He was right to worry about it.
Had I hurt Ava? It felt like we’d broken each other’s hearts, though we hadn’t meant to. It also felt terrifyingly like we might do it again, though it was the last thing I wanted. “I didn’t dump her eleven years ago, if that’s what you’re asking,” I said to Aidan. “We had a problem we couldn’t get past.”
“What problem?”
Fuck. The baby wasn’t only my story to tell. I wasn’t sure if Ava wanted me to discuss it. “It doesn’t matter now,” I said, hedging. “We both thought it was over. But it isn’t.”
“I can’t fucking believe this.” Aidan paced away from his desk. Outwardly he was calm, but we all knew better.
“Easy, Aidan,” Noah said.
“Actually, I think it’s nice,” Alex added. “I always thought Ava had a bit of a thing for you, Dane.”
Aidan’s voice was icy anger. “That’s easy for you to say. She isn’t your sister.”
Alex shrugged. “No, but she may as well be. So what if they like each other? You know Ava dates assholes. Dane is better than any of them.”
“He isn’t better if he’s been lying for eleven years,” Aidan said.
“Hold up.” Noah held his hands up. “Okay, so Dane, the two of you hooked up for a week.”
“Shut up, Noah,” Aidan said.
“Jesus, Aidan, your sister is thirty. She isn’t a nun. So she got it on with Dane. So what? My question is, why aren’t you together now? And what does this have to do with Okada?”
“Ava left town and wouldn’t say why,” Aidan said, pacing. “That tells you something about how happy she is about this.”
“She left town because she needed some time,” I said, trying not to get angrier than I already was. “There’s shit going on with her that you don’t know about. And it has to do with Okada because Ava might be pregnant, and if she is, I’m not going to Japan.”
Aidan stopped pacing and looked at me. “Pregnant?”
“This gets juicier by the minute,” Noah said.
I kept my eyes on Aidan. He looked like he might vault over the desk any minute and rip my spine out, Mortal Kombat style. “It’s what she wanted,” I said. “What we both wanted.”
“A baby?” Aidan said. “Ava doesn’t want a baby. She never has. She lives in a tiny apartment with roommates, for God’s sake. She works freelance work. She doesn’t want a baby.”
“Have you ever asked her?” I shot back at him. “Have you ever talked to her about what she wants at all?”
“I don’t have to ask her. I know my sister. She’s never even thought about having a baby.”
It came out. I couldn’t stop it. “She thought about it when we got pregnant the first time eleven years ago.”
This time he did come around the desk, fast and lethal. I got out of my chair, ready to take him, but he got to me before I could find my balance and shoved me back against the wall. “Tell me I’m mistaken,” he said in that cold voice of his. “Because I just heard my best friend say that he knocked up my sister. Twice.”
Now I was good and pissed. “Are you going to beat me up, Aidan? Because if you want to fight, we can fight.” We may be classy millionaires now, but we’d all grown up tough, and we were all able to fight. Aidan was wearing an expensive suit, but I knew for a fact he could hit quick and hard. And until today, he’d never even thought of hitting me.
“Okay, you two.” Alex and Noah had gotten out of their chairs and stood by, ready to tackle Aidan if he moved. “Back up, Aidan,” Noah said.
Aidan ignored him, his fists still in my designer shirt, his eyes still fixed on me. “Leave Ava alone,” he said.
He was out of his mind. “No.”
“We aren’t friends,” he said. “It’s all been a lie. We’ve never been friends.”
“We were friends,” I said. “We were brothers. But if you’re going to make me choose between you and her, Aidan, I’ll tell you right now: I choose her. I choose Ava. Every fucking time.”
There was a pause—Aidan on the edge of attacking me, Alex and Noah ready to drag him down. Me against the wall, watching the relationship with my best friend crumble into dust.