Page 48 of Crushing On My Brothers BFF

“You’re lucky I’m all dosed up,” he says, chuckling. “Or those kisses might give me ideas.”

“I want Sophie to know this doesn’t mean we’re not friends, you know? Do you think she could ever accept that?”

Paul normally takes this seriously. Usually, I can sense his panic, but now he smiles dreamily. “I think when she sees how happy we are together and hears us talking about babies and the future…”

My belly tingles like it always does when he talks about that stuff. I still can’t believe it sometimes, the fact he wants a future together as badly as I do, but he does. Over the past several months, we’ve talked about it alot.

“I think that’s the pills talking,” I tell him.

“Maybe,” he sighs, “but she’s always asking me when I’m going to find somebody.”

“I don’t think she meant me.”

I cuddle as close to him as I can without hurting his leg. Being with him felt right from the first time we did it, but there’s always a black cloud hanging over me. When I’m with Sophie, I’m lying about her brother. When I’m with Paul, I’m lying about Sophie’s crush on his best friend.

Okay, I’m notlying, but I’m withholdingbig time. I wonder if there can ever be a day when we don’t have to keep secrets and canreallybe together.

My phone vibrates. It’s a text from a mutual friend of me and Sophie.Have you seen the video?!

“What’s wrong?” Paul asks.

I click the link. A video of Sophie appears. She’s on her feet, yelling at Jane Larson. I can’t believe I let myself miss the livestream! What sort of friend am I?

“I had a silly crush on him…”

“Is that Sophie?” Paul asks.

“It’s from her interview today,” I tell him.

“Somebody found a video of me talking about the crush. They said they’d show my brother unless I got Kaleb to say it was him.”

“Wait, what?” Paul tries to sit up, then lets out a shaky breath when his body has different ideas. “What crush? Sophie has a crush on… on Kaleb?”

“That’s what she’s saying,” I murmur.

“What do you mean, what she’ssaying?Surely she’s talked to you about it.”

I jump to my feet, shaking my head, feeling pathetic tears trying to sting my eyes. All those moments with Paul, sneaking around, the mind-blowing sex, all of it leading here to this secret. Iknewthings were going to get bad when Kaleb came home.

“Don’t put me in this position,” I say. “It’s not fair.”

“Forget that part, then,” he growls. “I don’t care if you knew. If you did, you had your reasons for not telling me, but that’s what Sophie said, isn’t it?Isn’t it?”

He sounds desperate, as though he wants me to tell him he hallucinated. Sophie didn’t really say any of that.

“Yes,” I say. “She’s had a crush on him for years. I’m sorry.”

“A crush,” he repeats, then a smile slowly spreads across his face. “What does that even mean? A crush? It doesn’t matter. It’s not like us, Gwennie. It’s not like anything will ever happen between them.”

I bite down, smoothing my hands across my belly, feeling like our future children are criticizing me for not saying anything.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Sophie

“I guess you want me to apologize,” I say in the hired car back to the hotel.

Kaleb sits across from me, his arms folded, staring out the window. “I didn’t want anybody to know about the crush, but hell, the look on Jane’s face almost made it worth it.”

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