“What about the…”
“The lake access, too.”
A distant memory pops to the surface. Jackie covering her face when we watched that movie about a bear hunting a pair of lost hikers. “I read there are bears around—”
Carter and Eliza exchange a look. They both fight to smother their smiles, clearly in on a joke they don’t want to share.
“So far, Carter’s managed to escape unmauled,” she snickers. “We’ll be fine.”
“Did you consider getting guard dogs?”
Eliza gasps with delight. “Dogs?”
“I’d end up with twenty house pets,” Carter says, grinning at her disappointed pout. He steps closer, draping an arm around her middle and kissing her shoulder. “We can getadog, if you want.One.”
Eliza drops her chin to her chest to hide her smile, but Carter doesn’t miss it.
“What if something happens? Do you have an emergency response plan?”
“How about you have a chat with Derrick and Logan, if you’re so worried,” Carter says, with a smirk. “If they don’t hang up on you.”
Eliza glances between us, brows drawn together. “Should I be worried?”
“No,” he says, brushing the stray hair away and kissing the top of her head. “I’d never let anything happen to you or Jackie again.” Then he shoots me a smug look. “Because that’s what we do for the people we love. We protect them. Isn’t that right, Adam?”
I pretend I don’t understand what he’s getting at. “Oh, sure… unless she eats your last granola bar. Then all bets are off.”
Carter scoffs, but the corners of his mouth twitch.
My skull throbs. I’m cranky, not dumb. The ER doctor warned me about the potential aftereffects, but I didn’t expect them to hit so hard. Turns out bourbon-fueled, sleepless nights come with consequences after all.
Eliza looks at me with a widened gaze, like understanding is dawning on her. She’s the type of person who has an uncanny ability to read people’s minds, so I hastily take a particular interest in Carter’s cooking.
“Do you need help?” I say to change the subject.
Carter recoils. “No thanks, I don’t want food poisoning.”
“Carter, don’t be mean!” Eliza slaps his arm.
“You wouldn’t jump to his defense so fast if you were the one puking your guts out for two days,” Carter says, amused. “He tried one of his mom’s recipes in his first apartment. A chicken soup shouldneverhave clumps in it.”
I glare at him, but even I can’t help a snort of laughter.
“Tell her, Jackie.” Carter extends his arm toward his sister, who drifts into the kitchen, doing her best to pretend I’m not here. “You were there for the whole shitshow. Pun intended.”
She was there for it all. My firsts in a new city. She saw me struggling and held me tight. She laughed at my corny jokes. She showed me all the soft parts of her, the ones she kept locked away from everyone else.
At first, she was just Carter’s quiet little sister. We went from occasionally crossing paths in their mansion when Carter dragged me to New York on breaks, to being inseparable when I followed my best friend there after graduation. I was worried about him. That whole business with his college girlfriend had shattered him, and I didn’t trust his dad not to make things worse.
At some point, I started to notice the small things. Her razor-sharp humor. The unexpected way her mind worked when she had a problem.
And I wanted to know more.
I couldn’t help but observe the way strands of her hair curled under her chin when she tied it back into a ponytail. Or the delicate slope of her neck and the way it dipped between her collarbones. The perfect shape of her cupid’s bow.
Jackie tilts her head, silent for a beat. “It was a long time ago. I don’t remember.”
But then she finally looks at me. Something vivid and unbridled seizes in my chest, painfully familiar. That sharp stare says everything she refuses to put into words.
