Page 23 of Always

I draw in a breath. “This was a mistake.”

“You bet it was. You crossed a line, Braden.”

She’s not wrong, but people in glass houses… I scoff. “Icrossed a line? Have you forgotten how many lines you’ve crossed? Stealing a piece of mail from my house? Barging into my office and demanding information?”

“We’re not talking about me. We’re talking about you. But since you brought me into it, the last time I checked, I never showed up at your father’s home unannounced. That’s a major line.”

I don’t reply. I can’t argue her point.

“What are you really doing here?” she asks for the umpteenth time.

I shake my head. “I don’t honestly know, Skye. All I know is I was on the plane, ready to go to New York, and I told the pilot to change the flight plan.”

It’s not a lie. Though I had originally planned to come, something came up in New York. I figured it was a great excuse to hit the club, try to remember who the hell I am…

Then, midair, I changed my mind again.

“You didn’t know I was coming here?”

“No. I swear I didn’t.”

“Then why? Seriously. And don’t tell me you were worried about me or you were trying to understand me.”

“That’s actually the truth.”

“No, that’s the truth you told yourself so you could live with yourself for making this decision. I want the real truth.”

“I’m telling the truth. Or at least, the partial truth.”

“What’s the rest of it, then?”

“I don’t know. I just know…” I rake my fingers through my hair once more. “I’ve never felt this way before. It’s…unnerving.”

“Felt what way?”

I wrinkle my forehead. Purse my lips. Then I look away from her. “When did you talk to my brother?”

“Interesting pivot,” she says. “It’s not even slightly related to my question. But I’ll play along. He called me an hour ago, while I was in the cab coming here.”

“I see.”

“He says you’re miserable without me.”

Damn it, Ben! Brothers are supposed to have each other’s backs. Miserable?

I hate the truth of it.

“This is why relationships aren’t in the cards for me. I have aproblem with misery of any kind.”

She laughs. “You think that makes you unique? No one likes to be miserable.”

“I like it less than most.”

“You do? Because you, the great Braden Black, know how misery affects everyone else on the planet?”

“Damn it!” I’m tense again, so tense my body is trembling slightly from the rigidness.

“This is getting nowhere,” she says. “I’m going back in.”

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