Page 43 of Breathe Again

I could hear him chuckling.

Lily stood at the door with her hand on her hip, giving me a knowing look. “Cole busted you thinking of Kyle farting in his boxers, didn’t he?”

“No!” I shrieked. “Stop talking about it.” I stormed into the house with Lily laughing behind me.

“Sisters sure are different than brothers,” she said as we walked into her den with all five of my sisters waiting and watching.

“We aren’t just sisters. We know about brothers. We have Thomas,” Shelby chimed in.

Lily snorted. “Thomas is sissy-whipped by the whole lot of you. Took him a few months before he’d fart in front of me,” she told me.

“I do not need to hear about my brother passing gas,” I said, dropping my voice to a whisper on the last two words, which only made Lily laugh harder.

“I’m just saying, it is a perfectly normal bodily function.”

“Fine, can we please talk about something else no? Anything else?” I begged.

“Anything?” Ruby asked. “How are things with that new mate of yours?”

“Cole and I are doing very well, thank you,” I told my sister, and saw the disappointment fall across her face.

“I told you,” she said to Shelby and Peyton.

“It’s not always easy to discuss your mating. It’s private,” Maddie tried to defend me. “Even Lily struggled with it in the early days.”

All eyes flew towards my brother’s mate. She shrugged. “That was different. It was Thomas,” she said, and we all sort of shrugged and nodded our agreement.

It wasn’t any secret that Lily hadn’t thought much of my baby brother when she first discovered he was her one true mate. In fact, as far as she was concerned he’d been the biggest douchebag on the planet.

“Well, how's mated life going so far?” Lily asked, trying to get the spotlight off herself.

I smiled. “Really great.”

Ruby rolled her eyes. “Give it up, Lil. That's all she's ever going to admit to. Short, sweet answers, with a big smile for good measure and not a problem in the world. Right, Lizzy?”

“What's that supposed to mean?” I challenged.

“Even when we all knew your life was in the crapper and things were tough, you still hid behind a facade, never wanting to admit anything was wrong.”

“Nothing's wrong. Cole's great. He's everything I've ever wanted. I promise, when I say really great, I mean it.”

“Ruby's right though,” Peyton added. “Even if it wasn't, you wouldn't tell us.”

“Wait, wait, wait,” Lily jumped in. “You're sisters. Don't you guys share, like, everything?”

Maddie laughed. “Even as little kids we were never like you and Elise, Lily. Maybe because there's more of us. I don't know. Shelby and I were close. Ruby and Peyton, I always remembered being close, but Clara and Lizzy just keep things to themselves. And I don't think you should push her, Ruby.”

“You weren't the only one who checked out on this family, Madelyn,” Ruby said, ready to air her dirty laundry. “Lizzy did, too. One minute she's this awesome big sister who took no shit from no one, then the next she's a walking robot always smiling and right with the world, even though her eyes told a different story.”

“That's not fair. She's entitled to her privacy, Ruby. She never owed you an explanation,” Clara said.

“You've always defended her, Clara. Why? Don't tell me she didn't hurt you too, with her disappearing act and then coming back so cold. You two were close as kids,” Ruby argued.

“I know, but Lizzy was always larger than life and when things changed, I was forced to stop living in her shadow. It helped me be strong and follow my dreams. I may not have ever left this place otherwise,” Clara admitted.

“Now look at you,” Shelby said proudly. “Always jetting off around the world to save the animals. You're sort of my hero, Clara.”

Clara just blushed and smiled. She had never really liked the spotlight on herself.

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