Page 68 of Like You Want It

His have gone slightly hooded, and I know he’s thinking about the one on my hipbone. The blue feather that’s also a quill. The one he got to see up close last night.

I dunk myself under the water as Susie heckles me about having a secret tattoo on my vagina, giving myself a second to get my emotions under control. Then I stand again, giving Susie a small, slightly embarrassed smile.

Luckily, Peter calls us over for a delicious burger lunch. His blue cheese secret is just as phenomenal as he claimed.

Somehow I end up sitting across from Fin, and I find his eyes on me frequently, his expression that same infuriating shade of neutral.

My mind flits back to the picture frame in the bedroom, to a time not too long ago when Fin looked happy.

Susie mentioned someone named Ashley, and Fin didn’t seem too happy about it. Maybe that’s her?

When I finally give in to the urge to float in the pool on one of those foamy loungers, my eyes closed and my face to the sun, I wonder about the woman in the picture. The possible Ashley. A gorgeous blonde that was clearly important to Fin at one point in his life. Someone that made him smile like… well, like I’ve never seen on Fin. I wonder if she’s still around and what happened between them. If she’s the reason he’s so closed off about everything. The reason he’s up and down and so unsure.

“Alright, everyone. The party has officially started!”

I crack open an eye towards the direction the noise came from and see a figure just as tall and built as Fin looming in the sliding doorway.

“Noah!” Susie’s voice springs across the backyard and her footsteps slap along the concrete as she walks over to him with Nell in her arms.

“Your favorite brother has arrived.”

Susie laughs, and I slowly spin myself around so I’m facing them from my spot in the pool.

A guy with his back to me is cooing at Nell, taking her out of her mother’s hands and lifting her into the air, where she giggles and squeals.

A few seconds go by before he finally eyes the rest of the backyard, taking in where Fin still sits next to Peter. Manly chin nods are abundant as all three of them greet each other, though they don’t get up to say hello.

Then his eyes fall on me.

“And who have we here?” he asks, pulling off his Aviators and allowing his eyes to rake devilishly over my bare skin.

I blush. I can’t help it. As rowdy as I am, I grew up in an environment where compliments were sparse. So receiving them from someone, especially an attractive male, always gives me a light smattering of goose bumps along my arms and a blush in my cheeks.

And heishandsome. I’ll definitely admit that. Tall, broad, and muscular in a way that reflects his work at a gym.

His stare doesn’t light me up the way Fin’s does, though.

He hands Nell back to Susie, then turns his sights on me.

“Hey there, beautiful. I’m Noah.”

I raise an eyebrow at his blatant interest, but give him a smile anyway. “I’m Carly. I’m friends with Susie.”

He nods, taking a seat on the edge of the pool, letting his feet dangle in. “That was my assumption. And how do you know my sweet sister?”

“I live next door to her.”

“Oh cool. You know I…”

“Noah.”

It’s Fin again, with the whip crack of fury. I jerk my head to the side and see that Fin is now standing just a few feet away, glaring at his brother like he wants to shove him into the pool and hold him under the water. Maybe not to kill him, but at least while he fights it for a while.

There’s a pause. A heavy one. So much weight is resting in this pause that I worry about everyone sinking to the bottom of the pool.

“So it’s like that, huh?” Noah says, eyeing his brother.

Fin says nothing, just continues to stand there until Noah lets out a dramatic sigh and lifts himself to standing.