Page 13 of Falling for my Brother's Best Friend

My heart rate picks up speed with each degree he turns until he’s facing me. “Is that what you want?”

“I don’t see how it can be any other way.”

His tongue skates over his bottom lip. “You can honestly stand there and deny that you want me to pick you up and carry you into my room?”

I step forward, wanting to touch him, but I stop myself. Liam is the type of guy who if I give him an inch, he’ll go the mile to win me over. He loves a challenge, and that’s all I am to him. The first woman who hasn’t stripped down and laid herself willingly on his bed. Well, shit, I have done that, he just had the decency not to take advantage of me.

“Why didn’t you do that last night if you think that’s what I want?”

“You were drunk.” He pierces me with a stare that makes me feel as though he can see deep inside me, to all the uncertainty and insecurities lurking there.

“You’ve taken drunk girls to bed before. Why not me?”

His eyes narrow and he shakes his head as though I’m not speaking English. “You passed out. Even when you stripped yourself down, you weren’t in any frame of mind to take to bed.”

“Thanks, I suppose.”

He blows out a breath and his demeanor does a one-eighty, his usual smirk shining brightly. “You’re welcome, I guess.” I roll my eyes, and he crosses his arms. “It was nice to see you let yourself go.”

“Wish I could remember what it felt like, but the night’s a blur.” A nervous giggle slips out of me.

“Maybe you should let that side of you out of your cage more often.”

“If only.” Even I can hear the wistful note in my voice.

His eyebrows raise in question.

“What do you want from me, Liam?”

“What do you think I want from you, Savannah?”

“I think you want me to be the naïve girl from before my parents’ accident. But I’m the one who runs Bailey Timber now. I’m the matriarch of the Bailey family—after Dori, of course. There are expectations. I can’t just hop on the back of a motorcycle and party every night.”

He soaks in what I said before he speaks. “You have no idea what I want from you. And I saw that girl last night.”

I throw my hands in the air. “Because I was drunk! But that’s an exception for me.”

“If you keep telling yourself that, you’ll believe it.”

“Stop it.” I jab a finger in his direction. “This is who I am now.”

“Fine. I didn’t ask you to change everything about yourself.”

He doesn’t see what I do when I look in the mirror. He searches for traces of that girl who flirted with him when she shouldn’t have. The one who drew his attention because she was the older sister of his best friends. The one shiny red apple in a pile of bruised and rotten ones. That’s what he’s attracted to, not the version who’s thinking spreadsheets and quarterly reports and what I need to do to make sure all my younger siblings are okay.

“Let’s agree to disagree. I’ll check with my contractor today so that I can get out of your way. When there’s more space, this whole thing”—I wiggle a finger between us—“will go away.”

He slow claps, and I narrow my eyes. “Bravo, Sav, you always have a game plan.”

“Stop it!”

He laughs and shakes his head. “Go. I’m sure someone needs you somewhere.”

He disappears into the barn, leaving me shaken.

* * *

That evening,I’m at Northern Lights Retirement Residence for my weekly knitting class. Originally, I thought knitting would be fun. Keep me from obsessing over my to-do list and only think about the stitching. But I think I’m too neurotic to enjoy the art, and my instructor, Ethel, agrees.

---