Page 51 of Christmas with Brother's Best Friends
I expect her to at least smile and nod, but she doesn’t even do that. Instead, she sinks down into her office chair, looking smaller than usual. Like the weight of her sadness is crushing her.
“That might not be the best idea,” she says quietly.
Ryan turns to her. “Why not?”
Emma tenses in surprise when he suddenly breaks his silence. Her eyes meet his as she frowns. “Because I don’t trust myself around you guys when we’re all alone. Look what happened on Christmas Eve.”
And there it is.
Tense silence rings throughout the office as we all stare at her, waiting for her to keep speaking her mind. She obviously has a lot of bottled up thoughts that she needs to share. I think we all do.
“We can’t ever tell anyone what happened that night,” Emma says, attempting to make her voice sound firm, but it comes out shaky regardless. “If my brothers ever find out…”
“They’ll murder us in our sleep,” I mutter, already knowing that they’ll blow things out of proportion because they’re so protective of her. Honestly, I’ve always admired how fiercely her brothers protect her. But now that protection feels like a wall I can’t climb.
“Do you regret that night with us?” Josh asks her, sounding more vulnerable than I’ve ever heard him sound before.
Emma sighs and shakes her head, her eyes sinking to the floor. “I don’t, but… it can’t happen again.”
A shard of pain pierces my heart at the sound of those words. Obviously, it makes sense that we don’t repeat the action that could get us in serious hot water, but it still hurts to know thatour one night together was probably our last too. I won’t ever kiss her again until we’re breathless, or feel her soft, bare skin against mine.
It was a one time thing. One night of pleasure. That’s it.
That’s all it can be because of circumstances that we can’t even control.
“It’s bullshit,” Ryan mutters.
“Ryan,” Josh says through gritted teeth. “It’s already hard enough. Don’t make it harder.”
Ryan shakes his head as he turns away from us and Emma, his jaw tensing as he holds back words that I can already guess are laced with anger.
Emma stands from her seat and places her hand on his back. “Ryan.”
Ryan doesn’t move or say a word. If he could snap his fingers and disappear, I’m sure he would do just that.
“I know it doesn’t sound fair, but it has to be this way,” Emma says, her voice wavering a little. “I loved being with you guys, but just think about what will happen if people find out. Ifmy familyfinds out.”
Ryan slowly flexes his fingers, his back remaining tense under her hand.
“You guys and my brothers are so close. You’ve been best friends for as long as I can remember,” Emma continues as she remains behind him, trying to talk some sense into him. “You can’t throw that away. You can’t lose them.”
“I can’t lose you either,” Ryan replies. “I’m supposed to choose?”
“It’s not that simple,” Emma sighs as she pushes his shoulder, forcing him to turn around and face her. “I already have a complicated relationship with my parents. If they find out about this, I would never hear the end of it from them. This might seriously hurt our relationship, and I don’t want that. I don’t think that I can handle that.”
Ryan narrows his eyes a degree, and I almost want to grab him by his shoulders and shake him. I know that he cares about her, but so do we. He has to do what’s right for her and accept her choice, even if it hurts like hell.
That’s what you do for people you love.
“We have to stop,” Emma says, her voice dropping down to a whisper like they’re sharing a secret. A secret that we all know. “This will only destroy everything around us. We can’t do that.”
Ryan quietly grinds his teeth as he stares at her, holding back so many words that he wants to say. He lets out a faint grunt that doesn’t confirm or say much of anything besides a weakacknowledgement of what she said. “I need to put the Christmas decorations up.”
Emma’s eyes trail him until he disappears, her shoulders immediately sinking. “You guys understand what I’m saying, though, right?”
“We do,” Josh replies as he crosses his arms over his chest. “We don’t want to jeopardize your relationship with your family, and we don’t want to lose our best friends. The only way to do that is to… pull back.”
Emma nods before grabbing the rest of her things off her desk and tucking them in the tote bag. Her eyes do one more sweep of her desk, heaviness in them.
