My Brother’s Best Friends

***Theo***

Myshophadbeen located across a field from the giant potato chip in Lunar since I’d opened it and I’d never once appreciated it. The World’s Largest Potato Chip wasn’t exactly something that I cared about. Until Reagan visited it, apparently. I’d spent some time there as a kid, getting drunk and fucking off, but I hadn’t been there in a decade. It seemed like I was repeating a lot of things I hadn’t done in a decade where Reagan was involved.

Just as I was dropping a wrench and wiping my hands on one of the hundreds of shop towels lying around, getting as clean as I was going to get in the middle of a work day, a truck pulled up in front of one of the bays. I was seconds away from marching across the field and joining Reagan at the potato chip, so I didn’t appreciate the interruption. When I looked over and saw it was two of my best friends, the two who happened to also be vying for Reagan’s attention, I swore.

Charlie grinned in his easy way. “What kind of greeting is that for your best friends?”

I looked across the field and debated the odds. If I didn’t go at all, I stood no chance of getting time with Reagan. If I took the idiots along with me, there was at least a chance. Groaning, I motioned for them to follow me. “Reagan’s at the potato chip. You coming?”

August grunted. “No wonder you’re not happy to see us. I won’t take it personal, then.”

Charlie was already walking across the parking lot. “We came to take you to lunch, but food can wait.”

I considered grabbing a shirt but decided to use everything I had to try to get Reagan to hate me a little less. I fell into step with the guys and watched as Reagan bent over ahead of us. Even with a field between us, I nearly tripped over my feet.

“Jesus.” Charlie adjusted his pants and shook his head. “That ass kills me. She didn’t have all that back in the day. I liked what she had back then, more than enough, but this just isn’t fair.”

August whistled under his breath. “When I’m not looking right at her, it’s easy for me to feel like shit for going against Russ’ wishes, but the moment I see her, my conscious takes a long hike. She’s fucking stunning.”

I kept my mouth shut because I was afraid of how poetic I was going to start sounding if I started talking about her beauty. I wasn’t trying to embarrass myself. “Lunch, huh?”

“We were going to talk about how Charlie snuck into Raegan’s bedroom like a creep the other night, but I’m busy now.” Without waiting for us, August jogged off, getting to Reagan just in time to catch her as she stumbled off of a ladder.

Charlie swore like a sailor under his voice and looked over at me. “We could’ve been SEALS, too.”

I laughed and shoved him. “Your parents would’ve had to buy the Navy if you’d joined and I don’t take too kindly to being told what to do. Neither of us was cut out for it.”

As we closed the gap between us, I saw Megan Shaw come around the potato chip and roll her eyes as she spotted us. I also watched as Reagan pushed out of August’s arms and went right back up the ladder.

“You gave me a ticket. I don’t want to talk to you.” Reagan looked back as she noticed me and Charlie. “No.”

I moved around the ladder and gripped it while holding her unsure gaze. “No? That’s harsh. You haven’t even heard what we were going to say.”

She climbed up another foot and my heart clenched with a panic close to what I felt when I watched Iris being daring. Her face was stubborn as she stretched out with a rag that dripped on me. “I don’t need to hear what you have to say, Theo. If there’s anything pertinent that you think someone should know, you should tell Jenny. Hon.”

I gritted my teeth, but there was nothing I could do to change the fact that I’d married Jenny. The stupid teenage mistake had given me Iris, so I couldn’t be sorry for it. “Sounds like you might want to talk about it.”

“Nope.” She scrubbed at a particularly well-drawn penis and then stopped to glare down at me. “It just really shows me how little you cared about me, even as a person. That’s okay, though. It doesn’t matter. We’re just parts of Russ’ life to each other.”

She jumped off the ladder, scaring the hell out of me, and disappeared around the side of it. I braced my hands on the ladder and scowled down at my boots. I’d been inside her less than a week ago and she’d really just called me nothing more than an acquaintance.

Frustration built in me, but I stomped it down. My entire life was a practice in stomping my feelings down. Racing had helped before Iris had come along, but I didn’t take chances with my life anymore, not when there was a little girl who needed me. Without that outlet, though, things were harder. The first time I’d felt truly relaxed had been when I was with Reagan.

She came back around the chip and stopped in front of the ladder, just a foot away from me. With her eyes on her own feet, she spoke quietly. “I’m sorry. That was rude. Whether you ever considered me a friend or not, I thought of you as a friend.”

Before I could respond, she was gone again, the scent of her strawberry shampoo lingering. Feeling like I’d just been punched in the gut, I dragged in a shaky breath and scrubbed my face. I wasn’t sure what got to me more, her pure heart and kindness or the fact that she thought she’d never mattered to me.

Charlie walked over to me from where he’d been talking to Megan and clapped a hand on my shoulder. “All good?”

I met his concerned eyes and took a second to shake my moroseness off before nodding and grinning. “Guess we’re cleaning a potato chip?”

August appeared next to us with a rag and a frown on his face. “This is pathetic.”

Reagan walked around him and sent me a shy smile before grinning back at Megan. “And you were worried that this would take up your whole day. This is going to take no time at all.”

Megan scoffed and thrust a wet rag at Charlie. “Well, normally the dream team doesn’t show up to help me. If I’d known that I just needed to get a cute, single woman around to attract help, I’d have done this ages ago.”

I gripped the ladder harder to keep from reaching out to touch the sexy blush on Reagan’s cheeks. When she stepped up again, it put us face to face and I watched as her eyes searched my face, hesitating on my mouth before she looked away. More of my darkness faded with the knowledge that she wasn’t immune to me. I had a chance.

Charlie started scrubbing a spot a few feet away, his grin permanent. “I don’t think any woman would’ve worked, Megan. Any future plans will need to include Rea, unless there’s another dream team you’d like to have show up.”

Reagan made a sound of embarrassment from above but kept her lips sealed.

Megan tossed me a rag that I barely caught and raised her eyebrows. “Less gawking at my best friend and more cleaning, bike boy.”

I walked around to the other side of the ladder, placed a solid hand on Reagan’s waist so I’d be able to stop her if she wobbled, and started cleaning. “Good thing that I can multi-task.”