The possessiveness had gotten worse recently. Before, I could watch him flirt with his next target without even blinking an eye, but now every time I saw him putting moves on someone, a hole of negative emotions settled in my heart. The worst of them was jealousy.
But I couldn’t stop myself from feeling this way.Pushing down the emotions only made me prickly, which had me starting petty arguments with Dan.
I was well aware Dan didn’t like being alone and wanted a partner in life, but I didn’t understand why that partner couldn’t be me.
We weren’tin lovewith each other, but surely, we didloveeach other. We might not be related by blood, but that didn’t mean we weren’t family.
Was it so wrong to want to live your life with your stepbrother? We cared for one another, had each other’s backs, and nobody knew us better than us.
It had me wondering if I just wasn’t enough…
Frederick took another bite of his food and nodded. “Itisfor a good cause.”
“Exactly! And Carol said the hugging booth won’t be in a very crowded area, so wouldn’t it be fun to do it together?”
“Why not? It’ll only be for a couple of hours, anyway,” Frederick finally concluded.
My hands formed into fists in front of me.
“I’m volunteering, too,” I found myself saying. It was like my mouth had moved before I could think it through, but now that the words were out, I couldn’t take it back.
Dan turned to me with a suspicious gaze. “You are?”
I forced myself to nod. I couldn’t backtrack now that I’d already committed to the lie. It just meant I had to find Carol later and tell her I wanted to join their fundraising effortsafter all.
“Are you feeling okay?” Dan asked, reaching over the table to place a palm over my forehead. “It doesn’t feel like a fever, but maybe we should get you checked up at the clinic.”
I lightly slapped his hand away. “I’m fine,” I said roughly.
He didn’t look too convinced, but he let the matter drop…that was until Frederick left for the bathroom.
“What’s going on? Why are you volunteering when we both know you hate hugs?” Dan asked as soon as the interloper was out of sight.
“I don’t hate hugs. Mom hugs me. You hug me,” I grumbled and took an angry sip of my soda.
He’d sounded so excited about volunteering with Frederick, but his mood had completely shifted when it came to me. He didn’t use to be like this, so my question was, what changed?
Dan didn’t reply right away, but he continued to stare me down, as if he was trying to look directly into my brain to find the answers.
“And what about you?” I used the pause in silence to ask.
“Me? I love hugs, so volunteering my services isn’t a big deal,” he said, flashing the smile he used when he was trying to charm someone.
It only made me frown.
“I’m not talking about the hugging booth. I’m talking about today—right now. What’s going on? Why did you invite your nurse to our lunch when it’s always onlybeen us, and why the hell are you sitting beside him instead of me?”
Dan looked shocked by the barrage of questions.
Hell, I was surprised, too. I hadn’t planned on ambushing him like this. I was going to ask him later tonight when we got home, and it was just the two of us.
Dan never hid anything from me, so I knew I’d get an answer from him. But now that plan had gone down the drain, and I couldn’t help but feel like I’d done something wrong.
Dan looked panicked, like he’d wanted to escape—escape fromme—and that was something I never thought would happen.
It shattered something inside of me. I hated being the one making him look like that when I’d made a promise to my kid self that I’d always be the protector, and Dan would be one of the people I protected.
“Dan, I’m sorry?—”
