Page 3 of Wish

Really, it didn’t matter because the result was the same.

It was rough at first, navigating being a teenager who’d lost his parents, then realizing not long after that they were likely also the only people who would accept me for me.

Besides Win and Max, of course.

Real talk, though? I doubted even them sometimes. Part of me—avery bigpart of me—thought if they knew the not-so-platonic feelings I harbored for Max, they’d likely decide I was as depraved as other people claimed.

Naturally, I harbored my romantic feelings because I’d rather die inside every time Max smirked at a long-legged female and disappeared with her for hours at a time. When he came back, the smirk was still in place, but it was a lot more self-satisfied than before.

I wondered a lot about what it took to put that relaxed haze in his eyes, and I was jealous of every woman who got the chance.

Pining away for a man who was off-limits in every sense, feeling the flicker of hope light up my deepest pain when he smiled at me a little too long or acted like my bodyguard instead of my brother was preferable, though, to not having him in my life at all.

The pain of his absence and disgust would take such a huge chunk out of my heart that I wasn’t sure I’d survive without it.

I existed on a tightrope, balancing the heavy emotions I had for him in one hand while constantly heaping reminders and excuses in the other so I didn’t topple over into a place I couldn’t come back from. I wobbled a lot, but I was getting better at balance.

Until my brother went away.

My actual brother from the same mother. Win was older than me by two years just like Max. We always had a close relationship, our mother never willing to accept anything less. In her eyes, brothers got along and that was it. When we bucked her ideals, she put us in a giant shirt and made us wear it until we ended up hatching some scheme together or watching a movie on the sofa with me curled into the fabric of our shared shirt and resting my head against Win’s side.

Note: I donothave any non-brotherly-style feelings for Win. Just the thought makes me want to hurl.

An unexpected car crash flipped our entire lives upside down. With Max newly eighteen and Win not quite there, the pair somehow managed to keep the three of us together in the house we grew up in, both taking care of me, their underage sibling. The close relationship we always had shifted and transformed into an even tighter bond, the three of us clinging to the only family we had left: each other.

For a long time, I thought my love for Max was just brotherly—until I started having wet dreams about him and my heart would race when he came within touching distance. It freaked me the hell out and weighed me down with guilt. What kind of guy falls for his brother? Obviously, I could never tell a single soul, and I prayed the feelings would go away.

Thank God Win was always around to be a buffer between us, always there to remind me Max was his best friend since they were in kindergarten and I was just the annoying little bro.

Fast-forward. Win was a junior at Westbrook University in the sports medicine program and was spending a semester abroad in Sweden. It was great for him… Not so much for me.

Why? Because my feelings for Max were still burning up my insides like a forest fire, and there was no way to extinguish them.

Suddenly, my buffer for Max was halfway across the globe, and there was no shaking him because the only reason Win even agreed to go was that he knew Max would be here to look out for me.

I didn’t need anyone to look out for me, but they didn’t agree, and as they often liked to point out, it was “two against one.” Assholes.

Maybe it won’t be so bad. A few check-ins. Some phone calls. A meal or two.That’s what I thought.

The reality: He showed up all the time, bossed me around like I couldn’t run my own life, and put an invisible tail on me that reported my whereabouts to him twenty-four-seven. When I found myself in any kind of situation that whoever was watching deemed worrisome? He showed up on that damn motorcycle, his leather-wearing ass bursting in like he was the law.

Hell, he even exchanged numbers with my friends.

Myfriends, which he decided I could have after he met them.

That’s not even the worst part. Know what the worst part is?

I liked it. Dear God, I freaking liked his overbearing, asshole ways. Every time he showed up worried as hell about me and bellowing my name, my stomach fucking dropped. When his rough hands grabbed my chin, forcing my face up so he could study every inch and make sure I wasn’t hurt, a little more of my heart tried to abandon me and climb into his chest.

I was a walking disaster inflated purely by the pain of secret feelings I shouldn’t even have.

The shrill whistle cut through everything, even the buffer of the dense water surrounding my body. Lifting my head, water rained off me as I dragged in a breath and swung toward Coach Resch standing at the end of the pool.

“Time!” he bellowed, his voice echoing around the large pool.

“No whistles allowed at second practice,” Jamie complained from a few lanes over.

“You wanna do another lap, Owens?” Coach challenged.

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