Page 30 of Twins For My Bestie's Brother

I’m queasy with jealousy. I just want totattooagain. Make myself useful. Not to the world. But to myself. All I am right now is the Lily I always was.

A text comes through.

From Jackson.

I tap to look at it.

I can help you with the business side of things. If you want. No pressure.

I stare at the text for a few minutes trying to figure out what to say. Nothing comes to me.

But another text comes through.

I want to help.

I turn off the screen. I should say yes. I mean, he’s got all the business expertise in the world. I’m sure not to fail with Jackson on my side.

I flop onto my back. It’s too much to ask for. We’re already pretending to be in a relationship, for fuck’s sake. One thing at a time.

Although the way things went in the car . . . that wasn’t one thing at a time.

I close my eyes and try to fall asleep, but sleep doesn’t come. I push myself up out of bed and go to the metal box sitting next to my suitcase that I haven’t unpacked in all the time I’ve been back in Cider Bay.

I flip it open, revealing my tattoo gun and all my equipment.

Sometimes, when I can’t sleep, the only choice I have is to work. I don’t have spreadsheets or documents or anything I can pull up to take my mind off things. Sometimes sketching does the trick.

But sometimes the only thing I can do is this.

I clean off a patch of skin on the inside of my left thigh. It’s become my weird, messy canvas for all the times I’ve wanted to fuck around and find out.

I turn on the gun and press it against my skin. I’m used to the feeling, the cat scratch-like pain. It dulls after a while, but the first one always tries to make me jump.

There on the inside of my thigh, I write two words that have been circling the drain of my mind since getting out of Jackson’s car.

‘and whatever’

Looks nice amongst all the other little splotches of experiments.

Life right now. It’s ‘and whatever.’

Who knows what’s going to come next? With Jackson. With my job.

At the very least, I know it’s not going to be the same cycle of pain that each and every day became with Will.

So, I might not know what comes next.

And . . . whatever.

That’s just fine. In fact, if the ‘and whatever’ is anything like what happened in the car, I think I’m going to like what comes next.

Chapter 10

Jackson

“So, are you going to tell me why you’ve been avoiding me?”

I glance up at Kayla. She’s on tiptoe, reaching into the highest shelf of books. I already told her I would do it because I’m worried about her falling, but she is stubborn beyond all compare.

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