Page 70 of Filthy Rich Ex's Brothers

“Hey!” Ryan complains as he stumbles into the house, “Don’t I get a kiss, too?”

I wait to give him his until we’re climbing on the Vespa and I’m wrapping my arms around his middle. For him, I press a kiss right on the back of his neck, and I feel his shiver of pleasure all the way down.

Chapter 37

Serena

In the quiet of my room, I lie on my back and stare at the ceiling. The trees rustle against the side of the house, the sound traveling through the open balcony doors. The room is sweet and light with the scent of citrus, the sea, the impossible rolling hills of green.

But I’m not thinking about the scenery or the delicious fish Ryan made for us tonight. I’m not thinking about the walk with Graham through wild lemon trees, the gorgeous vista he showed me, and how his hand slipped to the small of my back.

Instead of anything that might bring me even a little peace, I’m thinking about my best friend.

Ex-best friend.

My mind rolls the tape on a loop. I think about confronting Bianca. I imagine walking back into the house and finding her there, yelling at her, asking her what she was thinking. If our friendship meant nothing to her. If she was with Alex before he cut things off with me.

If she had anything to do with my things being thrown out on the lawn.

Would she cry? Would she try to defend herself? Would there be some way, somehow, that this whole thing was a mistake?

Finally, after more than an hour of tossing and turning, trying to convince myself to sleep and being unable to, I get up. Moving quickly, I grab my camera, pull on a sweater, and pull my curls into a bun so they don't whip around my face in the wind.

The heft of my camera in my hands already makes me feel better.

Sleep won’t come, so I might as well do the one thing that always manages to take my mind off of things. When Graham and I walked through the lemon trees earlier, I found myself automatically composing shots, thinking about how I could show thefeelingof the place. Symmetry in the lemons themselves, beauty in the leaves, yet wildness, an untamed kind of flavor rooted in the haphazard way they dot the countryside.

A sort of euphoria floats through me as I tiptoe through the house, the tile floor cool under my bare feet. It’s silent and a little eerie, the moonlight filtering in through the huge windows in the living room. When I pass the couch, I can’t stop myself from glancing down, thinking about what Graham and I did togetherright there.

Outside, the breeze flutters against my skin like a cat looking for affection. I push into my Birkenstocks, walk down the front steps and re-trace the path Graham and I took earlier.

It’s different at night. At first, I think it might be spooky, that I might be too scared to go through with the night photography, but it’s not, and I’m not. It’s peaceful, a sort of quiet I haven’t experienced in a long time.

Well, not since being at the grotto with Graham. And before that… maybe never. Foster homes aren’t usually peaceful places, and living in the city, you get used to a certain level of background noise that never leaves. A sort of constant feedback of life, the bustle of always being near other humans.

As I walk, lemon trees sprout up around me, and I let myself fall into the art.

Moonlight shines on the fruit like sorbetto, all pale yellow.

I let my photos blur a little, adjust the settings and aim for a gauzy sort of feel. It captures what it’s really like out here—a dream.

I’m so enraptured with what I’m doing that I don’t realize there’s something or someone following me until I hear the crack of a branch.

My body goes still. I try to remember what Graham said when we were walking, if he mentioned anything dangerous out here. Are there bobcats? Could I fight a bobcat?

Maybe I could throw my camera at it.

But I don’t want to do that. Not withthesepictures on the SD card.

“Serena.”

The scream I let out is blood-curdling, and I throw my camera at the imaginary animal. Luckily, the strap around my neck snaps taut, stopping it from falling on the ground. It thumps lamely against my chest, and I cradle it again, a silent apology for sacrificing it.

“JesusChrist, Graham, you scared theshitout of me?—”

He steps out of the shadows and closer to me, and my throat catches. Of course, the man is handsome in low light, too. The size of him always hits me first, but now my eyes travel over his beard, the button-up shirt that hangs open on his broad chest, the backward ball cap on his head. Why isthatso attractive?

“You shouldn’t be out here by yourself,” he says, his eyes dropping down to my feet. “And definitely not in sandals.”