Page 30 of The Other Brother

I stop strumming.

“Since when do you play the guitar?” Oz asks.

“Since recently,” I reply. “Cody taught me.” I nod across the bonfire in Cody’s direction, and my gaze catches on his expression.

Pride.

A knot forms in my throat. Because the idea that Cody is proud of me stirs up feelings that I can’t cope with.

Annabel shifts closer to me. The cloying, clinging scent of her perfume mingles with the smell of smoke. “I didn’t know you were musical.”

I rip my gaze away from Cody.

“I’m full of surprises.” I flash her a smile as I return to playing.

Half an hour later,the wind kicks up and the swirling smoke stings everyone’s eyes, so we retreat to the house. Once we’re inside, I plant myself on the couch and use the reflection of the window to keep an eye on Cody who’s sitting on the arm of the chair talking with Beth and Jake.

Our eyes meet in the window. He’s watching me too.

I glance away, only to notice Eddie and Harvey have started a wrestling match on the mat by the bottom of the stairs. Harvey pins Eddie down, and Eddie kicks out his feet to hit the base of the lamp, which wobbles but luckily doesn’t topple over.

Cody stands up from the chair and moves toward the wrestling arena, his eyebrows drawing together, his mouth pinched. He stops a few feet away from them and shoots a look at me.

Shit.

Normally I’d be joining in and insisting loudly that jackknife power bombs are legal, but not tonight.

Before I know it, I’m on my feet and heading over to them too.

I loom over them and try to mimic the tone of every teacher who has told me off for doing something stupid. There’s a few to choose from.

“Hey, knock that off, you guys. You’re going to break something.”

Eddie and Harvey both stop, looking at me with identical quizzical expressions. It’s almost funny seeing them frozen in mid-action as Harvey has his legs wrapped around Eddie’s hip and Eddie has a chokehold on Harvey.

I work hard on keeping my face serious.

“Since when did you become the fun police?” Eddie asks as he slowly disengages himself from Harvey.

“Since they gave me the official handcuffs to play with,” I reply.

Eddie smirks. “The fluffy kind?”

“Definitely. Pink and fluffy. With yellow polka dots.”

“You seriously want us to stop?” Harvey cuts through Eddie’s and my random shit.

“Yeah, we don’t want anything to get broken.”

Harvey slides a look to Cody, who’s standing there as an unmoving witness to our conversation.

“Okay,” he says slowly, standing up and pulling down his T-shirt. “I’m going to grab another beer.”

“Don’t drink too much. I don’t want to be cleaning up your barf either,” I warn as I follow him out to the kitchen.

“Shit, you really have had a personality transplant this summer,” Harvey mutters.

“It must be all the salt air,” I say casually, watching him as he grabs a beer out of the fridge.