Page 52 of Theirs for the Holidays

I duck my head, pretty sure my cheeks are permanently on fire at this point.

The door opens and Andrew comes in. He nods at me and then glances over at his brothers, clearly startled to see them.

“Baby!” Isabelle says brightly, coming out of the fitting room and practically throwing herself into his arms. She kisses him, a deep, barely appropriate for public kind of kiss, and I turn my head away to give them some privacy.

When they separate, Andrew keeps an arm around Isabelle’s waist.

“Add that to the list of things I never wanted to see my little brother doing in front of me,” Sawyer jokes, making a face.

Andrew rolls his eyes. “No one told you to look. What are you even doing here? Do you just follow her everywhere now?”

“We can’t come pick up our girlfriend?” Lennox says, going for innocence.

“I mean, yeah, I guess you can.” Andrew says that, but he still looks surprised by all of it.

“We’re going to dinner,” I tell him, not that it’s any of his business.

“We’re having a date tonight too,” Isabelle chimes in before he can say anything. “We have to get them in where we can, you know?”

“Because of the wedding?” Rhett adds. “I’m sure planning and everything is taking up a lot of your time.”

“Well, there’s that, but also we’ll be busy when we’re married. We plan to start trying right away.”

No one needs her to elaborate on what she means by that. And I guess it’s not really a surprise. Isabelle wants to be the perfect wife and have the perfect life. A husband, a nice house, the requisite two kids. And she clearly doesn’t want to wait around now that she’s ticking things off the list.

“That’s right,” Andrew agrees, pulling her a bit closer. His gaze flicks over me and his brothers. “But that’s not something you guys will have to worry about.”

My stomach twists when he says that. I can feel a flush creeping up my cheeks, and this time it’s not a playful sort of embarrassment. All three of the guys look at me, and I can feel their surprise.

I should be angry that Andrew just threw that out there like it’s no big deal. My infertility isn’t something I’ve been super public about—for obvious reasons, and he knows that. Yet he still thought it was appropriate to just mention it casually in the middle of this boutique.

Andrew looks at me, and there’s something like pity in it. “Did you tell them?” he asks. “They really do deserve to know what they’re getting with you. We come from a big family, and I’m sure they want to continue that eventually. It’s basically false advertising if you don’t tell them, don’t you think? Like you’re trapping them.”

My jaw clenches and my eyes burn. I can feel the anger rising in me at the flippant way he’s talking about something so intensely personal.

“That’s none of your business anymore,” I bite out.

“And we do know,” Lennox says. “We’ve talked about all the important things.”

“Weird that you think we wouldn’t have discussed it,” Sawyer adds, moving in closer to me.

It’s Rhett who steps up to Andrew, getting in his face a bit. “And you need to watch how you talk to our girlfriend,” he says, his voice low, but carrying the seriousness of what he’s saying. “That’s a sensitive subject and you don’t need to be throwing it around so openly. Have some fucking respect.”

Andrew swallows hard, taking a step back.

Rhett doesn’t give him a chance to say anything. He puts his hand on my lower back. “Let’s go, Tink,” he says.

Goosebumps spread over my skin from that point of contact, and I nod, speechless.

He and the others lead me out of the boutique, leaving Andrew and Isabelle staring after us.

18

VIOLET

The days pass quicklywith the three Sullivan brothers living in my house, and the house feels like it’s getting smaller and smaller every day.

Between memories of that night with Lennox, my encounter with Sawyer at the bakery, and the way Rhett looks at me, I feel like I’m going out of my mind.