Page 28 of Scarlett and the Fake Boyfriend (Scarlett #2)

Why did he keep referring to himself that way? “Yeah, I guess.” Liam never told me I looked pretty. But he was also my annoying younger brother, so who knew.

I heard the sound of footsteps in the hall. “You need to get back down there.”

“No thank you.” He tried to climb up. But he seemed very wobbly on his feet.

“Axel, get back down. Briggs is coming.”

“Briggs likes me.”

“Does he?”

Axel shrugged. “Everyone but your dad likes me.” His words were a little slurred.

Sophie was right. He was definitely drunk. And as if he wasn’t drunk enough, he pulled a flask out of his pocket and took a sip. Which almost unbalanced him. He was lucky he didn’t fall over the railing of the spiral staircase. No wonder he’d been making so much noise down there.

I grabbed his flask out of his hand. “Briggs is coming to check on me. If he sees you in here, he’ll find out about the trapdoor.”

“Hey, give that back.”

“No. Get down.” I tried to put the trapdoor back in place, but Axel didn’t move. “Axel!”

He hiccupped and grabbed the flask back.

For the love of God. “Just...stay there.” I abandoned trying to get him back down the hole in the floor and ran out of my room, closing the door behind me.

Briggs had only been a few steps away from reaching my room.

“Everything is fine,” I said. “Just a false alarm.”

“Were you just talking to someone?” Briggs asked.

“Nope.”

“I swear I heard you talking...”

“Oh. Right. I was just talking to Sophie on the phone. But everything is okay. No need to worry.”

“Well, I still need to finish my sweep.”

“Really, Briggs, everything is fine. I was just spooked form a scary movie I saw earlier this week.”

“I’ll make it quick.” He walked past me and opened up my bedroom door .

Kill me.

Briggs walked into my room and I just stood there, waiting to hear the guys talking. But Briggs emerged a minute later, walked down the hall, and opened the door to the billiards room next.

Had Axel actually gone back downstairs?

Briggs checked out my mom’s office, my dad’s office, and the other guestroom before walking back over to me. “I’ll check upstairs too, but everything is fine down here.”

“Thanks, Briggs.”

“Call me if you hear anything else suspicious.”

“I will. Goodnight.”

“Goodnight.” He walked out of the hallway.

I waited a beat and then ran back into my room. I opened the trapdoor and went downstairs. I stepped over the glass shards from the candle as I looked around the room. But Axel was nowhere to be seen. “Axel?” I popped my head out into the hallway, but he wasn’t there either.

Crap. Had he left? I was supposed to be keeping him here all night and all morning. I pulled out my phone and called him. I heard his phone ringing upstairs. I went back over to the staircase as Axel answered the call.

“Shhh,” he said. “I’m hiding.” And then he hung up.

So drunk. I went back upstairs and closed the trapdoor. Seriously...where was he hiding? I looked in the closet, but I was pretty sure Briggs would have looked in there already.

“Axel?” I whispered.

He didn’ t respond.

Was there another trapdoor in this room that I didn’t know about? I spun around in a circle. “Axel, where the heck are you hiding?”

I heard him giggle. I turned and stared at my bed where I’d heard the noise. “Axel?”

“Sh,” he said.

What the? I got down on my hands and knees and looked under my bed. Axel had somehow squeezed himself under the frame. I honestly had no idea how he’d even fit under there. There was literally zero room for him to move.

He put his finger to his lips to tell me to be quiet.

“Get out from under there,” I said.

“No. I’m hiding.”

“Axel.”

He laughed.

“The coast is clear. Get out.”

He wiggled a bit. “I can’t. I’m stuck.”

Seriously? “How did you get under there then?”

“I don’t know. I don’t remember.”

“It happened five minutes ago.”

He shrugged and hit his head. “Ow.”

Okay, I didn’t need him to hit his head any more. I’d already thrown a candle at him. “One second.” I stood up and did my best to lift the side of my bed.

Axel rolled out and stayed on the floor. “Stealth mode.”

“You need some water. Be quiet for a minute, okay?”

He stayed on the floor. “I already have a beverage.” He pulled out his flask.

“No, you’ve already had enough of that.” I grabbed it from him and put it on my nightstand .

He reached out but made no attempt to get up. “You’re pretty even though you’re mean.”

I knew he didn’t know what he was saying. I tried not to let it affect me, but I knew my heart was racing. It was the second time he’d called me pretty tonight. “Be quiet.”

I left my room and hurried to the kitchen. I grabbed him a bottle of water and an ice pack before going back to my room. Axel was still sprawled out on the floor like a starfish.

I put my hand down to pull him up. He grabbed my hand, but instead of letting me help him up, he pulled me down on top of him.

“Ow,” he said when I landed hard against him.

“You were the one that pulled me down,” I said with a laugh.

“I don’t think so. I think you wanted to be on top of me.”

I rolled my eyes.

“You’re pretty even when you roll your eyes at me.”

“Stop saying that.”

He stuck his tongue out at me.

“Put that away.”

He stuck it out even more.

I tapped on the tip of his tongue so he’d put it away.

And he responded by biting my index finger. Really hard.

“Did you just bite me?” I laughed and rolled off of him.

“No.”

I sat up and stared down at him. “You definitely did.” I showed him the bite mark he’d left on my finger.

“Are you sure the boyfriend wasn’t the one that marked you? That’s kind of his job.”

To mark me? Is that what Axel did to his girlfriends? “Were you with George tonight?”

“Yes.”

I squinted at him. “Were you though?”

“Yes.” It looked like he wanted to laugh again.

“I heard she was hooking up with Luis Rodriguez tonight.”

“Luis has a girlfriend,” Axel said. “I’m thirsty.” He reached out toward my nightstand where I’d left his flask.

I handed him the bottle of water instead.

He scrunched up his face.

I unscrewed the cap and forced him to drink a sip. “I don’t think you were with George.”

His eyes locked with mine as I made him take another sip. “I wasn’t. I was with Georgia . Stop hanging out with my sister.”

I laughed. “I was forced to babysit because you were MIA.”

“With Georgia.”

“George.”

“You and Parker can’t team up against me. I’ll never survive.” He gave me a sad smile.

“Get in bed, Axel. We need to put ice on your head.”

“Why?”

“Because I bonked you.”

He stared up at me. “Hm.” He put his fingers in the hole in my jeans on my knee. And he just stared at his fingers on my knee for a few moments. “Do you take care of Liam like this too? ”

“No, Liam has never showed up at home wasted. My dad would kill him.” Or maybe not. Liam never got in trouble. “Why?”

“Because he’s your brother. And you think of me like a big brother.”

“What?”

“That’s what you said. That I’m like a big brother to you.”

I stared at him. “I never said that. I said you think of me like a little sister.”

“Ah right. Because the boyfriend told you so. What else has the boyfriend told you about me?”

His name is Jacob! Why did he keep calling him “the boyfriend” like he didn’t know him? “Would you quit it with that?”

“With what?” Axel played with some of the frayed pieces of my jeans, and his fingers on my skin were very distracting. “With what?” he said again. “Touching you?”

I stared down at him. I didn’t want him to stop playing with the hole in my jeans. I just wished he wasn’t drunk out of his mind while doing it.

“Has the boyfriend touched you yet?” Axel asked.

“No.”

“How ‘bout that. He hasn’t seen your tits or touched you. Is he even really your boyfriend? It seems a lot more like I am. I’m the one here taking care of you.”

Did he seriously think he was the one taking care of me right now? “Get up.” I grabbed his arm and pulled him to his feet.

He stumbled backward onto my bed. “Ow.”

I climbed onto my bed after him, lifted the icepack, and put it on the top of his head.

“No, it’s cold.” He dodged away from me and lay down on the bed.

I lay down beside him and put the icepack back on his head.

He groaned.

“You’ll thank me later.”

“No I won’t,” he said.

“You will.” I brushed some of his hair off his forehead.

He sighed. “Of all the people you could date. Why would you date my best friend?”

“We’re all best friends,” I said.

“Not now.”

I swallowed hard as I stared up at the star on my ceiling. I didn’t want everything to change. But Axel was right. I was worried it already had. “We’ll always be best friends. All four of us.”

We were both quiet for a few moments.

“Your text made it seem like you were jealous tonight,” Axel said. “Were you?”

“About George?”

“ Georgia .”

“I’m not jealous of George. I don’t even think you were with her.”

“Yes I was. I’ll draw a portrait next time so you’ll believe me.”

“Please don’t.”

He laughed and the icepack fell off his head.

I readjusted it for him.

“You can change into that silky number again. I’ll watch.” He laughed .

“You mean you won’t watch?”

“Isn’t that what I said?”

I laughed. “No. It wasn’t.”

Axel slowly turned his head to me. “I’m not your big brother,” he said.

“Or my cousin. I know.”

“You’re pretty even when you’re torturing me.”

“Stop saying that.”

“Why?”

I stared into his eyes. I so badly wanted him to actually think I was pretty. And every time he said it, it killed me a little. “Because you’re drunk and you don’t mean it.”

“But you are torturing me.”

That’s what he thought I was talking about? How was I torturing him? He was the one that had been torturing me for practically half my life.

Axel sighed and rolled toward me. His arm dropped across my waist and he closed his eyes. “It was supposed to be me,” he whispered.

“Supposed to be you for what?”

But he’d already started lightly snoring.