Page 92 of How to Break My Heart 1

“And you still believe I’m playing you, am I right?”

“I don’t know what to b-believe.” My words falter, and I’m unsure how honest to be with him. “We just need to get this wedding over and done with. Can we at least pause things until then? I know you’re not bothered by hiding from Maddy, but I am, and if you care for me in the slightest way, you’ll understand why I’m feeling so torn over this.”

The powerful sound of silence lingers in the room. Of all the words we could say to each other right now, perhaps this is the loudest. Besides, with Maddy coming over, the last thing we need is an argument between us.

Aston finally sighs, asking, “Okay, what do we have left to do?”

I go through my list and read from my screen. “So, this is my spreadsheet. Red means outstanding, orange means pending, green means complete.”

“Show me.” He yanks the laptop from me, only to place his fingers on the keyboard to start typing, but then he stops, reaching into his pocket to remove black-framed reading glasses.

“Are you touching my spreadsheet? I’ll let you know I spent hours on that and have a system.”

“Your system needs tweaking,” he brags, passing the laptop back. “Here you go.” His eyebrows raise with a smirk teasing his lips.

I press my legs shut, trying my best to ignore the heat rising between them while I glance at him. “Since when do you wear glasses?”

“Since staring at screens all day became blurry,” he admits.

“Huh.” I rub the back of my neck, then swallow with a struggle. “They look good on you.”

“Is that why your nipples are hard?”

I glance down, rushing to cover my chest. “No funny business. You are here strictly as a friend helping me plan this wedding.”

“Right, so I have to forget about how you came five times last night?”

“Six,” I mumble, taking a slow drink from my glass. “But who’s counting?”

“Apparently, you,” he teases.

I smack him with the pillow as he scowls.Why does he have to look so irresistible in those glasses?

“Can you be normal, please? Pretend nothing at all happened last night,” I beg of him.

“Impossible.” His grin is driving me crazy. “However, since my sister is about to knock on that door, I will pretend…for now.”

The knock on the door comes as no surprise not long after that. Maddy quickly enters my apartment and plonks herself onthe sofa between us. It almost feels like a parent chaperoning two teenagers. I laugh inside my head but make sure not to show my feelings in front of her.

We chat mainly about the wedding, but Maddy admits she’s done talking about it and needs to unwind. Her mood has been off since she walked in, but sometimes it’s better to let her cool down than give her a platform to air her grievances and make them ten times worse.

Hogging the remote, she switches to a movie, which is apparently some thriller. It doesn’t help that she talks through most of the movie, annoying both Aston and me.

“You know where this is going to go, right?” Maddy questions as I start to become uncomfortable when the man presses the female lead up against the wall and pulls down her panties. “Yep, he’s going to go in bareback. If a guy goes in bareback, it means he’s in love with the woman.”

I choke on my own saliva.

Maddy and Aston wait for me to pull myself back together, but I dare not look at Aston.

Maddy pats my back. “You okay?”

“Yeah, sorry.”

She then turns to face Aston. “You’re a guy. What do you think?”

“I think, as your brother, you asking me this question is disturbing.”

“I’ve never done it, to be honest,” Maddy admits, ignoring her brother. “Always used protection. Those high school sex-ed classes are really ingrained into me.”