Tangled Like Us (Like Us 4)

“You need to clarify,” I say deeply. “What do you think you are to me right now?”

Jane tucks a piece of hair behind her ear, then motions to me. “This is just friendship…just two ole pals drinking whiskey. If you’d like to drink with me, that is.”

Friendship.

I’ve been inside her pussy. She’s not some platonic friend. My jaw hardens. “We’re pals who fuck each other?”

“Precisely,” she says like we’re still on the same page.

But my chest tightens. She’s used to friends-with-benefits, and that’s where she’s placed me. That’s all she wants.

The fact that I’m sitting here and feeling like it’s not just that —it’s a fucking problem. I shouldn’t be veering off course.

“Correct?” she asks, waiting for my confirmation.

I nod. “Affirmative.”

“So what do you think?” She’s referring to the whiskey.

I consider her offer in a short beat.

Drinking alone with a client and not in a group setting—it’s a straight shot to buddy-guard territory. Something I normally don’t fuck around with.

But I’m not looking forward to leaving for security’s townhouse. I don’t want to separate from her yet. And I love whiskey.

I set my radio aside on the weight bench. “If we drink, I can’t touch you. It’s too inappropriate if someone walks in and sees.” I’ve one-hundred percent exhausted the “practicing for the op” excuse, and we need to be more careful.

“Oui.” Jane sits straighter, hands flat on her thighs. “No touching, it’s a necessary parameter.”

“I’ll get the liquor.” I start to stand up.

Her curious blue eyes follow my movement. All six-foot-seven of me rising, and a small breath parts her lips.

I zero in on her knees that knock together. Goddamn. My cock strains against my slacks. “Jane,” I say in my core.

She inhales. “Yes?”

I rub my mouth. “Where’s the whiskey?”

“Oh, um.” Jane shakes out her thoughts, then points to an old wooden cabinet. Where the team stores flashlights and extra batteries. “Top shelf, I think.”

It’s not far. Opening the creaky cabinet door, I find a bottle full of dark amber liquid in the back corner, third shelf. I brush off the dust and read the label on my way to Jane.

Taking a seat next to her, I wait to open it. “This is a thirty-year-old whiskey.” Expensive. “You sure?”

“Positive. It’s just been sitting there for years. It was a housewarming present from my brothers. I thought they would’ve all drunk it by now, but Beckett hid it so they wouldn’t.”

I open the bottle and pass it to her. The mention of her brothers reminds me of mine.

Tell her about Skylar.

She hasn’t pressured me to explain more. Neither did Maximoff or Farrow in the car. They’re good people. Compassionate, and I don’t want to wake up tomorrow and regret not saying something.

I’ve compartmentalized so much of my fucking life in order to push through. Built walls that I can’t even break down.

But I think compassion deserves compassion, and I want to be deserving of her.

Even if I can’t have her in the end.

She puts the bottle to her lips. Taking a small sip, then inspecting the label. “Tastes like burnt chocolate and oranges. Though I’m more of a whiskey novice, so I wouldn’t know if it’s any good other than I think I like it.”

I grab the bottle as she passes it. Our fingers accidentally touching. And lingering too long in the exchange.

Neither of us mentions it. The garage blisters, and I wipe sweat off my forehead with my bicep, the one without the numbed, stitched cut.

Tell her.

I’m looking at Jane more than the Dalmore. “I had an older brother growing up.” My voice is even-keeled.

Her brows jump. “Skylar?”

I watch her eyes soften on me. “Yeah.” I swallow a rock in my throat. “I’ve wanted to tell you about him. But it’s not something I usually talk about.” I swig from the bottle. Liquor sliding down smoothly, and my thumb brushes over the label, then I hand it back to Jane. “Skylar probably would’ve gotten a kick out of me drinking whiskey with a girl.”

She swishes the liquid. “Did he like whiskey?”

I breathe deeper for a second. I recognize that I want her curiosity. And intrigue. Full-force.

It makes this easier for me.

“More than he should’ve,” I answer. “He broke every rule my dad ever made.” I watch her sip the whiskey. “Banks and I were the good sons. Obedient. But I looked up to Sky, asked him a lot.”

She hands me the bottle, listening intently.

“I think he told me a lot of horseshit. But it was loving horseshit.” I rest the bottle on my knee. Staring at the blue Beetle for a second.

If she looks at you a lot, it means she likes you. His advice. He’d ruffle my hair with his hand and grin. Teasing me, and I thought he was a badass. Some kind of invincible warrior.

I tell this to Jane. Succinctly. Probably too stoically. Some walls will never break down. I don’t think I could ever cry about it, but I can at least try to share this, finally.

My gaze tightens, brows drawn together, and I take another swig. “It was a long time ago. We were kids, and then we weren’t.”

I tell her how Skylar was three years older. He died at fifteen. Banks and I were twelve at the time. “His death caused a lot of friction in my family.”

I notice her lips slowly parting in realization. She’s adding up pieces. “You were twelve when your parents divorced, weren’t you?”

I nod.

Same age as my brother’s passing.

More dawns on her. How I was around twelve, thirteen when I was adamant I’d join the military.

I’ve also told Jane that I’m not close to my dad. Not since the divorce. We only really talk about football.

I pass back the whiskey. “When my brother died, my dad said a lot of things. Things that he thought he could never take back. To my mom. To Banks. To me.”

“To you?” She draws nearer, her knees almost knocking into my legs. “You were only twelve.”

I’ll never forget the blackout rage on my dad’s face. “He probably would’ve lashed out at a fucking garden gnome that night.”

Jane hugs the bottle to her chest. “Has he ever mentioned it? That night and what he said to you?”

“Hell no.” I shake my head a couple times. “He’s too ashamed.”

Instead of making it right, he just withdrew. Became distant. He never showed me how to seek forgiveness, ask for it or accept it. Just to take fault for my

mistakes.

To carry blame.

I’m good at that. But I’m not him. If I were, I would’ve never walked over to Jane on the beach in Greece and tried to right what I’d wronged.

“My mom wasn’t doing well,” I explain, a pit in my ribs. There’s not a word to describe my mom around this time. Eviscerated seems too light. “But we were all lucky.”

She hands back the whiskey without taking a sip. “In what way?”

“We had my grandma.” I tell Jane how Carol Piscitelli, my four-foot-eleven grandma, packed up our small, one-bedroom apartment and found us a row house to live in.

She moved in with us.

She got my mom back on her feet.

She made sure that we kept our heads up. “We didn’t have a lot of things growing up,” I tell Jane. “But we had family.”

At a time where we were starved for anything but emptiness and grief, our grandma gave so much love.

“She sounds like a beautiful person,” Jane tells me, her soft smile so genuine. “I’d love to meet her and your mom one day—if appropriate. I know it may not be possible for security reasons, but I just…” She takes a measured breath. “They seem quite lovely, is all.”

My chest rises. “They’d like to meet you.”

She smiles more. “They would?”

I nod and I put the rim of the bottle to my mouth. Taking another swig. I watch a thousand other questions rush through her eyes.

She smooths her lips repeatedly. Contemplating what to ask.

She’s quiet for a while, and I almost move closer. I almost brush a strand of frizzed hair off her cheek. I almost pull her onto my lap.

Don’t touch her.

My muscles tense, and I look her over. “What are you most curious about?”

She’s wary. “That’s an incredibly dangerous thing to ask, you realize.”

“I’m good to go.” I nod to her. “Shoot.”

“What did your dad tell you that night?”

I figured this could’ve been on her mind. And I’ve never told this to anyone. Never repeated it. But I just let it out now. “He said I should’ve biked harder.” Off her confusion, I explain the rest.

How my brother died.

He used to bike out to a quarry. He’d sneak a few beers to drink, throw rocks, and swim. Sometimes alone, sometime with friends. Always to let off steam.