Page 66 of That One Moment

Once the meal is over, Sage takes Nova and excuses herself, saying she needs to head home.

“I can drive you,” Maria offers. “I have book club soon and it’s a few roads over from yours. Jamie, why don’t you take Caiden out this evening? Catch up a bit.”

“Yes, Jay, it's been so long, I’m sure you have plenty to catch up on,” Sage remarks, drawing out the word ‘so’. Jamie scowls at her but is met with a mischievous smirk. If Maria is confused by the comment, she doesn’t say anything.

“You can take your old room. Jamie will get you clean sheets,” Maria says to me, as she stands and starts gathering up our empty plates.

“There’s a lot of instructions for Jamie being thrown around,” Jamie responds coldly, getting to his feet and taking the plates from his mother. “I have plans tonight.” He storms out of the kitchen and my body deflates, feeling like I made a terrible decision in coming here. Hopefully, my father’s welcome will be a little warmer.

“Ignore him, Caiden.” Maria looks at me with a sad smile. “He’s going through a breakup and has a lot on his mind.”

Once Maria has left the room, I stare at my hands, ignoring Sage’s knowing looks.

“His mood has nothing to do with his break up with Rachel,” she says, and I look up. She has Nova on her lap, the baby cradled into her chest, her little blue eyes open and looking at me. “But you already knew that.”

“I know,” I admit. “He’s upset with me.”

“Bingo.” Sage smirks. “He thought you had something special but then you started ignoring him.” She looks at the door and then back at me. “Jamie has always known what he wants, he’s never struggled with that, until you. You turned everything upside down and then you shut him out.”

“I didn’t mean to,” I say defensively. “I just…” I shake my head because this is going to sound really bad, especially to Sage. “I just got upset that he left.” My eyes land on the baby. “And I know his reasoning but he never even said he’d come back. Like our time together was just a fling to him.”

She nods, not looking in any way offended as I’d expected. “Did you ask him to come back? Because from what I know, he asked you to come here. Heshowedyou what he wanted when he asked that. Jamie doesn’t do flings. He hasn’t put his heart on the line, not since Coop.”

I think about the way he’d begged me to go home with him that day, wishing I’d had the guts to accept his offer then and there instead of running off. Wishing I’d asked him to come back. Wishing we’d at least talked it through and found a way to makeuswork even with the distance. But wishes never got anyone anywhere, least of all me.

Sage shakes her head and with baby in arms and a bag over her shoulder she stands in the doorway. “Look, if you want my two cents, I think the two of you suck at communicating. He’s mad ‘cause you ignored him, you ignored him because… I don’t even know why, but I’m sure you have your reasons. Whatever. It doesn’t matter. You’re not children, sort this out.”

She leaves without another word and my only thought is how lucky that baby is to have a mother like her.

I lie awake on my bed, listening to my stepbrother stomp around his room. Maria hasn’t come back yet, and as far as I know, he hasn’t gone out despite supposedly having plans.

Jamie never lived here back when I did, but Maria and my dad had given him a room anyway, and sometime after Cooper’s death, he moved into it. Now, he’s only a few feet away from me, yet the distance feels like an entire ocean apart.

My skin itches, my legs restless and uncomfortable as I toss and turn, trying to ignore the ache inside me that wants to see him. To touch him. To kiss him. Ignoring the part of me that feels so pulled towards Jamie, it’s taking every bit of my resolve not to knock on his door.

Music starts playing loudly.The Whole of the Moonby the Waterboys seeping through the quiet of the house and into my room. It gets louder and I’m sure he’s doing it deliberately to fuck with me. When it plays on repeat for the third time, I climb out of bed with a huff and throw open my door, closing the space to his closed door in a few steps.

He opens after a few loud knocks and I suck in air as I take in how breathtaking he looks dressed in a tight white Henley and blue jeans.

“Can you turn it down, please?”

His eyebrows pull tight as he takes me in, dressed in black jeans and his hoodie.

“No,” he says bluntly, loud enough for me to hear over the music. “I’m leaving soon, anyway.” Jamie heads further into hisroom, his back to me, and I follow. His room smells strongly like him, his bed is unmade and there's clothing piled high on a desk. My eyes roam over his space before coming back to rest on his broad shoulders. He’s all power and confidence but at the same time soft and warm and so comforting, I want to lose myself in him every time he’s around me.

Feeling incredibly frustrated - at him, at my thoughts, at my undeniableneedfor my stepbrother - I disconnect his smart speaker from the wall, throwing the room into silence. “I thought you were going out?” My voice sounds harder than I intended.

When he turns around, his eyes are dark and there’s a hungry expression on his face which makes my pulse race.

“I am.” Jamie takes a step closer and I watch his chest rise and fall with every breath. “On a date,” he adds.

“Oh.” My heart plummets and my mind screams at me to leave but I was never one for making the right choice. “Is she pretty?” I don't know why I want to punish myself by asking.

Jamie steps closer, his head tipped to the side as he studies me. I stand straighter, not letting him see the tremble in my body. Tension is thick in the air and need courses through my blood, making sweat break out on the back of my neck.

“He. And yeah, he’s pretty.” My throat constricts as I swallow thickly and his eyes zero in on my Adam’s apple.

“Are you going to fuck him?” I clench my hands at my sides to stop myself from touching him. This game we’re playing suddenly feels familiar.

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