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Robbie rears back, hands dropping away as though I were made of fire. He moves out of the way so I can get past, and once I’m in the bedroom, the bathroom door snicks shut and the shower starts up.

I let out a shaky breath, and like clockwork, my phone pings with a notification, reminding me why I can’t want Robbie. I move over to the bedside table and switch my phone to silent without bothering to read the message.

Robbie is not an option. He never has been.

ROBBIE

I’m an idiot. I can’t even pinpoint the moment I thought kissing Noah would be a good idea. Maybe it was just having a nearly naked man in my grasp again. Or when I joked about kissing him in the rain, and he stared at my mouth like he was daring me to do it.

I’m pretty sure it was even earlier than that, though. I’ve been drawn to the sadness in him from the first moment we met. At the time, I assumed it was because I owed it to Richard to help look after his little brother. But he’s a grown man now; he doesn’t need looking after. Yet I still feel like he’s my responsibility—that it’s my job to make him smile. Just like when he was fifteen, standing there looking lost while his family all laughed and joked around him.

I shouldn’t have tried to kiss him. He trusted me enough to be vulnerable. Asked to share a bed with me, as long as I didn’t touch him. I took that trust and destroyed it.

My stomach sours as Noah gets out of my car without a word and follows the path to Richard’s front door. I wait for him to be let in, then drive to the farm. I don’t know what I was thinking. I should have insisted he sleep in the spare room and not let him in my bloody bed. It’s been torture having him constantly in my space. The smell of him on my bedsheets. Watching him walk around my house, wearing my T-shirt—maybe it’s a good thing we stayed in different rooms last night.

I turn into the long road that runs past Theo’s cottage and park up outside the farmhouse. Taking a deep breath, I push thoughts of Noah away and focus on what needs to be done today.

Plastering on a fake smile, I climb out of the car. “Morning!” I call out as I let myself through the front door.

“Robbie?” a voice shouts, one I’ve only heard over the phone for the past couple of years. “Is that you?”

“Yeah, Ellen,” I say, finding Theo’s ma in the den. As soon as I walk under the arched doorway, she launches herself at me, hugging me around my middle.

“Look, John, all the boys are here,” she says, voice breaking, her eyes filling with tears.

“Theo’s back then?” I ask.

“Yes,” she sniffs, releasing me. “And my Bailey.”

I look at her husband John, brows creased in confusion.

“Bailey lived with us for a while before Theo moved back to Scotland,” he explains.

Huh. Theo conveniently left out that little nugget of information. The MacLeods must have a thing for taking in strays. I went to live with them when I was fourteen and lost my da to the sea. Ellen and John raised me for four years, through teenage depression and grief. They forgave me for fighting with Theo when I was stressed doing my Highers, and helped me go to university when I was eighteen. They delayed moving closer to John’s ailing ma in the south of England until I was in uni, and even after they left, Ellen would call me twice a week to make sure I was behaving myself—as far as she’s concerned, I’m an angel.

I make my excuses and head upstairs to find Isla and Theo. In one of the bedrooms, Isla is fully decked out in her bridal gown and veil, her hair expertly braided. Theo’s next to her, fussing with the train and telling her off for stepping on it with her big clown feet.

“Sorry, wrong room,” I say. “I’m looking for my best friend, but she doesn’t seem to be here.”

“Now is not the time for jokes,” she groans. “How does it look?”

I lean against the door frame, taking my time assessing the mermaid-tail-looking dress she’s wearing. “You look beautiful. And that’s all you’re getting from me.”

“Begged Ma for a sister and ended up with you and Theo instead. Aren’t I lucky.”

“At least we both learnt how to braid hair,” I say, tapping my head where I plaited the sides this morning, before pulling everything into a bun.

“As if we had a choice when she threatened to throw the hairbrush at us,” Theo mutters.

“Aye, that’s something, I guess,” Isla says, ignoring Theo’s comment. She bats him away from her dress and turns to the floor-length mirror behind her.

“You okay?” I ask Theo as he comes to stand beside me.

“I think so.”

“You and Bailey work everything out?”

“Not everything, but we’ve made a start. What have you been up to?” He turns to me, raising an eyebrow. “My house was empty last night, and Bailey said Noah’s been sleeping at yours the past few nights.”