ied when the twins were much younger.
"I was watching her the day that she died." He pushes his water glass aside so he can reach across the table for my hand. "I had a friend over."
He doesn't need to elaborate. It was a woman, or girl. The thoughtful gesture to hold my hand is telling me that.
"We were in the guest house when it happened."
I nod. I pull my free hand to my forehead. I'm uncomfortable hearing the pointed details now. I pushed for this. I need to accept it.
"My father and Noah were at a ball game. By the time they got home, she'd been gone for hours."
"You didn’t call them to tell them?" I ask the question without any thought. It just rolls off my tongue.
"I didn’t know." His eyes stare into mine. I see the emptiness in them. "I was in the guest house, fucking some woman whose name I can't recall over and over again while my mother took her very last breath."
Chapter 16
"You have a secret." Alexa pulls on my ponytail from behind.
I almost choke on the mouthful of wine I'm trying to swallow. "What secret?" It's not a random question. When it comes to secrets, I'm hiding more than one.
"You're seeing someone, aren't you?"
"Seeing as in dating?" Nice stall tactic, Kayla. You really expect that's going to work?
She scowls as she takes a seat beside me on the weathered couch in my apartment. "Call it whatever you like. There's a man in your life."
"Why would you ask me that?" I try to level my voice. I haven't seen Ben since the diner but that means little in the big picture. I'm still sorting through my feelings. I'm debating whether or not to talk to Noah. I feel torn between my friendship to him and Lex and my attraction to Ben.
"There's a man's tie hanging from the towel rack in your bathroom." She tosses her head towards the hallway. "It's expensive too."
"How do you know if it's expensive," I scoff in an overly exaggerated attempt to change the subject. I knew that tie was there. I liked having it there as a reminder of Ben. Now it's pushing me into a corner.
"Noah just bought a new suit." She taps her hand on my thigh. "It was expensive. I saw that exact tie at the store. Noah almost bought it."
"Noah in a suit?" I struggle to conjure up that image. "He's not a suit kind of guy, is he?"
"He's a handsome kind of guy," she counters. "I like when he dresses up if we go out for dinner."
"Makes sense." I breathe a sigh of relief. If I can keep her on the subject of her fiancé, I'll keep her off the subject of the twin brother of her fiancé.
"It was nice to see him spend some money on himself." She takes a large drink from her wineglass. "He's going to get a tux for the wedding."
I smile at the joy in her voice when she talks about her wedding. "It's coming up soon."
"We're signing a pre nup next week."
"You're signing a pre nup?" It's not that surprising given how successful Noah is. He used to sell the nude photographs he took of women for tens of thousands of dollars. That has to add up quickly.
"It was my idea." She shrugs her shoulders. "He's worth a lot of money."
"He sold a lot of photographs back in the day," I tease. We don't talk about Noah's former career much anymore. It's never been a sore spot for Alexa. She posed for him too at one point.
"He got a huge inheritance when he turned twenty-five." Her words are slightly slurred. "It was from when his mother died."
I know more about that event than I should. "I guess a pre nup is a good idea then." I can't think of anything else to say.
"Do you want to know something?" She swallows the last bit of wine that had settled at the bottom of the glass. "It's about his brother."