I wanted to help her. I couldn’t help wanting to help her, to be honest. And I was pretty sure that if she asked me to, I’d inconvenience myself in more ways than merely having her share this bedroom with me for a few nights.
If this were an actual marriage, I’d be in trouble.
Thank God, it wasn’t.
Chapter 12
Katya
Holy shitballs. What the hell just happened? The Universe thought the combo of threatened deportation, a quickie wedding to fix it and a surprise marriage reveal to everyone we knew wasn’t quite enough? Oh and my husband’s secret European noble family. Now we had to add my screwed up dysfunctional family to the mix. All for a perfect crap stew.
Yum, yum. Ugh.
Mike seemed bummed there was no beer in the fridge. I interrupted Lucas before he could offer to go pick up a six-pack at the nearest liquor store. And much to my relief, neither of them pushed the issue. Derek had no reaction at all, which gave me a spark of hope despite my overarching skepticism.
“Hey, cool cactus.” My brother observed, nodding at Cocky in the middle of the table. Watching the irritation slide across Lucas’s face was the one highlight of the evening.
To say I had no appetite was an understatement—for crap stew or for the pizza we ordered to feed our new unexpected guests. It all sat like a rock in my stomach and I said very little during dinner.
I studied my brother while he was engaged in talking to the other two men. He seemed like the same old Derek. Fun and sweet and talkative. He could be a great guy when his mountain of baggage wasn’t weighing him—and everyone who loved him—down.
Nobody looking at him right now, with his relaxed attitude and his smiles would know that he could also be the most selfish human being on the planet. And everyone around him who loved him waited for the much-promised but never-delivered change.
I blinked, still stung that it was him and not Mum or Dad who had come or reached out in any other way. If they’d found out my address, then they could just as easily get my phone number or email. They could have contacted me directly. Instead, they’d sent Derek and a junk food care package.
And that hurt, too. They were consumed with their work, obviously. And those fancy embossed letters I kept getting from the expensive lawyers in Vancouver were no doubt the reason why. That old wave of bitterness deep down reminded me that this was Derek’s fault, too.
And there was no doubt that his visit was related to those legal troubles and all the reasons I’d ditched that bullshit in the first place. Yeah that was me, Katya the Brave who fled her homeland rather than stand up for herself.
But as Lucas had said, this visit was only for a little while. I could survive anything for a little while, couldn’t I? Hell, I’d been secretly married to the grumpiest man on earth for almost seven months now. That had to be some proof that I could go the distance!
I set our guests up in the empty room just off the kitchen, the would-be formal dining room that Lucas had never decorated. It had hardwood floors and echoing, empty white walls. I gave them Lucas’s air mattresses but played dumb about any type of hand pump, though I’d seen one in the storage closet right beside them. Oh well. They’d just have to blow them up with their own lung air.
My brother had the good sense to keep his mouth shut about it, though his friend Mike groused loudly. I gave zero fucks about what he thought. He’d always been public enemy number one and best-friend’s-little-sister-tormentor extraordinaire.
Dumping the pile of folded sheets and blankets that Lucas had also offered up into a pile, I heaved a sigh. The guys looked up from their phones as I mumbled, “If you need anything else, there are towels in the linen closet.”
“You have a nice house here, sis. Did you two just buy it?”
I shook my head. “Lucas has lived here for a few years. I just moved in when we got married.”
“That was fast.” Mike set aside his phone. I darted a sharp gaze at him, then turned away. Who really cared what this dickweed had to say? Not me. Nor did I ask him to clarify. He continued in spite of the dirty look I’d thrown him,