Apparently that level of detail was a bridge too far.
“Franky, I can’t do it. I’m sorry.”
Disappointment wrenched my gut. I had laid out my case, and this was not the kind of ask that improved with repeating. I had been so sure he would want to help, but evidently, there were limits to our friendship.
“Okay, thanks for listening.”
He took a step forward, as if to hug me. We weren’t really huggers, and I’d prefer not to start now. Instead, I backed away, my spine slamming into the doorknob, then quickly turned and staggered out. Failed before I had shot out of the blocks.
The hallway was not empty.
Jason Isner stood in a casual lean against the wall, making no secret of his interest in his older brother’s personal life. My personal life.
Both brothers were tall, dark, and green-eyed, but that was where the similarities ended. Where Sean was kind, empathetic, and warmhearted, Jason was … pardon my French, a dick. Recently traded to the Chicago Rebels, my dad’s old team, he had started popping up in places I usually considered safe from his brand of jockery (definition: mockery from a boorish athlete-type). My local coffee shop, the bar I occasionally frequented with my sister and friends, and now a dinner party.
The years had not brought us closer; if anything, they had entrenched our mutual dislike. But usually I felt on solid, intellectually superior ground around him. Not today. Now he was seeing me at my lowest point.
“Eavesdropping?” I snapped.
“Walls are pretty thin here.” He pushed off from one of those supposedly thin walls and moved in closer. Another thing I didn’t like about him was how he used his physicality to take up all the room and oxygen. So greedy.
“So you thought you’d listen in on a private conversation?”
“I thought I’d look out for my brother. Or maybe you think I’m too stupid to know how to do that.”
Still peeved about my earlier comments, then.
“I don’t think you’re stupid, Jason. But I do think you’re emotionally stunted.”
He moved closer, bringing all six feet and change to bear as he loomed over my five-foot-five frame. As I wasn’t interested in getting a crick in my neck looking up at him, I focused on his throat. Thick, strong, muscled, tanned … the typical throat of a man who spent far too much time in the gym.
He spoke to the top of my head. “Well, good thing you won’t be relying on me to be the best uncle to your kid. As they say, ‘Bullet. Dodged.’”
Of course, all he could see was his brother’s lucky escape, never mind the pain Sean’s rejection had caused me. Tears threatened, but I hadn’t cried in close to thirty years and I sure as hell would not be giving Jason Isner the satisfaction of witnessing my breakdown. I needed to get out of here, but I refused to allow him the last word.
“And there you go, proving my point.”
And then I crashed through the apartment’s front door before he could get another volley off.
Chapter Five
Jason
* * *
The audacity.
I was still fuming as I pulled out of the parking space just outside Rosie and Addy’s apartment in downtown Riverbrook. How in the hell did Franky St. James think asking a guy to donate his sperm was a good idea?
First, friends didn’t ask friends for baby batter.
Second, couldn’t she have found a boyfriend to do this important task?
Third, failing that, surely there were clinics for this sort of thing.
I had assumed that as a scientist, she’d be all over the test tube, baby-in-a-lab option. A total egghead, this woman usually had her nose buried in a book or a slug lair (or whatever you called a crib for slimy creatures), occasionally looking up to pronounce judgment on vapid, no-brained, muscle-bound lugs who could barely string a sentence together. So sometimes I did have trouble getting words out around her because the rare times we intersected, she insisted on goading me.
But I had no problem using my words when it came to protecting Sean.
