Page 93 of The Invitation
“Maybe she should give Gannon a shot,” I joke. “He’ll break her heart. She’ll love it.”
Gannon smirks.
“I couldn’t handle that drama,” Tate says. “And you couldn’t either—either one of you.”
“While that sounds like an absolute barrel of fun, I can’t go with you,” I say. “Sorry.”
I don’t know if it’s the way I say it, or the tone I use, or just that Tate can read me better than almost anyone in the world. But he looks at me with a curious, skeptical look that makes it clear he knows something is going on. That it’s not just me not wanting to deal with Carys’s friends.
That something else is at play.
I know it’ll come out that things have substantially changed with me and Georgia sooner or later, but I don’t really know how to explain it without it seeming like we got trapped in a cabin and fucked. Because that’s not what it was. At all. And I don’t want to cheapen the story by miscommunicating it and painting it in the wrong light.
“What?” Tate asks.
“Nothing,” I say.
“Liar. What’s going on?” Tate asks, studying me.
I smile. “Tate,nothing is going on.”
Tate leans toward Gannon and points at me. “See that little grin? That cocky wobble? That means fuckery is afoot.”
“Really? What kind of fuckery?” Gannon asks.
“I don’t know.”
Gannon glances at me, and then back to Tate. “I have no idea why you think you know this.”
“It’s called context clues, Gannon,” Tate says, sighing. “How can you be the oldest kid out of six and run a multi-million-dollar operation and not know how to read people?”
“It’s simple. I hate people. I don’t care what they think or what they feel. I’m going to do what I want, and they can take it or leave it. Doesn’t matter to me. Their opinion isn’t going to change a damn thing, so why would I waste my time trying to decipher their opinions?”
I grin. “Suddenly, so much makes sense about you, Gan.”
He rolls his eyes.
“Don’t change the subject,” Tate says, resting his elbows on the table and leaning forward. He’s like a bloodhound on a trail. “Start talking.”
“There’s nothing to talk about.”
Gannon settles in. “If I cared, which I do not, I’d start by considering what he’s been working on. Who he’s been dealing with? Where has he been in the last twenty-four hours?—”
“Gannon, you’re a fucking genius!” Tate exclaims, bolting upright.
Oh, fuck. Here we go …
“Tate, before you get too carried away?—”
“Do you know who he’s been spending time with?” Tate asks our brother. “And who he was with today in the storm?”
“Tate …” I warn.
“Let me check my notes and see who he was scheduled to be with today,” Gannon deadpans. “Come on, Tate. I have no fucking idea who he was with. Do you not listen to anything I say?”
“No.” Tate turns crisply to me and gives me a shit-eating grin.“Georgia.”
Waffles barks in the distance.
