Page 12 of Wrapped Up in Holly

Riley loved soccer, and she was growing so fast, it seemed like she needed new cleats every few weeks. Ari wanted to do gymnastics, which wasn’t cheap. And Holly, she deserved whatever she wanted.Everythingshe wanted.

Now, she settled her gaze somewhere over my shoulder, and I moved into her line of vision. “We figured it out before. We’ll figure it out again.”

She didn’t respond, only dropped her chin, clearly in disagreement.

“I love you,” I told her, and she nodded, but didn’t say it back.

“I’ll see you later,” she said quietly and turned, walking out of the barn.

I stared after her, feeling like my whole universe was slipping through my fingers, and when I finally spun around to face my brothers, they were standing in a line like they expected the next thing out of my mouth.

“I don’t know what to do.”

The three of them crowded around me in a semi-circle as Aiden said, “What happened? Start from the beginning.”

I explained how in the last few years, we’d drifted apart, not only physically but emotionally, too. And how, when she’d caught me with my hand around my dick one night while I watched porn, she broke down in tears. Then how she had confessed in our therapy session that she didn’t feel appreciated or loved anymore and how our relationship felt more like we were roommates as opposed to husband and wife.

“Well, I mean, not that I want to picture your dick, but mutual masturbation is hot,” Ryan said, completely unhelpfully.

I rolled my eyes.

Aiden set his hands on his hips. “If this is about you working too much on the farm, I can help you find a manager. I’ve been telling you for the last year that the profits have been sustaining in growth. You don’t need to do it all yourself. I get why you were because of those few lean years with the weather and crop yield, but you’ve done a great job of expanding the business. You can afford to hire help.”

I chewed on the inside of my lip for a while, thinking about how Holly barely met my gaze anymore. “What if it’s too late?”

“It’s never too late,” Tristan said, and when I gave him a bland look, he shrugged. “Actions speak louder than words, right? Show her how you feel. Show her how much you appreciate her as a mom, a wife, but most importantly, as a woman.”

For a kid, who I knew for a fact didn’t have a lot of experience with girls, he sure was a romantic.

Ryan on the other hand, slapped my arm. “Send the kids to Mom and Dad’s and fuck her like you’re two singles in your twenties. That’s mostly what it’s about, right?”

He wasn’t totally wrong, and when I gestured to my other two brothers for their input, they both shrugged. If Holly wasn’t feeling wanted because of the whole masturbation fiasco, I had to show her how much I still wanted her. How much I would always want her.

Ryan pasted on a shit-eating grin. “You’re welcome.”

Holly

Irearranged my pillows, settling back in my tiny twin bed, my cell phone pressed against my ear as it rang on the other end. My bottom lip was lodged between my teeth, my nerves a ball of excitement.

“Hey, babe,” Evan said when he finally answered.

“Hi!”

“How’d it go? I thought you were going to call me earlier.”

“I know, but it was so crazy. I didn’t get home until ten and then I was talking with Tori.”

“Yeah?” He yawned. “What happened?”

We’d had our end of semester runway show today. “One of Zed’s models had an allergic reaction and ended up in the ER.”

“Are they okay?”

“Yeah, she’s fine.” I waved my hand. That wasn’t the big part. “But he needed someone to fill in and didn’t have any time to adjust the clothes, so he asked me to do it since we were about the same size.”

I could hear Evan shuffling around on his end, waking up more. It was past midnight, and I knew he had a final tomorrow. I probably should have let him sleep, but I couldn’t keep this in any longer.

“You were a model?” he asked, and I nodded even though he couldn’t see it.

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