Before I could even say G’day, Simon swooped me up in his arms and hugged me, squeezing the air from my lungs. As soon as he released me, Chris did the same. Well, that explained why both of them were still single. They’d probably hugged their last girlfriends todeath.
Chris released me and I laughed. “Glad to see you missedme.”
“It’s not the same without my little sister underfoot.” He ruffled my hair before I could bat his handaway.
“But what are you doing here? Mum only mentioned Simon would be picking me up. Not that I’m not happy to seeyou.”
He winked at me. “Let’s just say she has no idea I’mhere.”
I stepped back and turned to Josh. “Josh, these are my brothers, Simon and Chris. Chris is the black sheep of thefamily.”
Chris laughed. “Well, that might not be the case after your little announcement.” He grinned at Josh like a crazed man. “So you’re the Yank who stole my sister’s heart. Good luck withthat.”
Should I tell my brothers the truth or keep them believing I was reallyengaged?
Or the real question was, should I tellSimonthetruth?
When I was ten, I had been climbing a tree and fell. Was I injured? You’d better believe it. I sprained my ankle. My mum frowned against girls climbing trees so naturally, I couldn’t tell her what really happened. If I had broken my leg, that would have been harder to explain—not so with a sprainedankle.
But before I had a chance to tell her my version of what happened, Simon blurted the truth. He hadn’t planned to—it justhappened.
When I was twelve, I kissed a boy. It wasn’t a big deal—until Simon accidentally blurted it at the dinner table thatnight.
When I was fourteen, my first boyfriend broke my heart when I caught him kissing my classmate. This was the same boyfriend my parents hadn’t known about until, well, you guessed it…Simon blurted out what hadhappened.
As much as I loved my brother, history was a bitch. And this bitch was warning me to lie to my brothers for the sake of mysanity.
Now, before you go all judgmental on me, I’m not normally a liar. I value honesty and do my best to uphold it. But there are times when twisting the truth is best for all concerned. I was just saving myself, my brothers, my parents, and Wilfred a lot of grief. And yes, it was easier stretching the truth than telling Mum that it would be an icy day in hell before I married someone I didn’tlove.
Not convinced that I was stretching the truth versus telling a flat out lie? I had slept with Josh, so when you thought about it, that wasn’t much different from being married. And being married was only a step up from beingengaged.
All right, it was a far stretch, but it stillcounted.
“That would be me,” Josh replied, answering Simon’s question about Josh being the one who had supposedly stolen myheart.
“Well, I’ve got great news for you two,” Simon said, seeming a little too happy, given that Nanna’s funeral was in twodays.
“What’s that?” Iasked.
“You remember Mum’s rule about no boyfriends or girlfriends allowed in ourbedrooms?”
I nodded, not that the rule mattered anymore now that the three of us were no longerteens.
“Since they have a full house because of the funeral,” he explained, “Josh will share your room. So you won’t have to go sneaking around to have thenaughty.”
The corner of Josh’s mouth jerked up. “Have thenaughty?”
I rolled my eyes. “It’s slang for havingsex.”
Josh laughed, and my girlie parts got excited again. “I figured that’s what it meant. But thanks for thetranslation.”
The panic rolling around in my stomach? It was absent from hisface.
Which meant one thing—Josh wasn’t experiencing the dilemma of being fully aroused like Iwas.
But I had my no-sex rule to uphold, which would be a lot harder to do now that we were sharing the sameroom.
Naturally, my tired brain made a beeline for the gutter when I thought about Josh and harder. My body fired up to a thousand degrees at the memory of his hard length insideme.
