The Sister (The Boss 6)

“Sometimes, naps make me feel guilty. Like I’m wasting my life or something.” I’d been struggling with that for a while, now. Losing someone reminds you of your mortality in the strangest ways.

“Waste a little on me?” His dark eyes were so earnest, so intensely focused on mine, my stomach fluttered.

It was all I could do to say, “All right.”

I snuggled into the crook of his arm and let him draw the covers over us. Neil came back with the water, my robe draped over his arm. He looked at me, burrowed down beneath the blankets, and said, “Why did I bother to bring this, then?”

Reaching for it, I sat up. “I’ll still put it on. I’m always cold.”

“I don’t understand women,” Neil said, to El-Mudad, not me. “Have you ever in your life met a woman who wasn’t constantly cold?”

“Should we put you between us, so you don’t freeze to death, Sophie?” El-Mudad teased.

I gave him a little push, and Neil protested, “No, no. She can’t have you all to herself.”

Neil laid back on the pillows and lifted his arm, and El-Mudad leaned against his chest. We lay in silence for a few moments, Neil running his fingers through El-Mudad’s hair, me with my face against his chest, breathing in his scent. He was becoming so familiar to me, now; there were details about him I’d forgotten I could remember.

I wanted to say something profound, to let them know what the moment meant to me. How it felt like we’d taken some first incredible step together, how it existed whether we wanted to acknowledge it or not.

Neil was so much more eloquent than I. “It seems as though we’ve arrived at the irreversible.”

El-Mudad and I both looked to him, and he went on, “Oh, we might believe we can keep this all to a timetable, but does it truly feel as though this isn’t going to happen between us?”

I giggled softly. “No, I wanted to say…”

“You think it’s already happened,” El-Mudad finished for me with a slow smile. “And why put off admitting that?”

“You guys?” I said, and paused for effect. “We didn’t even last a full week.”

****

We took El-Mudad to Ruby’s, a fun little waterside spot in South Hampton. The seafood was amazing and the atmosphere super casual, which was a nice change from the places we usually went. Plus, they had a band on Saturday nights.

“We stopped coming here for a while,” Neil noted grimly as we approached the door. He interrupted himself to thank El-Mudad for holding it for us, then continued, “Because I was avoiding bars.”

“But you’ll be all right tonight?” El-Mudad asked quietly, as though he were undecided whether or not it was his question to ask.

“Absolutely,” Neil agreed.

The hostess seated us at a table near the dance floor, and I clapped my hands a little in excitement. The band—a Billy Joel cover band, judging from their name and the fact they were playing “Big Shot” at the moment—had already started their set. The dinner crowd was already loosened up and absolutely full of Baby Boomers, which promised a good time. Something about receiving that AARP card made them restless. One pitcher of beer and they were ready to go wild, in the most entertaining ways.

“This is…” El-Mudad looked around with wide eyes and settled on, “lively.”

“Have you ever been in a restaurant that had prices on the menu?” I teased him.

“Get used to this,” Neil said, never looking up from his. “She loves to point out her humble roots, as though our nanny isn’t carrying around a Birkin as a diaper bag.”

“They hold everything!” I protested. And really, it wasn’t like it was the most expensive kind. “Besides, there’s no reason she can’t look stylish. She gets up with Olivia at night. It’s the least I can do.”

“Fair point,” Neil conceded with a laugh.

“For your information, Sophie,” El-Mudad said, his lips tilting into an amused smirk, “I do occasionally descend from my golden tower to mingle among the peasants.”

“Oh, shut up, both of you.” Honestly, if being in a committed relationship with the two of them meant being ganged up on like this…

I would still take it. Gladly.

“My only real complaint is the music tonight,” Neil said, pulling an exaggerated grimace. “I would rather saw both of my feet in half than listen to Billy Joel.”

“That’s a bit dramatic,” El-Mudad said.

“The long way,” Neil emphasized.

After the waitress took our order, Neil excused himself to use the restroom. It was strangely awkward to be alone with El-Mudad, now, and it took me a second to realize why.

“You know, we haven’t been alone together since we talked about…” How was I supposed to even phrase it? “The three of us becoming an us.”

“It’s a bit strange,” he agreed. “But if we do decide to, as you say, become an ‘us’, then there will be times that we can’t all be together at once.”