I'm In Love With My Brother's Best Friend?! novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: Flowers

Lucinda shuts the door on Brock while Jude stands silent behind her, and Brock names the place her grandmother's locket is.

I didn't take the roses.

"We're not talking," I said.

"I know you're mad."

"Mad is when you forget my birthday," I said.

"This is something else."

Brock leaned on the porch rail and tried the smile again.

"She's nobody, Lucinda."

"That's who I'm supposed to be mad at?"

"I mean she meant nothing," he said.

"I was lonely, and you were always studying."

"I was studying for the same chemistry class you copied my notes from."

His smile slipped, then came back.

"Come on, it was one time."

"You told her we broke up in September."

"I said we were rocky."

"You said rocky to a girl you were sleeping with and happy to me for four months," I said.

"Which of us was in the room?"

A floorboard creaked behind me.

I didn't turn around, because I knew the creak.

Jude had come down the hall and stood right behind my shoulder.

He wore jeans and no shirt, and he had a dish towel in his hand.

He didn't say a word.

He didn't touch me.

He simply stood there, tall and quiet and completely awake, and the porch got smaller.

Brock's eyes went up, and I watched him do the math.

"Who's this?"

"The roommate," I said.

"Not that it's your business."

"Roommate." Brock tried to laugh.

"You moved in with a guy the day after."

"I moved in with my brother," I said.

"He lives here too."

"Your brother's a nerd with a lab coat," Brock said.

"This guy looks like he lifts."

"I'm Jude," Jude said.

His voice was low and perfectly polite.

"I cook, mostly."

Brock stared at the dish towel and, I swear, took half a step back.

"Cool," he said.

"Look, Lucinda, I came to apologize."

"You came to get the video taken down," I said.

"It's got forty thousand views, and your coach follows the account that posted it."

He flushed to the roots of his hair.

I had guessed right.

"If you really want to apologize," I said, "you can start with my grandmother's locket."

He blinked.

"What locket?"

"The gold one I lent you in October for your big game," I said.

"You said it was for luck."

"Oh. That."

"Yes, that."

"It's at the house," Brock said.

"The frat house, in my room."

"Then bring it here."

"I'm not carrying it around like a pizza," he said.

"If you want it, come get it."

"Friday night is the party, so ask for it at the door."

"I'm not walking into your frat," I said.

"Then I guess it stays," he said, and now the smile was nasty.

"You'd have to say it to my face in front of the whole house, and you won't."

He set the roses on the porch rail.

"Think about it, Luce."

He went down the steps, whistling.

I watched him cross the lawn to his car.

My hands were shaking, so I shoved them into the sweatshirt.

Jude didn't move.

"You didn't have to stand there," I said.

"I know."

"Why did you?"

"You told me last night you don't take suggestions," he said.

"I didn't want to suggest."

I turned around.

He was very close, and the dish towel was in his fist.

His eyes went from my face to the porch and back to my face again.

"Was it his coach you meant?" he asked.

"About the video?"

"I made it up," I said.

"I guessed."

For the first time since I had known him, Jude Ransom grinned.

It was crooked and entirely unguarded, and it changed his whole face.

"Remind me never to lie to you."

"You're a terrible liar anyway," I said.

"Cam says you blush."

"Cam says a lot of things."

I stepped around him to get inside.

My arm brushed his bare stomach, and neither of us moved for a second.

Then the kitchen phone rang.

Jude took a long breath and went to answer it.

I stood in the hallway with my back against the wall and my heart doing something stupid.

"It's Cam," Jude called.

"He wants to know if you're eating breakfast."

"Tell him yes."

"He's coming back early for lunch," he said.

"He wants to check on you."

A second later he added, in a different voice, quieter, "And I'm driving you Friday."

"I haven't decided to go."

"Yes, you have," Jude said.

"I've seen you decide things."

I looked at the roses on the rail through the window.

Then I carried them out to the trash and dropped them in without a second look.

I was going to that party, and I was going to say it to his face in front of the whole house.

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