On cue, the doorbell rings. Wine glass in hand, another drink tumbling down my throat, I spy G on the other side and pull it open.
His look is lethal. I almost drop the glass.
“What’s wrong?” I stutter, watching him charge by. “Graham?”
Sitting my wine glass on the entry table, I latch the door and turn on my heel. He’s glowering at me from the other end of the foyer.
I’ve never seen my brother, any of them, so angry. Ever. His eyes are narrowed, wickedly so, as he heaves air in and out of his body. “Just saw Ford,” he says, his words measured. “He said he had lunch with you and Lincoln yesterday.”
“Yes,” I say, equally measured. It’s suddenly all clear why he’s so angry. Ford told him he met Dom. Thinking fast, I decide to go on the defensive. “And with Dominic.”
He smiles, but there’s no kindness to it. No amusement. “And Dominic. So, tell me, Camilla, what do you know about Dominic?”
“All I need to.” When his eyes narrow even more, I see where this is going. Storming by him, I don’t even look his way. “You can see yourself out.”
“I’m not done here yet,” he barks after me.
“I am.”
My steps smack off the tile as I enter the kitchen and position myself as far away from my brother as I can. Knowing this is about Dominic changes everything.
I generally listen to G. I value his opinion, but I won’t stand in my own house and listen to him take his opinions on a man he’s never met and twist them all around and throw them at me.
My blood boils, my own eyes narrowing as he stands across the room. “What do you want, Graham?”
“Let’s start with this: I had breakfast with our mother this morning.”
“Good for you.”
“She said Paulina called her last night.”
“Fuck Paulina,” I say with more emphasis than I even intended.
He lifts a brow.
“Yeah, Graham. Fuck Paulina,” I hiss, watching him absorb a very un-Camilla-like display. “Oh, wait, you already did.”
His eyes darken, making him look more like my father than I’ve ever realized. “Choose your words wisely, Camilla.”
“The same goes for you.”
“What’s gotten into you?” he growls. “Is this what he’s is doing to you? Making you some crazed lunatic?”
“This is a crazed lunatic?” I laugh. “Really? It seems to me that being accosted in my own home and standing up for yourself is a little less lunatic-y than barging into your sister’s house and making her feel like some kind of criminal for nothing.”
His lips twist together, dismissing me. “I want you to take a good look at yourself in the mirror, little sister, and see if you like what you see.”
Imagining what Graham is seeing causes me to smile. It’s something he’s never seen before. It’s something I’ve never felt before. Determination.
I’ve fought with Lincoln before and sparred with Ford, but never Graham. He’s always been so much older than me that our conversations have always been logical, even-footed. Him the older brother and me the younger, more submissive sister. Not today.
Today it doesn’t matter if I make him mad. I don’t care if he thinks I’m an idiot or calls me foolish. I have absolutely no need to humor him or try to see things from his perspective because he is wrong. On so many levels.
“Dom has made me see things differently,” I admit. “It’s making me see people differently.”
“Is that right?”
“It’s absolutely right.”