“The fuck up that I am.”
River kneeled. “Dude, you’re not a fuck up. You’re one of the most capable people I know. What happened?”
“I got married.”
He let out a surprised gasp at the same time the door to my brother’s room opened.
Emery poked his head out. “I thought I heard something. Do you want to come inside? Adam is here.”
We stood and followed him inside.
River went straight to Adam, who looked like he wanted to punch me when we walked in.
“What are you doing here?” Adam spat. “Haven’t you done enough? Victoria doesn’t deserve this. I don’t deserve this. Why don’t you just go and leave us?”
“Adam,” Lex said. “Let’s hear him out.”
“Why? I think I’ve heard enough.”
I stood my ground, trying to portray a calmness I didn’t feel. “You’ve heard nothing, Adam, but you’ve made plenty of assumptions, haven’t you? God forbid your whore of a brother actually falls in love, right? Who’d be the butt of your jokes then?” I paced the small space by the door. My instincts told me I should leave now, but I was too angry and keyed up. “This is a fucking circus, Adam. You’ve been walking on eggshells around Victoria since the day you met her. I’m already the black sheep of the family, so I don’t care if you hate me any more than you already do, but you have to hear this.”
He took a step forward, but River held him back.
“Don’t walk on eggshells for the rest of your life,” I continued. “At my wedding, we didn’t try to impress anyone. There were no choirs or string quartets. It was just us. Our reception was cake and champagne in our hotel room. You know what’s been the best part so far? Knowing I had him all to myself. That no one else’s judgmental stares or comments came between us.”
Tears started running down my cheeks. Every word out of my mouth was a realization that the only fake thing about my marriage was the agreement to make it fake, at least for me.
“You know what was the worst? Not sharing my happiness with the most important people in my life. But look at what happened when you found out? No one thought I got so caught up in love that I couldn’t wait to get married. No one. But everyone thought I messed up big time, and now I’m ruiningsomeone else’s celebration. I think that says more about you than it does about me.”
Adam was stunned into silence. Lex and Emery looked at each other.
I turned around to leave.
“Have you seen these?” Adam pulled out his phone and turned it to me. “You went to the mayor’s ball. You hung out with fucking royalty. It’s like we don’t know who you are anymore. You have a secret life. Why? Have we been so bad to you that you couldn’t tell us you were happy?”
I fell on a nearby chair like a deflating balloon.
“When I told you I saw Lior in Atlanta, you asked me straight-up if I’d hooked up with him. That’s the opinion you have of me. That I would do that, even with a client. How could I tell you that even though we didn’t hook up, we spent the whole weekend together as friends? We talked about business and ourselves, and for only the second time in my life, I made a true connection with another person. Something so precious that I didn’t want it tainted by my reputation.”
Lex crouched beside me. “Can you tell us your story with Lior? I like him. He helped Emery when he had the flashback on the side of the road. Emery could have been seriously hurt, not to mention he was confused over regaining some of his memories that included us. Lior found him and made sure he got home safely. That meant a lot to me.”
I’d forgotten about that. It had happened before Atlanta and the wedding. I’d kept my life so segregated in the last few months that I’d forgotten about the tenuous connections between us.
“I met Lior by chance at Tanner’s. We hooked up.” I looked at Adam. “I’ll give you this one.” And then I turned to Lex. “It was a one-time thing. We didn’t even exchange names. Weeks later, I got his contact information about the museum. That’s when Ifound out who he was. I didn’t want to miss the opportunity for us to work with Van Stern Enterprises so that’s why I sent you to meet him. I didn’t see him again until Atlanta. We hung out. I didn’t lie to you at our meeting. We had a connection, but he was working with us, so we decided to not pursue anything.”
“But you must have,” Lex said.
“I bumped into him at Tanner’s when I was meeting up with Jax. He was on a date.” I smiled as I remembered how possessive I’d felt of him. “I kinda stopped the date and made him come home with me.”
“Awww.”
We all looked at Emery. He blushed and tucked his curly hair behind his ear. “Sorry.”
I chuckled.
“And then what?” Adam asked. “You tripped and landed on the first commercial flight to Vegas? You sneezed and fell face-first into The Little Chapel of Love? Don’t insult our intelligence, Noah.”
I sighed. “I’m sorry. We…Lior took us away for the weekend. Jax and Tanner came with us. We got carried away, and it seemed like a good idea. I know it was fast, but…” I looked at Lex and then Emery. If anyone would understand my connection with Lior, it was them. Even if I was only telling my side of the story.
