The Bookworm's Guide to Dating (The Bookworm's Guide 1)

I said nothing, because I knew the answer was yes. But nobody else other than Saylor knew I had feelings for his sister, and even then she didn’t know just how deep they ran.

I didn’t even know myself until I saw her having a good time with another guy tonight.

And that fucking sucked.

I rubbed my hand down my face and blew out a long breath when I dragged my fingers over my jaw. “I’m glad I’m a builder and not a professional matchmaker.”

Colt snorted. “You and everyone else, man. You know you can just tell her you don’t want to do it anymore, don’t you?”

“I might have to. If she’s not going to be honest with me, I can’t help her.”

He grunted, looking away, and we fell into a silence that was only broken by our respective sipping of our beers.

I needed to get ahold of my shit. I’d come too close tonight to letting my true feelings be known in front of him.

Thankfully, it didn’t take long for the girls to return from the bar. They also came bearing two more bottles of beer, but both Colt and I rejected them. We were already on our second drinks and both had to drive home, so Saylor and Holley shrugged and kept them for themselves.

Kinsley sat next to me again even though I was pretty sure she wanted to be anywhere else but here. She peered over the table at her brother. “Spoken to Amber today?”

Colt let loose another grunt, but this one held more frustration than the last. “I’m heading over there after this beer. I found a house I want to look at this week, and I’m buying one whether she likes it or not.”

“Oh, that conversation is going to go well,” Saylor muttered, drinking the beer she’d intended for him.

Just to rub salt in the wound.

Colt opened his mouth, but Kinsley beat him to it. “Yeah, yeah, we know. She wants you to move in with her so you can have a baby, but her apartment is smaller than yours and she doesn’t own it, so what’s the point when you’ve saved up enough for your dream house?”

“His dream house is going to be completed next week,” I said dryly. “And he only wants the house because he wants to steal my idea of a man cave in the basement.”

At that, Colt smirked. “Who wouldn’t want a man cave in the basement?”

“I’d take a library,” Kinsley said.

“But not in the basement,” Holley added. “In a castle. With ladders. And enchanted teapots that talk and tell me I’m pretty.”

“Hell, I’d take the beast for all that.” Saylor finished the detour with a raise of her bottle, and all three clinked their drinks.

“What are they talking about?” Colt asked me.

“Beauty and the Beast,” I replied without missing a beat. “What? Piper used to love that movie as a kid. At one point, she used it for blackmail. Like if I watched it with her, she wouldn’t tell our parents I’d cut all the hair off her Barbie again.”

“You used to cut the hair off her Barbie?” Kinsley’s eyebrows shot up. “That’s low.”

“No, I didn’t,” I said. “Didn’t mean my parents believed me when she told them I had, though.”

“Aw, man, that’s genius. Why did she never share that with me?”

Colton frowned. “Hey! You were way more of a little shit when we were kids than I was.”

Holley snorted. “No.”

“Yeah, no,” Saylor agreed.

“She used to beat me with books!”

“And you deserved it every time.” Kinsley calmly sipped her wine. “As Lisa Kleypas once said, “A well-read woman is a dangerous creature.” But not because she’s smart, but because she’s always got a weapon on hand.”

“Who’s Lisa Kleypas?” Colton asked.

“And did she really refer to a book as a weapon?” I followed up.

She blinked at us both. “An author, and no. The latter is a Kinsley original, thank you. And a warning.”

“Terrifying,” I muttered.

“Watch it. I’ll beat you with a dictionary.”

“She will,” Holley assured me. “She might not look strong, but I’ve watched her haul encyclopedias around like they’re nothing.”

“Let me guess—a hidden talent of bookworms? Superhuman strength?”

Saylor grinned.

“No,” Kinsley mused. “But we do have extraordinarily strong fingers.”

“I don’t think I want to be part of this conversation anymore.” Colt drained the rest of his beer and got up. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said to me, throwing a wave over his shoulder to the girls.

I waited until he’d gone. “Why do you have strong fingers?”

All three of them mimed licking their fingers and flipping the page of a book.

“And now thumbs, thanks to e-readers,” Saylor added brightly, mimicking the tapping of a thumb on the side of a device.

“I’ll keep it in mind,” I said dryly.

This conversation had gotten weird.

Like Colt had a few minutes before me, I finished my beer. “Well, this has been enlightening, ladies,” I drawled. “But I’m leaving. This is getting a little strange, even for you.”