Page 59 of Nothing to Do

Sibling relationships could be complicated. Sometimes there was competition or one was valued and encouraged more than another. Love might seem like a given, but it had to be earned, right along with respect.

They’d expended too much airtime on Roman Lowe, more than he should be due.

“Tripp’s interesting. Six older brothers?”

“And he’s not the youngest,” he said. “How does he know your ex?”

“I don’t know. As far as I know, we’ve never met before. Maybe he met Thom.”

Though why that would lead to Tripp knowing her, she had no idea. Especially when he said he never forgot a face. Didn’t that suggest they had met?

“I’ll call Thom when we get back to civilization.”

“Hey, now I never said that.” His smiling tone met her hair in a kiss. “I don’t want you rekindling anything.”

“He lives in New York now. We made our choices.” Though what did that say for them? Zane’s lack of response betrayed he had to be thinking the same thing. “Do you live here full-time? You said you have a house in LA?”

“We’re not in LA,” he said. “We’re in Northern California.”

“We?”

“Rourke and me. We own a compound that houses both DT and Mosaic, his company. We live and work there.” California. It wasn’t forever away. It was better than Australia or Europe… or Mars. “I can stay anywhere, Wanderer. Live anywhere, work anywhere—”

“We shouldn’t talk about this,” she said, grateful they were closing in on the lights of the resort.

“Baby—”

“No, sex head, remember?” She sat up straight to put a little distance between them. “It’s been an intense night, an intense few days.”

Though he stopped by the service door they usually used, his reluctance came in overshooting it, just a little, then grabbing her thigh before she could leap out.

“Will you think about it?”

Their eyes met and she couldn’t come up with anything. Think about it? She’d done nothing but think about it that day. A holiday romance could be frivolous. But she’d met his friends, people he considered family. She’d been in his house, made love on his roof. They weren’t frivolous anymore, if they ever had been.

Yes, it was like a dream, some wild fantasy that could never be reality, yet she’d lived it. And it wasn’t an illusion. It wasn’t a temporary vacation affair. This was his life. His family.

She swallowed and leaned in, holding his jaw to steady herself as she kissed him goodnight.

Think about it?

She slipped out of the cart and back into the hotel without another word. Her purpose was supposed to be protecting her sister, yet in that moment, she needed the grounding of her sibling. Alessia was real. Her touchstone to real life. Maybe getting back into sister mode for a while would be a hard reset and she’d start thinking clearly again… or she could just be sunk with no hope life-as-she’d-known-it would survive.

TWENTY

UNFORTUNATELY, her sister had other ideas.

“A suite?”

“Yeah,” Alessia said, dashing around tossing things into the suitcase open on her bed. “For me, Alana, and Lark. Our security guys know every corner, we’ll be protected there.”

She wanted to ask protected from what, except she’d been the one harping on about safety regardless of their location. Changing that tune now would be hypocritical.

“And they just gave it to you?”

“We asked, ‘cause we thought you wouldn’t be back.” Alessia stopped to look at her, a line forming between her brows. “Why are you back? Did you break up?”

“I was worried about you. This is supposed to be—”

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