“I didn’t pretend I didn’t know her,” I mutter, even though that’s obviously not the relevant part of her complaint.
Her eyes widening in a mix of anger and disbelief, she yells, “She’s barely 18! You’re old enough to be her father!”
Hiking up an eyebrow, I tell her, “Why don’t you take a breath and calm your ass down. She’s young, yes, but she’s legal.”
“I’m less concerned about the legality and more concerned with her being my babysitter.” Looking back at Alyssa, she demands, “Is this why you haven’t been taking my calls? I was worried about other families stealing you away, and here it was my own damn brother. How did this happen? How did you two even meet?”
“I’m sorry,” Alyssa says, shaking her head. “I didn’t want to avoid your calls, I just thought it would be weird, and I… I tend to avoid awkwardness when possible.”
Bri finally takes a breath, but I get the feeling it’s more to appease Alyssa’s need not to be in an awkward situation than because I told her to. “All right. I’m sorry, I guess I overreacted, I was just completely floored to catch you and my brother…” Bri shakes her head, pasting on an attempt at a smile. “Well, he’s here with us tonight. I was just coming out to the car to grab another blanket so we had a little extra room to stretch out. Why don’t you come watch the fireworks with us?”
“I can’t,” she says a tad awkwardly, frowning as she seems to realize it herself.
“Well, why not?” Bri demands, her smile deepening as she tries to gloss over all the discomfort in a transparent attempt to win back her favorite babysitter. “It’d be romantic, wouldn’t it?”
“We aren’t dating,” I state, for some reason.
Well, not for some reason. I can already see my sister glomming onto a potential love interest, and I need to nip this in the bud.
Alyssa was already flushed, but now she flushes even more and tenses like I just insulted her. “That’s right, we’re not,” she says a little stiffly. “I’m actually here with someone else. I don’t think I can in good conscience finish the date now, but I should probably… not leave him to wonder where I ran off to.”
Bri’s eyes widen. “Oh. Okay.” Her smile is gone and now she frowns at me, wordlessly telling me I had better not fuck this up for her. “Brant, can I talk to you for a second?”
I glance back at Alyssa. Since I told Bri we aren’t dating, she looks like she can’t wait to get away from me again, so I say, “Don’t go anywhere yet.”
“I can’t go anywhere. My panties are in your stupid truck,” she mutters, crossing her arms over her chest and turning to look up at the firework display.
Technically, she could, just not without me hearing her in time to stop her. Just to be safe, I grab my keys out of my pocket. I press the button on my key fob and lock the doors, ensuring she can’t get her panties out of my truck until I let her.
If Alyssa notices, you can’t tell; she doesn’t look away from the fireworks.
To get a little privacy, I follow Bri over to a spot behind her SUV. Once we’re there, her pretense of politeness falls away. “How could you do this?”
I sigh, raking a hand through my hair, but she starts up again before I even have a chance to respond.
“And you’re not even dating her? Was it really worth it if all she is to you is some random fuck? You could’ve had that with anyone—why my babysitter? You had to know she’d stop working for me if you fucked her over, Brant. What the hell were you thinking?”
“Trust me, it wasn’t something I planned.”
“You have to fix this,” she tells me, planting a hand on her hip. “I don’t know how the hell you’re going to, because it seems like you’ve made a real mess, and I honestly don’t understand it. ‘Don’t shit where you eat’ has always been your philosophy. That’s why you don’t hook up with women who work at the bar, so why did you think it was okay to hook up with someone I employed?” Again, without giving me a chance to answer, she goes on. “But, whatever, it’s done.” She shakes her head, vibrating with annoyance. “You have to fix it, though, Brant. I told you what a great sitter she is. The boys love her and I want her to keep working for me, and since it’s your fault she stopped, you need to find a way to make amends.”
“How do you suppose I should do that?”
Bri shrugs. “I don’t know. Does she like you? Date her,” she suggests. “Stop treating her like a casual hook-up and lock her ass down. You’ve already made it weird enough that she quit talking to me. You can’t make it worse.”