“Why are you apologizing? As far as I’m aware you haven’t done anything… Have you?”
He rubbed at his temple before dragging his hand down his face. “I brought Thalia here for you.”
I stared at him, not sure I’d heard him right.
“I’ve been in love with Mia since I was fifteen.” Liam paused, staring out of the window. “She loves me as well…I know she does. She’s still pissed because I was a bastard to her, which I’m not getting into. With your wedding not far off, I brought Thalia home, hoping you’d like her and get distracted with her, calling this whole thing off. I’ve tried to talk to Mia, but she keeps walking off every time, and if I ring, she doesn’t answer her phone.”
He left me speechless. I’d known my brother had a thing for Mia and could never understand why he never acted on it, but perhaps he had at one time. He’d brought Thalia here for me?
“Jack? Say something.”
What to say? “Well, your plan with Thalia worked, because I can’t get her out of my head. You wanted me to fall for her and cancel the wedding so you’d get the girl, right?”
“Yeah. Except, the girl is supposed to cooperate.”
I started to laugh. “Just what the hell did you do to Mia? At one time I thought you’d both get together before everything went to shit.”
He blushed. My brother actually blushed like a girl. “Let’s just say I acted like a first class jerk right after. Ah, well, you know.”
Glaring at him, I looked at the roof of the car. I could be a jerk, but even I hadn’t done what I thought he was admitting to doing. “There’s only us here, spit it out, because I can tell you, I’m thinking all sorts.”
“Fuck, you really are going to make me spell it out aren’t you?”
“Yeah. I am.”
“When we were eighteen I took Mia out to the lake, and we…had sex…for the first time. Oh God. I freaked. I realized that I wasn’t just infatuated with her. I realized I loved her and freaked the fuck out. I couldn’t get her home quick enough, and then I left for college having never spoken to her.”
Liam hit the steering wheel with the flat of his hand in a rush of breath, and continued, “I fucked up. I know that, but now, before it’s too late, I need to get her back and I thought if you got distracted with Thalia everything would work out, but the stubborn woman won’t even talk to me.”
“I’d say when you fuck up, you do it big time. The thing is I need Mia to call the wedding off in order for Dad not to withhold my tuition. I don’t think he would, not when I’m so close to finishing, but I can’t risk it, at least not until I can come up with another way of getting the money. There is also Mia. What are her reasons for agreeing to marry me in the first place? Is it to get back at you? At least it makes more sense to me now. I’ve asked a few times, but she answered with a question of her own, like she always does when she doesn’t want to answer. A bit like you.”
“Yeah. That’s my Mia.” Sitting further up in his seat, he looked at me. “I need to get back. For now can we carry on as though we’ve not had this conversation and I’ll try and find out what’s going on from her end.”
“Isn’t that going to be difficult if she won’t talk to you?”
“I have a plan,” he said grinning.
I frowned. “Why does that make me nervous? You aren’t going to do anything stupid are you?”
He started to laugh. “No.”
“I’m going back to Donovan’s place. I still need to keep my distance from Thalia until this whole mess is sorted.”
“You don’t need to stay away, because you aren’t marrying her, even if I have to stand up in the middle of your wedding and announce that fact to everyone.”
Shaking my head, I climbed out of his car. “Thanks for telling me, and just be glad Thalia has me tied in knots, otherwise I’d be using my fists.” I slammed his car door, wondering how the hell we were going to get out of this fucking mess.
Chapter 32
Thalia
The days had dragged on since the last time I’d seen Jack. Three days, it had been three miserable days. I missed seeing his face, and the hot look that would cross it when he’d meet my eyes. I’d missed hearing his voice. I was falling in love with him. I’d met him close to three weeks ago, and although we hadn’t spent much time together, my heart knew what it wanted and it wanted Jack.
He was downstairs. I’d heard his voice about five minutes ago so I was rushing through getting dressed and quickly pulled my hair up on top of my head with a clip, before I dashed out of my room. I quickly walked downstairs and was about to push my way through to the kitchen when I heard another voice. ‘Her’ voice; it stopped me dead in my tracks.
What was she doing here? Hadn’t Jack spoken to her yet? Cancelled everything?
It would kill me if I walked in there only to find them all over each other.