Page 87 of My Brother’s Best Friends Entanglement

"And what? Would you like another raspberry?"

"No!” I practically slam the bottle down on the ground in frustration. “For fuck's sake, Alexia! Did you have a serious relationship?"

She shrugs, “If you define six months as serious then, I guess i did, yes."

I bite down so hard I'm pretty sure I chip a tooth. “What was his fucking name? And where does he live?"

The way she’s surveying me now tells she’s not done toying wiht me. “Hmm, which one?"

I jump to my feet, lucky she'd already slid off, or she'd have ended up dumped onto the blanket. "What do you mean 'which one'?"

She shrugs and reaches for a raspberry and plops it into her mouth. "I mean, it's a pretty straightforward question."

I drag a hand down my face, trying to breathe so I don't die from a stroke. What is wrong with me? When have I ever given a shit if a woman's had a serious relationship? As long as they didn't think we were in one, I couldn't have cared less.

Until now.

"Please," I say, kneeling down in front of her, my hands clasped in prayer. "Take pity on me, what is the name or names of the people you had serious relationships with."

She leans back on her hands. "Well, again, if we're using the metric as six months..."

"Alexia!"

She dissolves into a giggling fit so severe that it morphs into her almost choking, and I hand her my beer so she doesn’t due before answering my fucking question. She take a low sip, and the way her lips close over the rim of the bottle temporarily distracts me, but then the way I can feel my pulse raging in my throat reminds me of what we’re talking about.

"I dated casually," she starts, finally taking pity on my poor heart, "if I had time. Most guys I just saw now and then, no real commitment. There were two guys I dated more than a few times. One for over six months, and one we dated for a year and a half."

"A fucking year and a half?!" I grab the bottle of beer back and chug it.

"Yeah but it wasn't serious. We were both really busy, there were stretches of time when I only saw him like once or twice a week."

I try not to do the maths in my head of how many times she was with him. And what they were doing when they were together. “And how did it end?"

"Amicably. He moved away when he finished his Bachelors. He wanted to do long distance. I didn't. It ended. No hard feelings."

"Between the two of you maybe," I mutter under my breath. "A year and a half. I've known marriages that last for less. Did he meet your mother? Leon? Did you pick out china patterns."

She rolls her eyes. "You done? Because I'd like to move on to the next part of the evening, which doesn't involve talking about my ex-boyfriends."

I grit my teeth at the term. She has ex-boyfriends. Plural. "Fine. What's the next part of the evening?"

She pats the blanket. I sit. And then she's back in my lap like it's the most natural thing in the world, like she's done it a thousand times, her knees bracketing my hips, my shirt riding up her thighs, her naked core pressing against me.

"Okay, I like this next part of the evening," I say, hands finding her soft, delectable waist.

"What about you, though," she says after a minute, her fingers tracing idle shapes against my shoulder. "Do you have any serious relationships?"

It doesn't go unnoticed that she says "do" and not "did". I'm not really sure what to make of that. Does she think I'm cheating on someone right now? "I dated," I say carefully. "A lot. I mean, calling it dating might be a stretch, if we're being honest, which apparently we're being tonight."

She nods and rocks a little and it make me temporarily forget my own name. "I know your reputation, Marcus. Everyone in a hundred-kilometre radius knows your reputation."

"Yeah." I look past her, out shadows the clouds are forming in the dark sky. "I want you to know something, though. I might not have considered having long term relationships with them but I also never treated any of them badly. Never lied about what it was. Most of them felt the same way. I'm still mates with a lot of them. If you ran into Tracey tonight, she'd probably hug you before she hugged me." She makes a face that tells me either she doesn't believe me, or doesn't like the prospect of seeing Tracey again. "But, it's never..."

"Never what?" she asks, quiet, watching my face like she's trying to read the sentence I didn't finish.

"Never been like this," I say.

I should say the rest of what I mean. But I can't. Because for the first time tonight, there's a cold thread of guilt running through our picture perfect night. Leon. Whatever this is, whatever it's becoming, can't be anything until he's okay with it. And I can't commit, not until I know I'm not blowing up the one family that ever accepted me.