All laughter stops and cold fury settles across Mase’s face, clouding his eyes.
“Declan,” he warns, my full name testament to that. “I am going to make allowances for the fact that you have been knocked on your arse by Anita. However, if you ever refer to the shagging of my wife like she’s one of your usual slappers or make my fucking of her into awho can piss the highestcontest I will put you on your actual arse, understand?”
I can see he’s seething and regret my words. I regretted them as soon as they were out. “Sorry.” I apologise guiltily. “What do I do?” I am desperate for a solution to my turmoil and confusion.
“Go to dinner if that’s what you’ve agreed. No more sex until you’ve talked and if you can’t agree on what you want, need, cut her loose.”
“And if I don’t want to cut her loose?”
“Then we’re back to you being fucked like I was from the second I set eyes on Livy.”
“Shit,” I hiss as I realise the enormity of things because I was there when Mase met Olivia, but me and Anita, it can’t be the same, can it?
“Hey, there’s my boys,” our dad calls as he ascends the stairs. “Your mum was looking for you,” he tells me. Turning to Mase he grins. “And your wife is setting the dancefloor alight.”
“What did I tell her?” Mase asks as he leaps to his feet.
“Clearly you took too long.” I laugh, reminding him of Olivia’s words.
“Don’t look so amused little brother…you’ve got all of this to come,” he says but is already descending the stairs two at a time followed by me and my dad who has just slapped my back for no reason I can think of.
Maybe I should cancel dinner. This is a really bad idea. I am not Mase and I do not want or need what he has, not now, not ever…not anymore, and Anita needs to accept that.
Anita
Liv leads me into the reception and immediately grabs us a couple of glasses of champagne before directing me to sit at a small table in the corner. She watches me closely, too closely meaning I am in no way surprised when she launches into a discussion on how I came to be upstairs with Dec.
“So, Dec?” she asks and like that I am busted.
My mouth curls into a huge smile, but I am already flushing and then taking on a very guilty expression, I can feel it so I know she can see it. I nod but say nothing. I have no clue what to say. What is there to say and what is she expecting? I am clueless as to what Mase may or may not have told her meaning I am at a serious disadvantage in knowing exactly what herso, Dec,question means. It could just be that she is curious to know why we were upstairs together, or it could be that she’d like to know why I thought getting shagged against the wall of the honeymoon suite she will be sharing with her new husband was ever an option.
My mind drifts back to our earlier, interrupted conversation in the hotel room when I was talking about when she first met Mase, specifically the part where she said she expected that Dec knew about her and Mase which now makes me wonder if Mase knows about me and Dec. There’s no doubt that he was surprised to find us shagging in his room, but with hindsight he didn’t seem too startled to see me and Dec together meaning his brother knows that wasn’t our first time, but just what does my sister know?
“Anita, I feel a bit uncomfortable asking this,” she says nervously and my heart sinks as I imagine where this conversation is going. “Upstairs, you and Dec?” I can see an awkward flush creeping up her cheeks meaning she doesn’t want to ask me, but she continues. “The honeymoon suite, you and Dec…”
I am crapping myself now because if she suspects what we’ve done and I confirm it she could go off on one, rightfully so, but I do not need my recent shag, as amazing as it was to be outed in this very full room.
“I can explain,” I begin, but Liv is already picking up her earlier conversation.
“I can take a joke, so can Mase. We laugh, a lot, but if you’ve done something to our room, something bad it might not go down too well. Today has been perfect so far and I want it to continue that way. Mase needs it to be perfect, for me he thinks, but he needs perfection more than me. After everything with Raymond, losing the baby and the court case, Mase needs today to be the first day of forever for us both and our future babies,” she explains with a grin and I realise that she thinks Dec and I were unscrewing the legs on their bed or filling it with condoms, or whatever else people do to newlyweds and the relief I first felt at her misunderstanding is replaced with guilt as I replay her words.
“Are you pregnant?” I ask her with a grin for hers and Mase’s future babies and a suspicious glance in the direction of her untouched champagne flute.
Liv shakes her head. “Not that I’m aware of, although I haven’t had a period for five weeks.” She grins. “I might have packed a pregnancy test for our honeymoon though.”
“Wow, that’s great.” I mean it. It would be great if she was pregnant, great for Mase and her and they’ll be great parents whenever their time comes. I then think of our dad and just how thrilled he’ll be to be a grandad. My smile disappears at that moment as a cocktail of emotions flood my brain.
Olivia is already turning the conversation back to Dec and doesn’t seem to notice anything untoward in my mood or expression.
“I think Dec likes you, the way he looks at you…” and then the penny drops for her. “Oh my God, you and Dec, bloody hell. He was the one, wasn’t he? At our engagement party?” She doesn’t wait for an answer. Her mind is already putting the pieces together with a gasp. “Upstairs, you and Dec…Anita, please be careful,” she pleads with a concerned frown. “Dec is a man whore. I love him, and he and Mase are close, but that’s what Mase calls him, a man whore, which is fine…”
Oh shit, she is doing the rambling thing our dad does and I need her to stop before I end up confessing all my sins and hidden skeletons come falling out of every closet I’ve hidden them in.
“Liv, I know. I know what Dec is, but it’s fine. We’re going out to dinner, soon, to talk. We both know that it’s complicated because of our families being linked and neither of us planned what happened and we weren’t expecting what happened to happen, either time,” I say, hoping I am explaining myself clearly, but with thoughts of the twice Dec and I have had sex I can’t keep the grin off my face.
“Bloody hell!” Liv mutters and then laughs. “You’ve got that face…I had that face from the first time I shagged Mase. If he is anything like his brother, you won’t ever be able to move on. Nobody will ever come close,” she tells me with an arched eyebrow that is also questioning me further.
“It’s like nothing I have ever known,” I finally admit with the biggest of grins that my sister reciprocates and then we both laugh again.
