Life was funny. I desperately wanted Mr. Right and a happily ever after so much I was trying to force it, while Silas only wanted a good time with a series of Mr. Right Nows.
I wasn’t sure which of us was more messed up.
CHAPTER 3
Hank
“Didn’tI ask you to move these clothes last week?”
I picked up a pair of sweats, gym shorts, two T-shirts, and socks from the leather wingback chair I’d picked up at an estate sale when I moved to Granville to save my brother from eviction.
Stale sweat and another scent I’d rather not associate with my brother clung to the laundry.
“Ugh.” I dropped the bundle on his lap where he sprawled on the sofa. “Go wash this.”
“I’ll get to it,” Corey said without looking away from the shooter game playing out on the screen. He wore a headset and laughed at something someone had said. “Yeah, my brother is so fucking fussy. If I wanted to be mothered, I’d have stayed back home, you know?”
I pulled his headset off, irritation flaring. “It’s not fussy to not want to live in a pigsty, Corey.”
He groaned. “Dude, what’s the point of having a bachelor pad if you’re going to be so uptight?”
“This isn’t a bachelor pad,” I said. “It’s not required that a house with two men in it be filthy.”
“Like I said, uptight,” he said with a shit-eating grin.
I picked up a T-shirt and threw it over his head. “Don’t be a shithead. I moved here to help you out, not to?—”
My phone rang, cutting across my words.
“That’s not Mom, is it?” Corey said, sounding like a scared little kid. “Don’t tell her I lost my job. You know how judgmental she is!”
I glanced at the Caller ID. It was our cousin. But this seemed like a great opportunity to motivate my brother.
“I won’t if you clean up and remember you’re a grown-ass man.”
My brother jumped from the couch and gathered loose clothes. “All right, I’m doing it. Be cool, man.”
“Oh, I’m always cool,” I said with a smirk as I lifted my phone to my ear.
My brother scuttled off to the laundry room. Our mom was a perfectly nice person. Too nice, maybe? She was someone who expected a lot of us, though, and when we didn’t live up to it, we could hear the disappointment in her voice.
I had learned to shrug it off, but Corey was used to being the baby of the family. It was harder for him to own up to his mistakes.
“Hey, Fox,” I said into the phone. “What’s up?”
“Not much. Same shit. I’m sick of this town.”
I chuckled. “You should move to Granville. It’s cute.”
“I don’t think cute is really my vibe.”
Fox was a tattoo artist, and his last boyfriend was a badass biker, so he had a point.
“Omaha, then?” I suggested.
“Actually, that’s a great idea. Let’s go to Omaha for the weekend.”
That wasn’t what I’d meant, and he knew it.
