Page 43 of Tell Me Something True

Unfortunately, they’d repeated that process for several more years while the trouble Walsh got into grew bigger and bigger. Until Miles realized he wasn’t getting through to the kid. And letting him go without consequences wasn’t helping him.

He couldn’t save Walsh from his own mistakes.

Not if the kid didn’t want to save himself.

“—and he asked me if I’d texted him to,” Verity continued, as if Miles hadn’t spoken, “as he so charmingly put it, yank your chain.”

That wouldn’t be so bad, would it? Her testing boundaries before heading off to college in a few months. Asserting her independence.

“Did you?”

“Oh, absolutely,” she said with faux innocence. “I mean, what other possible reason could I have other than to irritate, annoy or otherwise induce panic in one or more of my brothers?” She laid her hand against her chest, just a damsel in no distress whatsoever fucking with her brother. “It’s what I live for.”

“I know,” he muttered. “That’s the problem.”

One of many that kept him up at night.

“Hilarious. Believe it or not, there are a few times in my life where I make a decision that has absolutely nothing to do with anyone else but me and what I want—”

“I’ll give you a thousand dollars right here, right now if you swear you’ll never, ever, want Reed Walsh.”

“—and as someone who’s seen Reed, I know darn well you realize that a girl doesn’t have to be trying to rile up her brothers to become infatuated.”

“You’re infatuated,” he repeated dully. “With Reed Walsh?”

“I didn’t say that.”

But she was blushing. Hard. And avoiding Miles’s eyes.

He knew she was almost an adult. That she’d had a few boyfriends in high school and would, undoubtedly, have more in college and beyond. He wasn’t trying to keep her a little girl. And he wasn’t some overbearing asshole trying to guard her virginity. It was her body and her choice what she did with it. Who she shared it with.

This was about protecting her from getting hung up on some asshole who wasn’t nearly good enough for her. Someone who’d only hold her back. Who’d break her heart.

Opening a drawer behind him, he reached in and pulled out the first thing he touched. “Here,” he said, holding it out to her without looking at it. “Just kill me now.”

He shut his eyes and tipped his head back, hoping she at least made his decapitation quick and painless.

Unlike this conversation.

“That’s a whisk,” she pointed out. “And it’s plastic.”

He opened his eyes. Frowned at the small, red whisk in his hand.

“I could hit you over the head with it a few times,” she added, sounding a bit too eager to do just that. “It probably won’t kill you, but it’ll at least give you a headache.”

“Already got one.” He set the whisk down then scrubbed a hand through his hair a few times. “Look, you’re at a delicate stage of your life. You’re growing up. Your body is changing—”

“Are you serious right now? You do realize I’m all the way through puberty, right? Came out stronger and better on the other side, with hips, boobs, and a regular menstrual cycle.”

“All I’m saying is that it’s normal to have certain urges” —he winced, not because he didn’t want her to have those urges, he just didn’t want to talk about them— “when it comes to boys. Or girls, or both, depending on your sexual preferences. But that doesn’t mean you have to act on them.”

“Oh, I see. Like you didn’t act on your urges last night with the blonde bombshell? I’m sure you two spent a lovely PG-13 evening together discussing politics and sharing childhood memories.” Shaking her head, she tsked. “If only we all had your strong moral fiber and ironclad willpower.”

Blonde bombshell. That had to be the most accurate description of Tabitha he’d ever heard.

She’d sure as hell blown his life to bits all those years ago.

“This isn’t about me,” he insisted. “This is about you and your future. I thought you wanted to go to school unencumbered by any romantic entanglements.”

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