginity? Check his pockets. And yeah, there’s that little matter of lying to your faces ever since.' That'll go over great.”
Holly sets down her champagne glass. “Sierra.”
“They'll never forgive me. Either of us. They had a deal?—”
“Sierra.”
“—and Roman will lose his mind, Nolan will do that quiet disappointed thing that's somehow worse, and Caleb will probably try to fight Everett which is just embarrassing for everyone because Everett would destroy him?—”
“Sierra.”
I stop. Breathe. Realize my hands are shaking.
Holly's expression softens. “You've been carrying this alone for a really long time, haven't you?”
The question cracks something open in my chest.
