“Jensen, what’s up?”
I couldn’t tell him. There was no way I could tell him that I’d had the best kiss of my life with Emery Robinson. I hadn’t known it was her. And I knew Landon too well to drop that on him.
“Nothing. Hangover headache,” I lied. “Tell me more about Emery. I remember her…only vaguely.”
Understatement of the century. I remembered the taste of her lips and the feel of her skin and the way she kissed very well. Intimately. Everything else that came to mind about Emery was like a bridge over water on a foggy night. I knew it was there, but I couldn’t see it.
“We dated in high school for two years, but we broke up on graduation. The last time I saw her was our five-year high school reunion, and we didn’t talk then, and I had no idea she’d be at Sutton’s wedding. I guess Heidi invited her.” He shook his head. “I mean, I didn’t even recognize her!” he repeated.
“How could you not have recognized her?”
“When we dated, she was the captain of the soccer team, who liked to skateboard on the weekends,” Landon said in his defense. “Even at prom, she wore her hair up and no makeup. I don’t know what she’s been up to in the past decade. We’re not even Facebook friends.”
“And Miranda was pissed?”
Landon shrugged. “I don’t know why. I’m not interested in the girl I dated in high school, who I haven’t seen in years. I married Miranda.”
Oh, I knew why Miranda was pissed off. Emery looked hot as fuck. Whatever she had looked like and acted like in high school, she was a woman now. One I would very much like to get intimately acquainted with. Too bad I would probably never see or talk to her again.
“Is that the real reason you’re leaving this morning?”
Landon groaned and glanced back toward the door. “I don’t know, man. Probably. She’s super jealous of all my exes.”
I opened my mouth to say something to Landon about last night with Emery. It wasn’t that I wanted to keep it a secret, but what would really come of telling him? I wasn’t the dating type. I was the fuck-’em-and-leave-’em type. Even if I had done more than make out with Emery, it would have just been a hot-as-fuck one-night stand. It wouldn’t have fucking mattered who had dated whom a decade ago.
“Are you sure you can’t stay for church?” I asked instead.
At that exact moment, the front door crashed open. Landon sighed heavily and seemed to retreat into himself at the very thought of the person at the door.
“Miranda?” I hazarded a guess.
“The one and only,” he agreed. “I should probably head out.”
“Landon! Let’s go! We have to get on the road!” Miranda yelled from the foyer.
Landon’s eyes traveled through the open doorway. “I should probably go. I certainly don’t want to stand between the two of you in another confrontation.”
“Morgan’s the instigator; I assure you.”
Landon glanced back at me and rolled his eyes. “You don’t fool as many people as you think you do.”
I sure hoped I did in that moment.
I held my hand out to my brother. Landon clasped it tight.
“I just want you to be happy. Tell me Miranda makes you happy.”
“Landon!” she shrieked. Her heels clomped across the hardwood floor, drawing ever nearer, like a dragon ready to breathe flames.
“You’re a good brother,” Landon said with a smile and shook my hand.
Miranda stomped into the room. “Would you hurry up, or would you rather me leave you behind so that you could be with your ex-girlfriend instead?”
Landon winced. “Come on, Miranda. I’ve told you a hundred times that I didn’t even know she was going to be here.”
“Well, I’m sure you’ll know when we’re back for Christmas so that you can sneak away and see her,” she accused.
“Seriously, she’s just back from college for a few days, visiting a friend. She’ll be gone before we get back. Calm down,” Landon said with a sigh.
“Whatever. Don’t make me late for the flight,” she said, turning on her heel and storming away.
“I’ll see you in a couple of weeks,” Landon said.
We hugged, and then he hurried down the hall toward his tyrant wife. And, while I was sad to see my brother go, I feared even more for the things he hadn’t said. One day, I would figure out the disaster that Miranda had created in our family but not today. Today, I had to go to church.
Chapter 8
Emery
“I cannot believe you’re making me do this,” I said to Kimber as we stood outside of our mother, Autumn’s, house.
It was the house we’d grown up in. Small and squat with red clay bricks and dark roofing. Like everything in Lubbock, it had a monstrous fence for the entire backyard. A tree her mother had planted when she moved in towered over the property. The house was in one of those timeless parts of town. Nothing had changed, not even the people. They’d just settled here like dust.