I stand there, completely at a loss for what to do as Bri sputters, never once finishing a thought.
She never gets to, either, because the sliding door behind us opens, taking us both by surprise. When I turn around, Brant comes through the door with a frown on his face as he takes in our close proximity. My heart hammers then drops through my stomach.
“What are you girls doing in here?” he asks, a thread of suspicion in his voice as his gaze lands on the open photo album.
I step away from Bri, backing over to the other side of the counter where the album lies. “Bri was just showing me some old photos of you.”
He doesn’t sound entirely convinced, but he moves closer to take a look. “Oh yeah?”
“Mm-hmm,” I say, looking back at him as he stops just behind me. “You didn’t tell me you were such a hottie, even at my age.”
Brant’s gaze lingers on the photograph then he looks up at Bri. He doesn’t say a word, but Bri fidgets nervously, and her guilty response probably does more than anything to raise his suspicions. She could have shown me any picture in this album, but the one he walked in on was the one of him with Nicole.
“Just looking at pictures, huh?” he murmurs.
Bri still can’t look at him. God, she’s bad at this.
I don’t know what to do, so I flip back a few pages and stop on one of him, Bri, and their dad. He’s in the middle with a twin on each side, one arm around each of them. Since someone has to say something and it’s the truth anyway, I look up at him and say softly, “Bri told me your dad passed away. I’m sorry to hear that. I really would’ve liked to meet him.”
Brant’s gaze drifts to me, still mildly distrustful. His eyes rake over my face then drift a little lower, like he’s taking stock of me. Seeing I’m still here and calmer than Bri, he slides his arm around my shoulders—maybe just to see if I pull away from him or not, but I don’t. Regardless of everything Bri said, I lean right into him.
Brant seems to find a measure of relief in that. He looks down at the photograph I flipped to and nods faintly. “I’d have liked that, too. He was a good man.”
“It sounds like it,” I agree.
Brant nods, then looks across the counter at Bri. “Everything okay in here?”
“Yeah,” she says quickly, forcing a smile. “All good.”
“You seem upset.”
“I’m not,” she lies.
His gaze lingers on his sister for a moment, and with every second he stares, she seems to get more and more uncomfortable. It’s cringeworthy, honestly, and it goes on forever.
After what feels like 8,000 years, Brant finally looks down at me and says, “It’s getting late. I think it’s time for us to go.”
“Okay,” I agree. I’m reluctant to leave the photo album though, and as I close it, I can’t help running my hand across it one more time. “Do you have one of these?” I ask Brant. “I’d love to go through the rest of it and see more pictures of you growing up. We didn’t make it very far before you came in.”
“You can take it home with you,” Bri offers. “And you can bring it back next time I see you. Right?” she adds, looking at Brant instead of me.
His eyes narrow doubtfully, but he merely says, “Of course she can.”
22
Brant
Most of the ride home is pretty quiet. Scout’s curled up on the seat beside us and Alyssa is flipping through Bri’s old family photo album, running her hands across the thin plastic film protecting our pictures and smiling to herself.
All of a sudden, she looks over at me and says, “I know why you don’t like Dirk.”
That’s just about the last thing I expected her to say. I’ve been waiting for her to tell me what she and Bri really talked about, now that Bri isn’t here acting like a nervous wreck and making Alyssa uncomfortable. Her loyalty to me is far greater than any loyalty she has toward Bri, so now that we’re alone, I expect the real goddamn story.
Not following her sudden insight into my opinion of Dirk, I glance over at her. “What?”
She has the book open to that picture she was looking at when I walked into Bri’s kitchen, the one with me and Nicole. Now she covers most of the picture with her palm so only I’m visible and she stands the album up, angling it toward me so I can see it better. “Look at this, you at our age. Hair a little too long, smirk a little too insolent, a dark, mysterious gleam of trouble dancing in your eyes—you were Dirk. You don’t like him because you see yourself in him, and… well, that’s exactly why I do like him.”