I take the stairs two at a time and my usual worried smirk is replaced by a smile today. It will all be okay. I’ll explain the plan again, he’ll understand, and I’ll have her. I produce my keys out of my pocket and fumble with them, trying to get the door open. Because that’s what this has been about all along … Sweet, innocent …
Emme.
Standing in front of me, opening the door for me – to my own apartment. Wearing Aiden’s hoodie. I clench the paper bag in my hands and I know in that moment I had it all wrong.
He remembers everything.
He acted on it, too, while I was busy at work, earning money for the both of us.
And she’s here now.
“Hi,” Emme says softly, her doe eyes big and trusting.
Mine, I growl in my mind.
Chapter 7
I walk in like I’m in a trance and when Aiden catches my eye, he winks at me.
He winks at me.
I’m about to strangle him, but in the next second, I’m enveloped in a bear hug by Emme. “I missed you so much,” she whispers in my ear.
I have to restrain myself so I don’t hug her back and my hands form fists at my sides. I can feel her jutting hipbones poking me through her jeans; she’s pressed so close to me. All I want to do is take her in my arms, but I know I couldn’t stop there …
“What is she doing here?” I ask Aiden, stepping out of Emme’s touch and ignoring the hurt which is coming off her body like a fragrance.
“I thought it was about time we buried the hatchet,” Aiden says cheerfully and brings a bowl of salad to the kitchen table. I see that it’s already set with two plates and there’s sliced baguette as well as some charcuterie. I wonder who paid for that, I think bitterly. “It’s been too long since we had Emme over, don’t you think?” Aiden teases.
Oh, so she’s Emme now, when before, he always called her little sis. I hate his guts right now, and I know I’m being unfair but I want to grab her and carry her into my room, do all the things I’ve dreamed about to her. Forget Aiden. She belongs to me.
“Am I allowed to eat here?” I ask viciously instead of responding to my brother’s words, nodding towards the two places he’s set. “Or should I leave?” Somehow I don’t feel welcome in my apartment.
“Yes, please – stay,” Emme jumps in cheerfully and I turn around to look at her. She’s acting like she owns the place and it bothers me, because it’s the one thing I paid for myself. I’m the one who pays the rent here, and her dirty money will do her no good, no matter how good those jeans look on her. And I’m trying not to look.
“Are you staying?” I ask her angrily and she flinches a little.
“Aiden invited me for lunch,” she says softly, but then she raises her chin up. “I didn’t know we needed your permission.”
Well, that’s new.
Emme is always quiet, obeying everything we say. But now she’s standing up for herself?
“It’s my place, so you do, yes,” I reply coldly and her eyes burn with a quiet fire I’ve never seen before. And I’ll be damned if it doesn’t turn me on even more than her usual sweet and submissive personality.
She looks taken aback for a second, but I’m not regretting this in the slightest. She doesn’t belong here, not in her designer heels, with her handbag that cost more than our rent does.
“Ignore him, Emme,” Aiden tells her cheerfully. “He’s being an ass. Why don’t you sit down? I’m sure we can have a nice time without Blane, too – his loss, right?”
He’s shooting me daggers with his eyes across his shoulder as he sits Emme down, and I feel so angry I could slap him right there, on the spot, even though I have no right whatsoever to do that.
It was your idea, I tell myself, just to punish myself further.
“Enjoy your dinner in that case,” I say, the venom spilling out of my words. I turn on my heels and walk out of there, now knowing where I’m going, but needing to get away.
Because it might have been my idea, but it should have been me sitting there with her. I should be the one she looks at adoringly with those huge eyes, not my brother. And I’m afraid that had I stayed there longer, I would be the one to get hurt, not Emme …
Chapter 8
I can’t really tell you what I do for the rest of the evening. I walk around the streets, pretending I don’t care, when my mind is swimming with ideas how to get her for myself. But I can’t, and I won’t. I’ve held back for so long, and I’ll just have to last longer.
Time passes slowly and finally, I’ve had enough. It’s pitch black outside and the few streetlamps in our neighborhood and barely throwing any light on the pavement as I make my way back home. I stop under our apartment building, glancing up at the window that I know is in our kitchen.
The light is on.
I can just picture them, sitting at the table I paid for, eating food that Aiden made, my paper bag forgotten on the counter. I want to grind my teeth together with the pure rage I feel, but instead I settle for throwing a punch at the façade of our building.
I cuss loudly and look at my bleeding knuckles, nursing my hand in my hands.
“Well, that didn’t help much,” someone conveys my thoughts out loud and I turn towards the voice like it’s a siren calling to me. Of course, it’s Emme. She’s standing on the doorstep, Aiden’s hoodie peeking out of her pristine white coat.
That alone lets me know she knows nothing about how hard life can be, because in my version, that coat would be shredded and dirty within days, and if hers get so much as a little stain on it, she can just replace it with another one. It’s an endless supply of white coats for her, and a loop of torn jackets for me.
My imagery sucks, I tell myself in my head, before finally rushing into our building, ignoring Emme completely. But instead of backing off like I expected she would, Emme steps in my way and I brush against her.