Griff's Place (Havenwood #4) - Riley Hart Page 0,8

while I could see his happiness for his brother and best friend, there was something else brewing under the surface too.

Sadness.

His eyes found mine for a second, and it was there, clear as day, but then he turned away, and oddly, I felt like I’d lost something. Whatever it was, I wanted it back.

CHAPTER TWO

Griffin

I didn’t know what it was about Kellan and Chase’s announcements that had me so twisted up. My emotions were like that game with the paddle and the ball on the string. They didn’t make sense and were all over the place, the tether getting all tangled every time I thought I got a handle on them. What was the deal with that game, anyway? Was anyone actually good at it?

On the one hand, Jesus, I was happy for them. In a lot of ways, Kellan’s and Chase’s best interests had always been the most important things in the world to me. Sure, those two truths used to be two separate entities, but now they were entwined. Kellan and Chase both had everything I always wanted for them, so why was there a part of me that felt like a puppy who’d been left at home alone and had nothing better to do than sit around and wait for their people to come back to them?

It was fucking ridiculous. And embarrassing.

Maybe I’d feel better tomorrow.

I’d left their place a little over an hour ago, grabbed a bottle of whiskey, and was now sitting on my back porch, drinking from the bottle. Even though I owned a bar, I wasn’t much of a drinker, at least not hard alcohol. I enjoyed a good beer, but rarely enough for even a buzz.

“Boo!” came from behind me just as I was about to take a drink. It almost tumbled from my hand before I got my grip, and I looked over my shoulder to see Josh standing in the doorway leading from the kitchen to the yard.

“What the hell are you doing here? And why are you in my house?”

He sighed, came outside, and took the chair beside me. It was pitch black in front of us, the sound of frogs and crickets breaking through the night as moths fluttered around the light on the porch.

“I would think the reason I’m here is pretty obvious. To see you, unless you can think of some other reason I should be here?” When I only grunted in return, he added, “And I was in your house because your truck is out front, but when I knocked, you didn’t answer.”

“So you let yourself in?”

“Damn straight, though not really straight at all.” He winked, and I rolled my eyes.

“That was cheesy.”

“Yeah, but I got you to smile, grump-ass.”

Damn it. Fucking Josh was right. I was smiling. I didn’t meet his eyes. The thing was, it had been hard to look at him ever since that night this summer when I’d realized the man I’d met for sex looked like him. He’d had the same wavy, chestnut-colored hair, both messy and sort of floppy. The same long, muscular frame, similar angular features, sharp, skinny nose, and high cheekbones. He hadn’t had that damn Marilyn Monroe beauty mark like Josh did, and maybe his lashes weren’t quite as thick, but—Why in the fuck was I thinking about his goddamned eyelashes? What in the hell was that shit?

I tilted the bottle back and took another drink.

“Gimme that,” Josh said, and I handed him the bottle. He took a long swig and passed it back. We sat there for a while, in the quiet fall evening, lulled by the sounds of Virginia nights.

I swallowed down some more.

“It’s weird, huh? Kell and Chase?” he finally said.

“It shouldn’t be.”

“That doesn’t mean it isn’t. I hate that—what people should and shouldn’t feel. We’re fucking human, and we’re all different. There can’t be rules on how something affects us or doesn’t.” He was right. I was about to tease him about being so damn profound, when he took the bottle from my hand and added, “Well, unless we’re the ones who decide what we should or shouldn’t feel. No one else has the right to decide for another person.” Josh drank more, then said, “Whew. That’s strong. Keep it away from me. I think it burned fire down my esophagus.”

Fine by me. I’d keep my whiskey to myself. What he said continued to tumble around in my brain clunkily, like when you threw tennis shoes in the dryer. “What do you