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“Right,” she says, rolling her eyes. “The two of you are both single and sharing a hotel room instead of coming here. But you’re friends.”
“We didn’t share the hotel room on purpose, and as I told you on the phone, Rob and I are just taking a break. I’m not planning to spend that time screwing his best friend.”
“Something’s changed with you two, though,” she says. “He’s different. Proprietary.”
“He looks at me like a little sister,” I reply, but even I’m not so sure of that anymore. There have been plenty of moments over the last few weeks that you don’t have with a sibling.
“Tell me something: if I’d put you two in the same room all weekend, would anything happen?”
I’m saved from having to reply by Matthew, who comes barreling in and throws his little arms around my neck. He asks where Brendan is, and I’m grateful to deliver him to the room across the hall. And grateful to escape Olivia’s question. Because when I think about last night and the way I was about to combust lying there, I don’t like the answer.
* * *
I spend most of the afternoon inside with Olivia and Dorothy, while Brendan is out doing guy things around the grill with Will and the crew. As far as I can tell, those guy things mostly involve drinking beer and ridiculing the Seahawks.
After dinner, we pack all the gear in the van for tomorrow, and nearly everyone turns in early, since wake-up is at 4 AM. But Brendan and I remain, because I’m not ready for this day to end, and I guess he isn’t either. Every minute of it has been amazing.
We go out to the deck, and he pulls a bottle of champagne from behind his back and pops the cork.
“Isn’t that for tomorrow night?” I ask.
“We’re pre-celebrating. There’s tons left for tomorrow.” He drinks straight from the bottle and hands it to me. “Come on, where did firecracker Erin go?”
I take the champagne, because so far doing things Brendan’s way has worked out pretty well for me.
“Rob would never do this,” I say.
“You mean relax?”
“Yeah, that. Or sit out somewhere in the dark, without a purpose. Or drink straight off a bottle of champagne. He wouldn’t have stolen the bottle of champagne in the first place,” I add with a snort.
“It was weird when you guys got together,” Brendan says. “I didn’t think it would take. He’s so straight-laced.”
“I’m straight laced.”
“I’m not convinced that’s true.” He looks over at me.
It feels as if he’s reading every filthy thought I ever had. I hope not. They’re all about him.
We finish the bottle of champagne and begin a second one. I’m getting tipsy, which I usually find unsettling, having watched my dad do it for so long. But tonight it’s just lovely, all of it—the sky, the breeze, Brendan. It’s perfect, aside from the fact that I can’t stop taking in his profile, the sharp jut of his jaw in the moonlight, the softness of his mouth. And his legs… Normally it’s his upper body that’s my weakness, but right now only his legs are on display, and I’m forced to admit that they’re every bit as perfect as the rest of him.
“I’m sorry I was so shitty to you,” he says, apropos of nothing. “That night when you asked if we were becoming friends.”
“You weren’t shitty. You just didn’t seem that interested in being my friend.”
He laughs wearily. “It wasn’t lack of interest, Erin. I didn’t know if I could be.”
“Why not?”
“Isn’t that obvious by now?” The heat in his gaze makes my heart feels like it’s fluttering somewhere around the middle of my throat.
“No,” I whisper.
“It should be,” he says. “I was attracted to you. Too attracted. And it’s just always been easier to avoid the whole thing by being an asshole.”
I could tell him right now that it’s mutual, that for years I’ve felt like I can barely function when he’s around. Except this is a conversation we should not be having at all. Nothing good can come of acknowledging it, so I stare off into the distance and remain quiet.
After a moment he rises. I half expect that he’ll just walk inside, but instead he comes around behind my chair with the champagne in his hand. "Tip your head back.”
