Page 12 of Seven of Hearts

His sister’s best friend.

4

LOGAN

Istared at my phone, not really sure what I was waiting for. Frankly, I didn’t want to admit to myself that I was waiting for a text from Leah—although I knew it would never come. For the rest of the send-off brunch, she hadn’t even glanced my way.

Maybe she was just trying to keep Kylie from figuring out we had hooked up. Maybe she was just better at compartmentalizing than I was.

It’s not like I was well versed in casual hookups. That condom had been in my wallet for a long time. I’d never had a use for it.

“If you stare at your phone any harder, your eyes are going to burn a hole in it.”

I glanced up and found my oldest sister, Kristin, wiping her hands with a dishtowel.

“Something on your mind?” she asked.

I stuffed my phone in my pocket. “Just tired. Not looking forward to dealing with airport security.”

Kristin let a quiet laugh slip. “The wedding was beautiful, but I’m wiped. We barely had the energy to drive the mile home.”

“Should’ve stayed at the inn like I did,” I said as I raided her coffee maker as soon as the brew cycle finished.

“You could’ve stayed here, you know,” she said as she sipped from her mug. “Especially on Sunday and Monday. We haven’t turned your bedroom into a craft room or a home gym.”

“Yet,” I said, teasing her.

She snickered. “If I were going to turn it into something, we would have done it by now. Not twelve years after you went to college and moved out. You always have a place here. With Hunter and Kylie out of the house now, it’s awfully quiet these days.”

Truth be told, my sister’s giant house had never felt like home. The people in it felt like home, but the house was just a house. The six of us—my siblings and Will—had moved out of our trailer and into the house the summer I graduated high school and moved to college.

I appreciated that they tried to make it my home too, but it was what it was.

“You sure you’re doing okay in Chicago?” Kristin asked hesitantly, cocking her head.

“June in Chicago sure as hell beats June in North Carolina,” I said by way of circumventing the question.

“Will’s not working you too hard, is he? I still don’t understand why y’all had to choose a city so far away for the new team.”

“It’s strategic,” I said.

She sighed. “I know that. I just miss you, is all. With Bryan and Will working remotely here, it just feels like you should be too.”

Thankfully, Will padded into the kitchen and made a beeline for the coffee maker before I had to come up with some kind of response.

“You sure you have to head out today?” he asked. “You should take some time off. Stay another week.”

I chuckled. “Sorry. Can’t. My boss is a hard-ass."

Will smirked. “You have time that you can take off. You just choose to not use it. I checked.”

And that’s what sucked about my brother-in-law being my boss.

Technically, Will was the founder, CEO, and a whole lot of other world-salad acronyms of the tech company I worked for.

When I was a teenager failing math and at risk of not graduating, Will had been there to motivate me and give me something to work for.

I’m sure there were whispers around the new offices in Chicago about me being a nepo hire, but I didn’t give a shit. Will made me work every position I had ever held in the company.

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