Page 48 of An Unexpected Home

Carly was by far the most insane with nerves. She had barely slept the previous night, keeping everyone else in the house awake with her questions. And Brandon got it, she was putting up a lot of money to get this business off the ground. A lot of her own money. But Melanie had the same amount invested and she was much calmer. At least as far as he could tell.

And then there was Leah. She’d paced back and forth in her bedroom for hours, questioning each and every decision she had made in the last two weeks. Brandon tried to help, telling her that everything was going to go fine. After about the third time of saying it, he realized that if he didn’t just shut his mouth, not only would he not be getting sex anymore, but that he might be dead.

So he kept his thoughts to himself and just watched as she went over it all. Finally around two-thirty in the morning, she fell exhausted, into bed.

“Brandon, have you seen Logan?” Melanie shouted as she rushed past him, not stopping for his answer. “He was supposed to be here ten minutes ago.”

“I haven’t seen him,” he said loudly since she was already halfway down the hall.

There were only a few more minutes before the open house was due to start and he was putting the finishing touches on setting up a banner.

“Looks good,” he heard Leah’s voice and turned to find her looking up at him. When she had left the house that morning – after only 3 hours of sleep – she had been wearing old jeans and one of his sweatshirts. And seeing her in his clothes had stirred something inside him. But now looking down on her, she was dressed in black dress slacks and a polo with the studio logo on the right-hand chest.

“You almost ready to open the doors?” he asked, climbing back down the ladder.

“Yep. Carly is up front and Mel is changing.”

Looking around the studio, he said, “You guys have something special here.”

She shrugged. “It’s Carly and Mel. They are the ones with the dream.”

“Hey,” he said and touched her shoulder. “It’s you too. I’ve seen how hard you have worked and how much you love it.”

A smile lit up her face. “It’s funny. This isn’t the life I pictured for myself but now...now that I’m here doing it, I don’t know why it wasn’t always the plan.”

He gave her what was planned as a small kiss but ended up being a lot longer.

“No time for that,” Mel said, grabbing her hand and ripping her away from him.

She laughed and gave a little wave with her other hand. “Here we go!”

Folding the ladder, he put it back in the storage closet before meeting up with the girls in the front lobby.

Standing to the side he watched them give each other quick hugs before unlocking and opening the front door.

Dozens of people filed in, some he knew and some he didn’t.

“This is pretty impressive,” Logan said, walking up to stand next to him.

“They’ve done something pretty cool here, both for themselves and for the town.”

“You staying all day?” Logan asked him.

“Plan to.”

“Yeah, me too.”

Looking at his brother, he saw dark circles under his eyes. “What’s going on with you?”

Shrugging, Logan looked at his feet. “Just dreading this trip next week.”

“Are you ever gonna tell me why you hate traveling so much, all of a sudden?”

“If I knew, I’d fucking tell you. All I know is that when I’m here, I feel happy and when I’m anywhere else, I am miserable.”

Brandon got it, but only in the sense that he loved it here. He’d only ever been away a few times; college and vacations, and each time he couldn’t wait to get back. But Logan, he had been gone for years and had never really had a home until he’d moved back.

“How long is this trip?”

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