Total pages in book: 47
Estimated words: 46599 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 233(@200wpm)___ 186(@250wpm)___ 155(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 46599 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 233(@200wpm)___ 186(@250wpm)___ 155(@300wpm)
I follow June’s voice, emerging from the courtyard area. Relief touches me when I see that Mom is standing next to June.
That would’ve been bad.
“It’s their first dance,” Mom says, offering me a smile. “Where have you been?”
“Scouting photo spots,” I say, the lie coming far too quickly.
It’s like my body; my core knows I need to protect the future with Ben.
Even if there should be no future.
“Well, come on,” Mom smiles, touching my arm. “We can’t miss this.”
“No, of course, we can’t.”
Because this is Alex’s day, not mine, not Ben’s.
It’s Alex’s.
He’d hate me if he found out.
CHAPTER SIX
Ben
“Your speech was great, Ben, great.”
I do my best to smile as a very drunk – and a very happy – Alex walks over to the table and drops into the seat. I’ve never seen him so ecstatic, like all the pieces of his life have fallen into place.
Before, I would’ve thought about how happy I was for him. Or how unlikely the same was to ever happen to me.
But now, all I can think about is his little sister, the way her expression twisted when she told me to get away from her. All I can think about is how she felt in my hands.
Her body, her passion, her everything.
“It was easy,” I tell him. “I just spoke from the heart.”
That part is half true. The speech itself was easy to write. It was simple to explain what a good man Alex is and how dedicated and loyal he is because he is all those things.
The difficult part was that everybody was looking at me. That included Becca.
She was staring at me with her wide innocent eyes, kissable lips, and captivating aura. Maybe that’s why I followed her afterward when I saw her leave the function room.
My body was roaring, is roaring for her.
It will never stop.
Alex cheers and throws his arm around me.
“You’re the best, Benny boy, the best friend I ever had.”
I chuckle. “Benny boy? Maybe we should get you some water.”
“What’s wrong, Benny boy?” he laughs. “You don’t like your nickname?”
I grin, going along with the joke, but then Becca and her friend walk across the dancefloor. Things are winding down now. Some people have left already.
I’m not sure if Becca is moving her hips like that on purpose or if everything she does drives me feral.
Her dress swishes around her body, outlining the shape of her ass subtly, just enough to make me almost bolt from my seat and charge across the room.
“I’m happy for you,” I tell Alex, forcibly averting my gaze from his sister.
We haven’t kissed yet. I remind myself of that, as though it means a damn thing, as though we wouldn’t have kissed if her friend didn’t interrupt us.
Twice now, we’ve been saved by an interruption.
What happens the third time?
“Did you see Tiffany’s friend, Olivia?” he asks.
I stifle a groan. Alex gave up on matchmaking me with someone a long time ago, but clearly, the mood and maybe the alcohol has made him want to try again. It’s his day, and so I’ll let him. But there’s no way I’m doing anything with Olivia or anybody else who isn’t named Becca.
“I didn’t,” I say.
“Well, she saw you. Look. There she is.”
I follow his drunken pointing. The woman is tall and wears a nice dress…or, I guess it’s nice since she doesn’t stir me even in the slightest.
She isn’t Becca. It’s that simple.
She isn’t my best friend’s sister.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
“Maybe I’ll talk to her after you pass out,” I banter. “But I’m fine here for now.”
“I want this for you,” Alex says, his words jumbling together. “I want you to feel this…this magic. I know. I’m getting soppy. I don’t care. I’m allowed to on my wedding day, aren’t I?”
“Yeah,” I reply.
“Don’t you want this?” He reaches for his drink, then places it down when he realizes it’s empty. “I wish you could feel what I feel. I wish I could. I don’t know, like transplant the emotion or whatever. Does that even make sense?”
“Sure,” I say, resisting the urge to grind my teeth.
I do feel what he feels. Or something else. Something fiercer, more primal. But it’s there, this need he wishes I had. It’s just aimed at the wrong person.
No, not the wrong person. Becca will never be the wrong anything, not to me.
“But you have to try,” he goes on. “If you want this.”
“I haven’t met the right person yet. That’s all.”
“But how do you know?”
Stop making me lie to you. I roar in my mind.
It’s unfair. He’s not making me do anything. I could tell him the truth right now and make his entire wedding about that. Warp this memory forever.
“What if I find somebody, but we can’t be together?”
“Why would that be?”
I shrug. “Maybe she’s twenty years younger than me.”