Eight Brothers Fiancee (Love by Numbers 7)

I supposed there was a small part of me that wanted to try and take my upcoming nuptials seriously. Maybe if I opened my mind to being with Malia for real, I could get her to back off my brothers and Alexa and just run the company with me. I’d let her make some changes here and there and play the role of the loving husband. She was attractive, there was no denying that. I could probably find a way to enjoy being with her alone. I’d never been with any woman without Huxley there. I was well aware that there were people who would find our closeness abnormal, if not unnatural. Despite what people believed to be true about Huxley and I, me being the really mature, well put-together one, and him being more immature and chaotic, so I must have been the stronger of the two of us; nothing could be further from the truth.

I always struggled with confidence and making friends. If it was up to me, I would have spent all of my time with my brothers, and that would have been plenty for me. I was an introvert by every definition of the word. On the other hand, Huxley was popular, and despite his childish behavior, he could get people to follow him, even if he was marching straight into hell. He took me everywhere he went. Every sport he wanted to play, I had to play it with him. Every club he wanted to join, I had to join too. Even college, I was just planning to attend online classes, but he demanded that living on a college campus was a ‘rite of passage’ and that we had to do it together.

We used to have separate romantic lives, for a time. Throughout high school, we would date different women, but they’d all be turned off by how close we were before either of us would ever get to second base. One day, one of the women breaking up with Huxley told him that as long as he and I were as close as we were, neither of us would ever find a woman. That was when Huxley decided that the only way we were going to be able to date women was together. We had to find women who not only accepted our closeness, but were willing to be with us both. The first woman we’d ever found willing to try, was a freak, and thrilled about the thought of being with two men at once. We’d just been dating up to that point, but we finally lost our virginity together.

Ever since then, that’d been the arrangement. We do it together, or we don’t do it at all. As we got older and came across more adventurous women, we involved the rest of our brothers and it just sort of became something we did. Call it brotherly bonding, we found that we enjoyed a woman most when she was shared amongst us. Never did I think we’d actually find one who I could see being around for the long haul, and now that we had, we couldn’t even do it. It was terrible.

“Hey.” I looked up from the plate of eggs I didn’t realize I’d been staring at and Huxley was walking into the kitchen. “Did you get the text?”

I nodded. “Yeah. She’s been with all of us now.”

“Yeah. That’s supposed to be a good thing.” Huxley reached into the fridge, took out a bottle of orange juice and drank right from the carton.

“What do you want from me?” I asked. “I don’t want this anymore than any of you.”

“I still think we could find a way out.”

“Do you?” I asked. “The wedding is in two days and Dante’s men get here today. What’s your big plan?” Huxley looked at me and then just rolled his eyes. “That’s what I thought.”

Both of our phones chimed at the same time. I didn’t even look at mine, there wasn’t much it could say that I was interested in, but Huxley checked his. “They want us to go to Quentin’s.”

“You go,” I said. “I’m gonna go to bed. I slept on the couch all night because Malia was in my bed.”

“You can sleep later. This could be important. Come on. I’ll drive.”

I dragged myself up from my barstool and trudged out to my golf cart parked outside. Huxley loaded into the driver’s seat and I spilled into the other side. He drove clear to the other side of the estate where I could see that all of the golf carts were parked outside, including Huxley’s that Alexa had been using to get around. Huxley filed mine in alongside them and we got out and went inside.

Quentin’s home, though laid out exactly like the rest of ours, was devoid of any of the fireplaces or fire features the rest of us had, and thus he had more space in his den. We walked in and all of the guys and Alexa were sitting amongst the massive, circular couch that was laid into the floor. Huxley and I stepped in and found spots to sit. I tried to avoid Alexa’s gaze, but eventually I couldn’t resist the urge to look at her anymore and my eyes locked into hers. I was like a kid all of a sudden. I held out my arms and Alexa didn’t hesitate. She stood up from where she was sitting next to Delvin and walked over to me, hugging her arms around my back and pulling my head to rest against her stomach. She fed her fingers into my hair and rubbed and I never wanted to let go. She was a mecca I didn’t know I needed; a place to feel safe and secure. Being there with her and all of my brothers; I wished I never had to leave.