Page 158 of Crazy for this Girl

“Laynee knows that,” Jonah says. “She looked amazing in those wedding dresses she showed me.”

The what?

I feel my whole body go rigid as Laynee tenses at my side, rubbing at one of her temples as I crane my head in her direction.

Yeah, she knows what just happened.

I’m on the verge of losing my entire shit with what she was too blind to see with that Oscar prick. She really needs to brush the hell up on her Nancy Drew shit because how in the hell did she not know he was a shady fuck? There had to be red flags, and she was about to throw her whole life down the drain for some con.

Thank fuck the stupid dickhead got caught, but it still does nothing for my brain to chill and not believe that she thought he was the one for her.

I was.

I always fucking was.

And I almost made the same mistake, so who am I to fucking talk?

“I love wedding dress shopping,” Ellie chimes in. “I went with my sister a few months back.”

Jonah chuckles knowingly. “I know, Els. I’m working on it, babe. You will have the wedding of your dreams. I promise you.”

“Slow your roll, Jo,” I proclaim, keeping my attention on him but aware I’m about to get someone else’s. “I’m working on your sister right now.”

All eyes on the table fall on me, and I should feel like a dickhead for announcing my full intentions for Laynee but, again, I’m not. It’s been way too long enough and her parents couldn’t have been that in the dark to notice that I had a crush on Laynee at one time or another...or forever.

“Are you two…” Jonah wags his fingers between us. “Finally?”

“No,” Laynee quickly objects as if she’s committing one of the seven deadly sins for being with me.

No, I’d be the eighth.

One that’s sated in all things fucking carnal and obsessed with Laynee Reese. If I had it my way, we wouldn’t leave my room for a week. If I was able to get her to listen to me, I’d already have her underneath me, writhing in pleasure and speaking of all the things I always imagined and wished she’d say.

“He’s just messing around.” Laynee straightens her back, trying to allow my earlier words to her fall off her body that I’m sure are already seeped into her brain. "The man hasn’t changed, Jo. He’s still the annoying idiot he always used to be.”

“Oh.” Her brother frowns, which makes me grin at her feeble attempt to ward off my even trying to date her. “Damn.”

“I’m surprised,” Ryan muses lightly, flicking his eyes from me to Laynee, then back again. “I swear I would’ve put a bet on the both of you ending up together. You were that close.”

“Cal had dreams of his own,” Beatrice chimes in like her thoughts matter. “Running a billion-dollar company and all. I’m sure he didn’t want to wait around for someone to figure things out.”

“Only because my father croaked and my mother forced me to take care of my whole family,” I grind out, tired of Laynee’s mom always making a fucking comment. “My mother had debt up to her ass from her lack of being able to stay out of stores that sold thousand-dollar purses and shoes. My cousin was one more arrest from going to jail, and I had to get his lawyers paid up when the cops found him with a six-ounce bag of cocaine in his backseat. My aunt has always had health problems and no insurance since my uncle died years ago at that point. When my father left me the company, one of the terms in his will was that I had to take an accelerated business class to get my degree as quickly as possible. Meanwhile, his company was run by a bunch of crooked higher-ups that my father had employed. So, at twenty-one, in order to fulfill his dreams, while everyone was out having their first legal drink and partying, I was overseas in Iraq watching my brothers and sisters die around me.”

The room falls silent, when Jonah’s uttered fuck breaks through the air.

I feel cold sweat forming around the back of my neck. The air in the room thickens. I just broke in front of Laynee’s family because Beatrice pushed me over the edge like I finally decided Laynee was worth my time. That other things took precedence over her.

“You want that drink now, boy?” Ryan solicits, clearing his throat and standing from his chair. “Because I need a beer.”

He doesn’t wait for me to answer, striding to the kitchen while the room soaks in the information I just blurted out yet again.

It’s not shit that everyone needs to know, but she does.

And Laynee won’t let me fucking talk for more than two seconds without running away from the shit we need to sort out.

Laynee’s hand suddenly and surprisingly finds mine underneath the table, and she squeezes hard, secretly telling me that my words hit home.

They weren’t to make her upset, but they needed to be in the airspace that she was in, and I’m desperate as fuck at this point.

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