was hers. Too elegant and neat to be Zach’s, that much was certain.
Wreck this life: My new plan
1. Stop worrying so much about the future
2. Call Roger and tell him off
3. Flip off the next photographer you see
4. Get a tattoo
5. Have a torrid affair with a hot guy
Something twisted inside him as he came to the last step. A torrid affair . . . Was that what she was doing with Zach? “Abby, if you’re just using Zach, you need to stop. He—”
“Zane . . . be quiet,” she said, and there was steel in her voice.
Closing the book, he tossed it onto the nearest countertop and then he hooked his thumbs in his pockets, staring at her until she slowly lifted his head. “Be quiet?” he echoed. “That’s my brother, Abigale. My brother, and I love him. Okay? I love—”
“Stop it,” she said, sliding off the stool and coming around the island to glare at him.
Abby wasn’t a small woman. She was nearly five nine and almost all of her was leg, it seemed. But Zane was still a good four inches taller than her. She held her ground as he advanced on her. “Look, damn it, you’re not being fair to him if all you’re doing is trying to make yourself feel better after that fucker dumped you,” he snapped.
“I asked you a question,” she said, her voice low and hard.
“Fuck the damn question.” Zane caught her arm and glared down at her. “I know Roger treated you like hell. I get that and I understand if you need to . . . hell. I don’t know what you’re trying to do, but whatever it is, it shouldn’t involve hurting Zach.”
Her eyes glinted with rage as she glared right back. “Just when have you ever known me to intentionally hurt him?”
“Intentionally? Not once. But over the past seventeen years, you’ve done it a lot. If you’re just fucking with him, you need to pull back and now,” he said, feeling a little sick inside as he stared at her. Damn it, this was going to kill Zach. It was just going to kill—
“Seventeen years.” She shook her head.
“What?”
“Is that how long?”
He pinched the bridge of his nose and then turned away. “Abby, I think you should just leave, okay? I need to get some stuff done.” Call Zach. Call . . . hell. Maybe call Mom. I don’t know. “And I can’t do it with you here. So can you—”
“Answer me!” she shouted.
His temper snapped and he spun around, glaring at the woman he’d known most of his life. “Answer you?” he asked. “You want me to fucking answer you?”
“That’s why I’m here. I just want a straight answer.” She jerked her chin up at him, attitude and disdain written all over her face. “How long, huh? Just how long has he been in love with me?”
“Forever!”
The word hung between them for an endless moment before he turned away. Slamming his hands down on the counter, he stared at the glass-plated cabinet in front of him, wishing he could yank those words back. “Shit. Shit. Damn it, Abby, this is something you need to be talking about with him. Not me.”
Silence greeted him.
Looking back over his shoulder, he saw her leaning against the counter, a lost look on her face as she stared off at nothing.
“Abby,” he tried again. “You need to go home. You need to talk to Zach.”
She flicked him a glance. The expression in her eyes was so raw it was hard to even look at her. “I tried.”
“You tried to talk about this with him?”
A soft sigh escaped her and he watched as her reflection turned and moved away.
Slowly, he eased around, watching as she moved back to the island and settled back on the stool. “Yeah.” She hooked her hands over her neck, staring at nothing. “I did the tattoo thing first . . . we were talking. I said something about Roger . . . I dunno, but something like how could he do that to me if he’d really loved me. And Zach’s response? He said that Roger never did love me. So simple. So easy. So . . . so Zach.” She paused and took a breath. “Anyway, a few minutes later, I asked him if he’d ever been in love. He said he had. But it hadn’t worked, the woman hadn’t ever noticed.”
Now she lifted her head and stared at Zane. “It was me, wasn’t it?”