and I swallowed my wounded pride when I wondered why.
“It’s my sister,” she eventually mumbled against my chest. “She’s inside.”
Blinking at nothing, I was floored as I replayed her confession. Until now, it had never occurred to me how little we knew about her. She’d managed to get away with uncovering pieces of our past while giving away nothing of hers in return. Unfortunately, it wasn’t the time to ask her why or berate myself for not demanding to know more.
Later.
Asking if her sister was okay would have been redundant since no one goes to hospitals for fun, so I asked instead, “What happened?”
Before she could answer me, though, someone with a deep voice called her name.
I felt Braxton stiffen in my arms while her face stayed planted in my chest. She was taking careful, controlled breaths now as if she were psyching herself up to face an opponent in the ring. I was seconds from telling the older man dressed in brown corduroy and a plaid flannel who had her eyes to get lost when she lifted her head and turned her attention toward him.
“Hi, Dad,” she said brightly despite her trembling in my arms. “It’s nice to see you.”
He was lucky to be her father when he didn’t return her greeting or her sentiments. “Your mother sent me down here to see what’s keeping you.”
The look he gave me said he didn’t approve of me touching his daughter and the look I returned dared him and his mustache to do something about it. Braxton’s father was tall like me and well-built, so it would be an evenly matched fight if it came to that, but hopefully, it wouldn’t. I’d hate to fuck up my future father-in-law.
Braxton, noticing our silent pissing contest, pulled away before walking inside without another word spoken. I didn’t like how she seemed to make herself small as her father followed closely behind, so I added that to the growing list of problems to tackle later.
Since visiting hours were over and we weren’t entitled to the same perks Braxton got being a local, the three of us waited in the lobby while Braxton visited with her sister.
“Please tell me I’m not the only one who didn’t know she had a sister,” Loren blurted the moment we were alone. His frown was deep, telling me this bothered him as much as it disturbed me. “Did I miss something?”
“We all did,” I told him.
It didn’t make any of us feel better, though, since there were three of us, and we still sucked at this boyfriend thing.
Rich scrubbed a hand down his face as he stared off in the direction she’d gone. “What else don’t we know about her?” he mused out loud.
“If she’s secretly married, I’m kicking your ass,” Loren informed him. “That bit of karma’s all on you, bro.”
“More importantly, what’s been up with you lately?” I finally asked Rich. It pissed me off to see him pulling away from Braxton and not being able to do anything about it. We were supposed to be in this together, not to mention sharing her had been his goddamn idea.
For some reason, Rich tipped his head toward Loren as if that answered anything. “Ask him.”
“I’m asking you.”
Loren taunted Jericho with a Cheshire smile in my peripheral, telling me he had something to do with it, after all.
Nevertheless.
I kept my gaze steady on Rich, who sighed.
“Loren threatened to tell Braxton about Emily if I didn’t back off until I told her myself.”
My gaze immediately swung to Loren, who looked unapologetic as fuck. “Why would you do that? No, scratch that,” I said before he could answer me. “Why would you do that without talking to me first?”
“Because last I checked, my balls were attached to my body and not in your pocket.”
Closing my eyes, I blew air through my nose as I reminded myself that we were in a strange town in the middle of nowhere. Getting arrested because I put Loren in a hospital while in a hospital was not the way I wanted the rest of my weekend to go.
I decided to let it go for now and focus on something I could change. “When are you planning to tell her?” I asked Rich.
“He wants to wait until he’s actually divorced as if that will make any goddamn difference.” Loren rolled his eyes. “Actually, it will,” he quickly backtracked. “Because the longer he waits, the deeper her feelings get. Dip shit can’t see that, though.”