Page 48 of A Taste of Chardonnay

“Why did you care?”

“Just like you were trying to protect me, I was trying to protect you. You deserved better than Danny Becker.”

I was amazed at how oblivious I had been. I thought he was being an overprotective and overbearing brother type. Honestly, at the time, I thought he was being a dick. I was having fun, wanting to flirt with a cute guy who had been paying attention to me, and Brady blocked me at every opportunity.

I finished cutting the romaine and tossed it in a bowl before sprinkling a decent amount of shredded Parmigiano Reggiano on top. “Why didn’t you ever tell me?”

“Tell you what?”

“That you liked me.” I held my hand up, cutting him off. “And don’t tell me it was because of what you overheard. If you had a crush on me, that meant you liked me way before that moment. So why not tell me?”

He sighed and took a sip of whiskey. He tipped the glass back and forth as if he was trying to think of a way out of answering. His eyes lingered on the amber liquid before looking up and locking on mine. “When I heard you call me trash that day, the reason it hurt so much, was because I believed it to be true. You deserved better than Danny Becker, but you also deserved better than me. Even if it killed me to see you with any guy, I knew I could never be worthy enough for you.”

“I hate you thought that.”

“Tell me it’s not true.”

“It’s not.”

“You’re full of shit. You just don’t want to hurt my feelings.”

“When have you ever known me to put someone’s feelings over the truth?” It was why I was considered a bitch by many. Some would say I didn’t have a filter, but I was more of a straight shooter. I didn’t believe in bullshitting. I didn’t believe in not being honest with someone.

“Not often.”

“How about never? There is one thing you can always count on with me, and that’s the truth. So when I tell you I never once thought you weren’t worthy of me, I am telling you the truth.”

“Come on. You’ve hated me since high school.”

I squeezed some lemon over the salad and added a generous amount of Caesar dressing. “Hating you and being attracted to you are two totally different things.”

“How so?” he asked.

I grabbed two plates and piled salad on top, pushing a plate toward Brady. We might have been having a conversation, but the man needed to eat.

“If you hated me, then you wouldn’t want to be with me,” he added.

“I’ve had sex dreams about you,” I blurted.

His eyebrows shot up, and his mouth opened slightly as though forming a response but then froze mid-thought. He looked as if he'd forgotten how to breathe. His gaze darted to mine, staring at me like he expected me to confirm he hadn’t heard me correctly. “What?” he finally managed.

“The books I read. They’re vampire books.”

“Vampire? Like Anne Rice?”

“Kind of. I call them my vampire sex books. They’re really explicit, and I might have fallen asleep while reading a few times and dreamed of you as the vampire.”

Realization settled in those green eyes. “That’s why you were ogling me on Halloween.”

“I don’t ogle.”

“Oh, you were ogling.”

“That’s not the point. The point is, I might have disliked you, but subconsciously, it wasn’t so cut and dry. My feelings for you were fueled by how you treated me.”

“I was a dick, so you were a bitch.”

“That’s one way to put it,” I said, stabbing a piece of lettuce with my fork. “But even with all the bickering, you managed to sneak into my dreams. Annoying then. Annoying now.”

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