Page 102 of Already At Risk
“You’re annoying,” I muttered. “Excuse me while I go talk to my sister.”
Julian laughed as I strode away from his irritating ass, crossing the lawn to Collins, who brightened as soon as she saw me.
“I didn’t know if you’d be here.” She beamed as I drew her into a quick hug.
“Well, pretty much all of my favorite people were going to be in one place.” I had to raise my voice a little to be heard over the music. “I couldn’t exactly miss it.”
Seeing Collins made me feel ashamed that I’d even been considering skipping the event.
“Beau will be happy to see you, too,” Collins said, pointing behind her to where Beau stood by a makeshift DJ booth. It was a table with two massive speakers sitting on it, almost entirely concealing my brother-in-law. But I could see him enough to know that he was preoccupied with talking to the man who stood next to him—tall, sandy-haired, straight nose, sharp green eyes. There was something oddly familiar about him.
“I would pay you an obscene amount of money if you let me play ‘London Bridges.’ I promise it’s Noah’sfavoritesong,” the man was saying before pausing to add, “Okay, that’s a lie. I don’t have an obscene amount of money.”
“He has an obscene enough amount on his own,” I cut in. “Don’t even think about giving him anything.”
Beau’s head jerked up, his expression morphing into his characteristic easy grin.
“Oh, hey, man. Nice to see you finally show up.”
“I’m like…” I checked my watch. “Ten minutes late.”
“Okay, no money,” the other man said, singularly focused on getting Beau to play some throwback Fergie that I had to imagine haunted anyone with the last name of London in middle school. “Might I offer you my hacking skills?”
Beau laughed, turning back toward him. “Are youtryingto sabotage this engagement party? Should I also throw in a little ‘My Humps,’ too?”
“Dude, I am the youngest child out of five,” he deadpanned. “I was put on this Earth to annoy the rest of my siblings. Literally no other reason.” Sothatwas why he seemed familiar—he was one of the London brothers I hadn’t met. “Plus, I’ll have you know that I madethat—” He wiggled a finger in the direction of Gemma and Noah, still happily chatting. “—happen. So I think everyone here owes me.”
“Noteveryevent is about you, Sullivan,” a woman’s voice said behind me. It was said sort of caustically, without a lot of heat and just a small amount of snark. But Natalie’s brother whipped his head around like someone had yelled at him. A flash of stark emotion crossed his face, and then a name I couldn’t quite make out fell from his lips like a sigh. The way he stared at whoever was just over my shoulder had me turning in their direction.
But it was another woman who stole all my attention, sidetracking me from their interaction. Natalie stood there, too, looking fuckingstunningin a coral-colored sundress.
It was unbelievable. That I got to exist in the same place she did for snippets of time.
My mouth ran dry, and my hands twitched, desperate to haul her over my shoulder and take her somewhere no one would find us.
Yep, this was why—thisexactfeeling was why I probably shouldn’t have come today. It had been brought to my attention on more than one occasion that I was terrible at masking how much I wanted this woman, and of course, she had to show up lookingradiant. Like I’dknownshe would.
Natalie smiled at me, giving a little wave of greeting that was altogether too casual for us. In a different world, one where she hadn’t walked into my office and I hadn’t committed to being her legal representation, one where her ex hadn’t hurt her in the way that he had, I’d be sliding my arm around her right now, pulling her into my side.
“Excuse me,sister.” Natalie startled at the sound of her brother’s voice, and I turned back to face him, finding that all the color had drained from his face. His eyes tracked the other woman as she strode away. “I thought you loved me. What the hell?”
“I do love you, Sully.” Natalie slipped past me to give her brother a hug, even while he continued to wear a somewhat horrified expression. “But I also love Ellie, and she happened to be in town this weekend, too.”
Natalie moved to hug another man who was standing slightly behind Sully. Had he been there the entire time? I hadn’t even noticed, but the more I looked at him, the more I realized he looked just like Noah, except even taller and broad-shouldered and with tortoise-shelled glasses sitting on the brim of his nose.
“A goddamn warning would have been nice,” Sully muttered, staring across the lawn after the woman who was now crouching next to Chloe.
“If you need to go inside and fix your hair, we’ll all cover for you,” the quiet brother said, and Sully swung a glare at him.
“What’s wrong with my hair?” He ran a hand through his mop of blond hair while wearing a scowl.
“Nothing,” Natalie assured him before smacking her other brother on the chest. “Be nice, Theo.”
“Ouch.” Theo made a show of rubbing his chest, his lips twitching as he cast a warm look at Natalie. “Missed you, too, Nat.”
She wrapped herself around his middle, and he threw an arm over her shoulders, hugging his sister to his side and pressing a kiss on top of her head.
“Yeah, be nice, Theo,” Sully echoed. “At least I’m capable oftalkingto women instead of just staring at them from the corner.”
