“Okay,” she says with a sigh. “Now that the guys are gone, let’s chat. The kids are feeling one another out and are enjoying the blocks on the floor. Do you want an iced coffee?”
Oh god.
I can’t even think about iced coffee right now. All I can think about is how much she’s going to hate me by the end of today. Thank goodness Eli left me his pickup, because I have a feeling I’ll be leaving early.
“No thanks,” I murmur.
She smiles, and still, it’s sweet as pie. Inwardly, I cringe as I wait for the other shoe to drop, but as she moves around the kitchen and begins to speak, I realize that she’s telling me her story. She’s not even asking me about mine at all.
“I wouldn’t care if Eli told you, but I doubt he would, even though he’s honestly one of the nosiest guys in the group. But he and Luke almost had a falling out over it. I’m pretty sure there’s still a bit of contention between them, so he probably isn’t going to offer the information. But since it was in the news and tabloids and was a whole drama, I figure it’s better you hear it straight from me,” Clara announces.
I sit at the kitchen island, ass planted on the barstool, and listen to a fascinating story about how she and Luke got together. They were discovered having sex in a club and then got outed and almost broke up over it all.
“So you’re not actually siblings,” I say.
She shakes her head, stirring her iced coffee with one of those glass straws. On a side note, I always wondered how those were cleaned because I have no idea how you get soap on the inside of a teeny-tiny straw like that. And while I’m hyperfocusing on said straw, Clara continues.
“No, we didn’t even know one another until we were adults. We’re stepsiblings.”
“Oh, so they really just went on a whole dramatic thing with it and blew it out of proportion,” I say.
She hums, lifting the glass before she wraps her lips around the straw and takes a sip. “Totally. I almost lost my job, and Luke could have lost his spot on the team due to a morality clause. It was a whole drama, but thankfully, it worked out well,” she says, then her gaze shifts past my shoulder, and she gets this dreamy smile on her lips. “Really well,” she breathes.
I know she’s looking at her daughter Sloane. It gives me a moment to glance over at Ryan as well. The two of them are still playing with the blocks, stacking them and watching them fall, and then stacking them again. It’s adorable.
“I’m sure you know my story as well,” I whisper as I shift my attention away from Ryan and back to her.
Clara’s eyes widen. “I don’t know more than you guys had a one-night stand two years ago.”
“That’s all?” I ask, knowing it’s a lie.
This is Eli’s best friend’s wife, his roommate at one time, and she doesn’t know that I ghosted him? Granted, it was due to my own embarrassment, and really, I had no reason to do so, but I didn’t know that two years ago.
“All I know is that it was a one-night stand. You were in college, and he couldn’t get hold of you. Figured you regretted it and just didn’t want to deal with him.”
Slowly, I turn my head and look at Ryan. “I didn’t regret it then, couldn’t regret anything that has to do with him, and even if I wanted to, I couldn’t now.”
Fingers curl around my wrist, and I look back to Clara. She’s smiling, a little wetness in her eyes as she does. “He’s a good guy,” she says softly. “Loves his family. Loves his friends and is trustworthy.”
“Are you trying to sell him?” I ask with a laugh.
She shrugs a shoulder. “A hot hockey player who doesn’t have a stick shoved up his ass is not a hard sell,” she says, then winks. “Plus, he doesn’t date, and then there’s the way he looks at you.”
“Looks at me?”
Clara hums while sucking on her straw again before she nods her head. “Looks at you. It’s the same way that I sometimes catch Luke looking at me. Which is the only reason I recognized it.”
“How is that?” I ask.
I’m almost afraid to actually say the words because I’m not sure if I want to know. I’m not sure if I want to know anything at all. I think I want to stay completely inside of my little bubble of not knowing.
“Like he can’t believe you’re his and also like he wants to rip your clothes off at the same time.”
Wow.
I want to rip his clothes off, too…
ELI
