Page 133 of Only Between Us

I chuckle. “Yeah, fine. I probably should have told you. It was Josh’s idea.”

“And yet, you’re now here looking at her like I look at Mom. Like Colton looks at Josie. Like Leo looks at T. rexes.”

“She’s not my pretend girlfriend. She’s the one.” I swallow past a fast-forming lump in my throat. “But she wouldn’t move with me if I got signed. And the distance is an issue for her. Living on opposite sides of the country and all that.”

Dad hums thoughtfully but doesn’t offer anything else.

“Is that it? No wise, cryptic monologue telling me how to change her mind? No smack to the back of my head for the moping?”

“It’s a valid concern. Opposite sides of the country is no joke, let alone with your travel schedule once you get signed.”

“Whose side are you on?” I fiddle with the pen in my hand, clicking it rapidly. “What am I supposed to do if she ends it?”

“You keep being the man we raised you to be. You keep doing the right thing, and know that if it’s meant to be, the right things will come to you.”

I squint at the sky. “What does that even mean?”

Dad gives a low laugh. “You asked for a cryptic monologue. Who am I to deny you?”

He rises when Siena comes out onto the terrace. Dad pauses behind my chair and smacks the back of my head.

“Ow—what the hell, Dad?”

He laughs to himself, giving Siena a soft pat on the shoulder as he heads inside. “That’s for all the moping, son.”

Siena turns a bewildered look on me once the French doors are shut, leaving us alone outside. The quiet evening breeze catches in the slit in her pale yellow, flowy dress.

“You need me to go in there and defend your honor?”

“Nah, I’ll get him back, don’t worry.” I tuck the pen behind my ear and help her settle in my lap.

“Your family is so sweet. Exactly how I thought they’d be.” She’s got her head on my shoulder so I can’t quite see her face, but there’s a smile in her voice.

“They love you. I half expect Leo to come out here and fight me for you.”

“It wouldn’t be a fair fight.”

“Leo would win?”

“You’d win. You’d always win, Brooks. There’s no competition.” She fingers the heart-shaped gap in my tattoo near my elbow. “I still can’t believe this is there by accident. What are the odds it would all come together like that?”

I release a long breath, surrendering to the words that have begged for release for what’s felt like ages. “What are the odds I’d smash into the love of my life on a field she was never supposed to be on in the first place?”

Siena’s gaze travels every inch of my face, as though searching for a hint of a prank. Which is insane, considering I know she already knows.

In the same way I don’t need her to tell me to know that she loves me back.

“Brooks…”

“I know. I agreed to keep things simple. But there’s nothing simple about the way I love you, Siena. It’s risky and complicated, and I have no idea how it’ll turn out. But you’ve given me the ride of my life since the minute I knocked you over. And I want to stay on.”

Siena nods in a way I can’t quite decipher, then she reaches for the pen tucked behind my ear. She stares at it between her fingers for one silent moment before clicking it open. That sweet line carves between her eyebrows as she smooths her thumb over the skin right below the crook of my elbow and draws over my skin.

The smallestS+Bright there, in the middle of the accidental heart.

My phone rings on the patio table the moment Siena opens her mouth to say something.

It’s Josh.