Page 23 of The Love Losers

“I’m reasonably sure she didn’t say those words,” Lainey says, trying to look serious as she nudges his arm. “I don’t think anyone else has ever said those words before.”

“I’m going to trademark them.”

“And I’m going to win this wife-off,” I say with a grin.

Nicole points to me. “I’m betting on the blonde.”

“I think I have to do the same,” Claire says apologetically. “Blonde solidarity. Plus, sheismy boyfriend’s sister.”

“Do we have to be on different teams?” Damien asks Nicole, his eyebrows arched, “Because I think you’ve got this one in the bag.”

Lainey sighs as Jake puts his arm around her and gives her a moony look. “Fine, I’ll lose supporting you.”

“Your faith in me is wind beneath my wings,” he tells her with a grin.

My brother just grunts and gives me a worried look. Of course, my gentle giant of a brother’s go-to look is worried. It has been ever since our parents died, leaving him as the head of the household. Declan’s a fix-it guy, and he thinks it’s his job to be a mother and father to Seamus and me, even though we’re both mostly functional adults.

I know him well enough to understand that he needs a private conversation, so at the first opportunity I head out to the back porch. It’s cold as a witch’s tit, but I stare into the night, lit by a nearly full moon and hundreds of pinprick stars hanging over the rolling slopes of the mountains in the distance. I’ve been here for months now, and they’re still beautiful enough to leave me breathless.

I’m not remotely surprised when he joins me two minutes later, holding my purple coat.

“I just don’t know why you have to get involved in this,” he says, as if we’re in the middle of a conversation rather than the start of one. “It would be better for you to come to New York City with Claire and me. Seamus misses you.”

“No offense,” I say, shrugging on the coat, “but my plans aremuchmore interesting. Besides, Seamus said he was going to come visit for a few weeks in the new year. No need for me to go anywhere.”

“And there’s no need for you to help that Anthony guy. Jake’s already working with him, and now Damien and Nicole are looking into the threat. You should stay out of trouble.”

I turn and grin at him in the warm light from inside the house. Behind the door, I can see Lainey and Claire silently laughing at something Jake said, Nicole sitting on Damien’s lap on the living room couch as he beams at her. A Christmas tree chosen by Claire and chopped by Declan presides over all of it—the star slightly crooked because she put it on after drinking too much peppermint schnapps. It’s a warm scene, one that makes my heart glow, but I’m not really a part of it. It’s my world, and it’s not. “My dear brother, you know trouble has a way of finding me. I…need this.”

“Why?” he asks, his brow furrowed.

He doesn’t know about Roman. No one does, other than Anthony Rosings Smith. It seems odd that I’d unzip myself for astranger, not to mention a stranger whose situation in life is so completely unlike my own, but it felt like the most natural thing in the world.

“I just do,” I say.

“Are you…interestedin him? Or do you just want to show Jake up?”

“I don’t know,” I say, not a lie, not strictly the truth.

Iaminterested in Anthony, but I don’t understand what it means yet. All I know is that we have an undeniable connection—deep and strange.

My brother opens his mouth to object, and I shake my head. “I’m an adult, and you’re going to need to trust me on this one. You can’t kidnap me to New York.”

He cocks his head as if to challenge that statement, and I add, “It would totally mess up your proposal.”

My brother’s eyes widen. “How’d you know?”

I grin at him. “I had a suspicion, so I told Claire I thought I’d left something in your house the other day. It only took me five minutes to find the ring. You’re usually better at hiding things.”

“I don’t want to be good at keeping secrets anymore,” he says, his eyes seeking something in mine.

I smile, genuinely happy for him and wanting him to know it. “I’m glad, but I guess that’s something we all have to learn at our own pace.” Then I play-punch him in his steel arm. “And what the hell, by the way… Why’d you make me go searching instead of telling me directly?”

“I know you better than you think.” He gives me one of his Mona Lisa smiles. “You’ve always liked following breadcrumb trails, so I threw some. I’ll tell Seamus about it after I ask.”

“Does Nicole know?”

Nicole takes being Claire’s half-sister very seriously, which means she makes Claire’s business her business

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