”Havoc.” I said with a growl as I reached his table, flopping down without an invite. I watched as his eyes travelled to my mud-caked boots, and a sneer curled his lips. ”No one calls me Liam anymore.”
“Make yourself at home, why don’t you?”
“Yeah, I was going to, thanks.” Jesus, could he be any more pompous? What a complete and utter ass. I looked around, my own lip curling. “Why am I here?” The table he was at was set with three place settings. A small posy of happy looking yellow flowers sat in the middle of the white table cloth.
“Could you have not left …” He waved his hand in my general direction. “Thatat home and worn something more appropriate?”
The cut. He was talking about my cut, like the leather offended him somehow.
Hypocrite.
“No.” I studied him over the table. My little half brother. The reason my father had left my mother and abandoned us stared straight back at me, his eyes unwavering. “Why are we here, Lucas?” I didn’t have the time or the inclination for his crap today. We weren’t exactly best pals. Hell, I hadn’t even known he existed until my old man’s funeral five years ago. And we had only met once in that time.
That one time was all it had taken to realise we had absolutely nothing in common.
“I wanted you to meet someone. I wanted to tell you face to face that I was getting married.”
So he had come to gloat, which wasn’t surprising at all. He had always been good at gloating.
Look at what college I got into.
Look at how much money I make.
Look at me.
Look at me.
I wasn’t bitter. I liked my life. But I was suffering from a major case of blue balls, thanks to a certain dick tease and her mind-altering hips.
Shit, I adjusted myself under the table. Just the thought of her was enough to make me hard.
“Was?” My eyebrows quirked up. He had said ‘was’. “You said ‘was’?”
His face shut down, like a shutter closing tight over his eyes, and I bit back a laugh.
“She called it off, but it’s fine… it’s…” His face told me it wasn’t fine at all. “She will come round.”
I laughed. Pulling the pack of cigarettes from my pocket, I tapped it on the table absently. And my brother’s eyes flashed. “You can’t smoke in here.”
Go figure.
“So what happened to make her drop your ass, little brother?” My voice was mocking, and I didn’t even try to hide it.
“She didn’t drop my ass. We just had a disagreement. I made a few mistakes in our relationship, that’s all…”
A few mistakes. I knew what that meant. He had been playing around and been caught out. “Looks like the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.” He could pretend all he liked that he wasn’t like our father. Or at least how our father used to be but there it was.
“You can talk.”
I couldn’t help it. I grinned. “Only difference there, little brother, is that I’m not the settling down type, so I can never be accused of cheating. The women in my life know exactly what they are getting into. Can you say the same about the poor girl you tricked into marrying you?”
Air left his lungs in a whoosh. His lips pursed. “I didn’t trick her into marrying me. She loves me…” His eyes grew wide, and I turned in my seat to see what he was staring at.
Well, fuck.
I watched as her footsteps faltered. Her chin tilted up as she stared at us. And even from across the room, I knew the moment she recognised me. The bottom lip that I had tasted with my tongue disappeared between her teeth.
Yeah, she definitely recognised me. I gave her my best shit-eating grin as my brother called her over with a wave.
