Page 11 of Depths of Desire (The Saints of Westmont U #4)

Mine, too , I thought, then got out of the car and picked up my duffel from the back seat.

Lena’s room was upstairs, and the curtain dropped over the window as I glanced at it. The car slowly pulled away and glided into the distance before disappearing around a corner.

The front door swung open, and my little sister planted her hands on her hips. “You’re late.”

Seeing her warmed up something in me that I thought was dead by now.

“Snips,” I said, a smile stretching my lips uncontrollably wide.

I crossed the front lawn in four long strides and dropped my duffel inside the house, then thrust my arms forward, wrapping them around Lena and lifting her into a hug.

She was tall like our parents, but still half a foot shorter than me, and she was light as a feather. “We gotta get some food into you.”

Lena scoffed as I planted her back on the floor. “Not your bland chicken, thank you.”

“It’s protein. We like protein. It’s our friend.” My tone rang knowingly as I stepped inside the house and shut the door. “Where are they?”

“Out. They almost dragged me to their date with the Richardsons, but I knew you had to be close,” Lena said, leading the way into the large open living room.

It was spotless as always, not a thing out of place and not a speck of dust on the obsessively polished surfaces.

My parents were a team, that much was for sure.

Dad vacuumed, polished the floors, and dusted every surface whenever there was a single mote of dust in the air.

Mom was the same, but her priority was always to put everything in its designated place.

They were people who loved order and neat things.

I’d half expected them to put labels on Lena and me growing up.

Turns out, they weren’t fond of labels if they didn’t conform to their perfectly normal expectations.

“Date?” I asked.

“What do you call afternoon cheese and wine tasting?” Lena asked.

“Torture chamber in the deepest circle of hell, if I had to call it anything,” I admitted.

Snips laughed aloud and dropped into an armchair that swallowed her wiry frame whole. “I missed you, Big O.”

I stood by the fireplace to chase away the chills from that short walk across the lawn.

The tree was decorated so perfectly that it lacked even a hint of inspiration or creativity.

The entire place looked like it was picked up from a catalog.

The socks hanging from the mantel didn’t have a single loose thread.

“How did getting snowed in go?” Lena asked.

I glanced at the fire, suppressing the flood of flashbacks, the echoes of Lennox’s panting, the blazing movement of his fingers along my back, and the life-ruining sensation of his body coiling under mine in ecstasy of pleasure. “Ten out of ten. Strongly recommend.”

“Mm, I wouldn’t hate spending extra time with Lennox Ellery,” Lena said.

I snorted.

“What?” she demanded.

“Nothing,” I said in a hurry. My snort was perhaps a little too contemptuous. You’re barking up the wrong tree, Snips , my snort had said loud and clear. “Not sure if Lennox is that kind of guy, Snips, that’s all.”

“Mm, Summer said the same thing,” Lena mused.

I frowned at my sister. “She did?” Lennox hadn’t come out. I remembered him saying that.

“I shouldn’t be saying this,” Lena blurted. “Summer told me because of you, because of that shitshow.”

“What did she tell you?” I asked.

“Nothing. She asked me how I handled it, and I told her it wasn’t anything for me to handle, you know? I think she wanted to know if she should say anything to Len or not. I told her to let him be. If he wants to talk about it, he can tell her himself.”

“Good advice in general,” I said. “But why would she even think…?”

Lena looked at me for a moment. “She just thinks he’s gay. Maybe because he never mentioned a girl. She asked me what I thought.”

“And what did you tell her?” I asked. I didn’t know Lennox’s parents.

I had no idea if they would make a fuss.

Small towns weren’t exactly open-minded when it came to their own immediate family, even if they touted pride for all those faraway kids in big cities.

There was a duplicity to it when someone lived in a community like this, where everything could quickly become gossip and everyone knew everyone else’s business.

We could all agree that gay was okay in New York and San Francisco.

But in our homes? That just never happened.

Because if it did, people wouldn’t stop talking about it.

Snips snorted. “What do you think? I told her it wasn’t any of our business.”

“Good,” I said. “Because it’s nobody’s business but his.”

She shot me a look that welled with sneaky questions, though, and I just turned away.

“He’s still crazy handsome,” she said matter-of-factly.

I wouldn’t out Lennox randomly just because my sister was cool enough to want to know if something had happened. Besides, I liked having last night to myself. I liked keeping it a secret. Liked holding it tight and all to myself.

“Come,” Lena said, patting the edge of the sofa next to the armchair. “It’s time to catch up.”

I turned back to her, with a smile impossible to completely push away from my lips, and joined my sister.

My parents would show up later. It would be fine.

Nothing would happen, and nobody would say anything even remotely out of place.

And in ten days, I would be back at Westmont, leaning over the edge of the pool, controlling my breathing and narrowing my focus on the only thing that mattered.

That should be enough.