Jake clears his throat and nods to the kitchen. “Can you help me in the back with something, East?”
“Sure.” I put down my beer and follow him into the kitchen.
Grimacing, he leans against the counter and runs a hand through his sloppy mop of hair.
“What do you need?” I look around the kitchen for something heavy that needs lifting or boxes that need to be unpacked—anything to explain why he brought me back here. What I don’t do is look at his office or even walk near it. I won’t return to the scene of the crime with Jake watching.
Not that it felt like a crime. It never feels wrong when I’m with Shay.
Jake takes a deep breath, opens his mouth, then snaps it shut again. What the hell?
“What’s up, Jake?”
“Listen.” He winces, like just having to come up with words is causing him physical pain. “I’ve never had to do the protective-big-brother thing. I respect Shay and know she can make her own decisions.”
I arch a brow. “Why do I get the feeling there’s a big but waiting at the end of that sentence?”
“I heard you and Shay fighting in the office tonight.” He rolls his neck. “Then I heard you . . . not fighting.”
“Oh.” While under a different set of circumstances, I’d be happy to own up to what I was doing with his little sister in there, I have a feeling Jake doesn’t want to hear that Shay seduced me into a veritable hate-fuck against his office door.
“Oh? That’s all you have? Seriously?” He mutters an impressive string of curses. “This is when you’re supposed to tell me it wasn’t what I think. Dammit.”
I scrub a hand over my face. “Jake . . .” But what do I say? Yeah, I screwed your sister in your office, but only when she insisted? Don’t worry, we used a condom from your desk?
“First of all, regardless of how the rest of this conversation goes, let’s just establish that’s my office. I’m going to have to have my cleaning lady in to disinfect the place. The only sex that’s permitted inside this kitchen is between me and my wife. Got it?”
I laugh, but it’s forced. This conversation is painful. I’ve had testicular exams less awkward. “Sure.”
He folds his arms. “Are you serious about her, or is she just some convenient lay to you?”
My brows shoot up. “You’re kidding, right?”
“Of course I’m not kidding. You think I’m enjoying this conversation? This is Shay, Easton. She’s . . .” He shakes his head. “Do you remember the guy she was with in high school and college?”
Steve. How could I forget the ass who had her so nervous he might call it quits if she didn’t give him her virginity? The guy who stayed with her only to dump her in Paris? I bet I know more about Steve than the Jackson brothers do. “Yeah, I remember him.”
“They dated for, like . . . three years?”
“Two and a half.” I wonder if she ever told her family that I met her in Paris. Obviously she didn’t tell them what we did there, but she could have admitted we spent time together. Fuck, after the bomb I dropped when she got back to the States, I bet she didn’t talk about it at all. That would be like Shay. She’d rather pretend she wasn’t hurt than risk my relationship with her family.
“And then there’s this mystery guy she’s been seeing from her work. The guy I assumed she was still seeing until she . . .” He pulls a face. He doesn’t have to finish that sentence for me to understand what he means. He has the face of a brother who now has more knowledge of his baby sister’s sex sounds than he ever wanted to have.
“They’re seeing other people.” The words taste bad. Shay isn’t the kind to sleep around. While I wouldn’t judge her if she were, that’s not what she’s about. She’s a long-term kind of girl. I know she is. We’ve both carried this thing for each other for more than a decade. But as the guy who just had a quickie with her in the bar office, I’m not sure I’m the one to judge her choice to have casual sex with some asshole professor.
Jake shakes his head then turns to the counter and starts unloading plates into stacks at the end of the service line. “Did you know she always had a thing for you?”
I meet his eyes. “Always as in when?”
Jake shrugs. “Always always.”
I’m pretty sure any thing she had went both ways. “Did she say something to you?”
“She never talks about that stuff. Not to me, at least. But she didn’t have to tell me. I could see it. She followed you around every time you were over. After you moved away, every time Carter brought you up, she’d hang on every word.”