Page 65 of Bad Boys After Dark - Brett
Sophie went to him, but he stormed away, splaying his hands like a warning. “You should give me some space to get this out of my system.”
“Brett, why are you so upset? I’m sorry I hit a nerve, but is it because you lost Lorelei? Or because your parents divorced?”
He looked up at the sky, trying to calm the rage eating away at him. “I’m sorry,” he finally said. “It’s both, and it lives right there beneath the surface. You didn’t need to hear all that. I’m sorry.”
She closed the distance between them and wrapped her arms around him.
“Sophie, please give me a minute.” He tried to step back, but she held on tighter.
“Talk to me,” she said softly.
He ground his teeth together, upset with himself for burdening her. “You don’t need to hear any of this ugliness.”
She leaned back enough to gaze into his eyes. “No, Brett. You don’t need to hold it in. You committed to me, and communication goes hand in hand with commitment. I want to help and understand what you’ve gone through. My mom had a brother who died when he was young, and she said it was the worst kind of sadness she’d ever known but that talking helped.”
“Jesus. I’m sorry for your mom and her family.”
“Thank you. I can’t imagine losing a sibling, or what that would feel like. But please talk to me. Help me to understand so I can be there for you.”
He looked away, but he didn’t want to shut her out. “I don’t…I’ve never really talked about it.”
“All the more reason to,” she said with a small smile. “I’d love to hear about Lorelei. I know it’ll be hard, but I’d like to know what happened with your family.”
“Soph, it’s all awful.”
“It’s awful that you lost Lorelei and that your parents didn’t stay together, but it must have been wonderful to have had a sister for all those years. Were you close to her?”
He felt a pained smile tugging at his lips. “Yeah. Really close. She’s the reason I know how to dance.”
“She liked to dance?”
“Lorelei liked everything. She had a personality that was bigger than life, and she wanted to be famous for about a hundred different things—acting, modeling, dancing, baking, trapeze…” He felt a knot that had lived in his chest forever loosen the slightest bit. “She loved old movies, musicals, and plays. She watched all the old Fred Astaire classics, and she took dance lessons down the street from our house. I used to walk her there twice a week. Her teacher wrangled me into being Lorelei’s dance partner.” Memories flew through his mind at breakneck speed, bringing a smile. “I haven’t thought about that for a long time. My family doesn’t know. I remember thinking about how my brothers would give me shit for dancing.”
“And yet dancing helped you reel me in. I always wished I had an older brother. Lorelei must have felt so special to have that secret with you.”
“I hope so. She liked to pretend I was her bodyguard. A few months before she died, my parents took us to a Broadway show, and she wore this fancy dress. She was so excited, and she made all these plans about her big debut. My parents bought each of us boys dark suits.” His throat clogged with emotions. They were the suits they’d worn to her funeral. He cleared his throat to try to regain control, struggling to find his voice again. “She, uh, she wanted to pretend she was an actress. When we got into the theater, I put my arms out to the side and walked ahead of her, clearing the way, and said, ‘Lorelei Bad coming through. No autographs, please.’”
Sophie laughed softly, her eyes glistening with tears.
“She ate it up, waving as she walked through the lobby. Can you imagine? I don’t know how she did it. The girl had more guts and confidence than I could have dreamed of at her age. I haven’t been to a show since…Anyway, after we lost her, the whole bodyguarding thing tore me up.”
“Because you couldn’t protect her?”
He nodded. “We lost her so quickly after her diagnosis. That was the beginning of the end. We went from being a loud, happy family to not knowing what we were. My mom cried day and night, and my father worked all the time, and when he was home he completely lost his shit.”
