Bad For You: (An Older Brother's Best Friend Romance) (16 page)

nautica

I toss my bag over my shoulder and head towards the apartment
building that’s becoming too familiar.

My mind has been choked with thoughts of
Bracken non-stop since I woke up naked in his bed this morning. Hell, I’ve been
thinking about him more in this past week than I have in years. I’d been slowly
getting over him more with each day, but now all of that hard work is
deteriorating.

He texted and asked if I’d come over when I
got off work. Another text followed, telling me to bring an overnight bag and
cancel any plans I have for the weekend.

I replied with a no. He said yes. I said no.

And he won, considering I’m standing in front
of his door waiting for myself to muster up the courage to knock.

We had sex last night – great sex
– something I thought would never happen again. I’m waiting to wake up
from this fervid dream.

I jump back when the door flies open before I
have the chance to do shit. I look up to see Bracken’s large frame standing in
the doorway. His eyes are fixed directly on me as a smirk crawls across his
lips.

“I saw you pull up from the window,” he tells
me. “I figured I’d help you out incase you got lost
or
tried to make a
run for it.”

I play with the strap of my bag. Dammit, why
does it seem like the man can always read my mind?

“Nope, I was just …” My words come out like a
stutter. Why am I so damn nervous? I was vulnerable and naked in his bed last
night, and now I can’t even form a complete sentence?  

“Deciding whether or not to bail on me?” he
says, taking the words out of my mouth.

“Yeah, pretty much.”

He takes my bag, leads me into his place, and
sets it down onto the carpeted floor next to another one.

“Are we going somewhere?” I ask.

He heads into the kitchen, opens up the
fridge, and starts packing bottles of water into a cooler. “We sure are.”

“Where?” I assumed he told me to pack an
overnight bag because he wanted me to stay here – not go somewhere else.

“It’s a surprise.”

“Yeah … I don’t like surprises.” I join him
in the kitchen. “I’m not letting you take me to some unknown place to stay
overnight.
”

The old Nautica would’ve been game and
excited for this, but not this one. No, I want no part in surprises from the
man who crushed my heart.

“Well you’re surprise-hatin’ ass is going to
have to get over it.”

“You’re expecting me to be okay with you leading
me to who the fuck knows where and stay the night without giving me any info?
You’ve lost your damn mind. You asking me to bring a bag was pushing it, but
this, it’s outrageous.”

“I sure am.” He grabs my face and plants his
lips on mine before I can stop him. “Trust me, we’re going to have fun.”

I need to pull away, but my feet are locked
in place. My mouth hovers back over his, and I can feel his harsh breaths
kicking at my lips.

“I don’t think you know what’s fun to me
anymore,” I whisper.

He chuckles. “Oh babe, I can probably name a
few things.” I shiver as his tongue runs in-between my lips before he takes a
step back.

I stay frozen while images of last night play
out in my mind. I shut my eyes and can almost feel him inside of me again. I
blow out a breath, hoping to calm myself down. I don’t want to leave. I want to
push him down on the hardwood floor and take him right here, right now.

He’s sucking me back into his world, faster
and more intense than before, which means the hurt is going to be harder to get
through this time around.

“Come on,” he says. I go stumbling forward,
my mind still not straight, when he catches hold of my hand. I’m trying to keep
up as he grabs our bags on the way out the door and guides us to the parking lot.
“This is me.” An oversized, red four-door trucks beeps at the same time its
lights flash. He releases my hand to open up the passenger door.

“You always did have a thing for trucks,” I
mutter, jumping in.

He stops, standing next to my seat, and
arches a brow. “Correct me if I’m wrong, babe, but so did you. Or at least the
back seat of them.” He winks, his upper lip twitching into a smile, while I
glare at him. I flinch when his hand runs along my thigh, right underneath the
hem of my skirt. “You need to loosen up before I find a much more entertaining way
to get you to unwind. And trust me, we probably won’t make it out of the
parking lot if we do it my way.”

He laughs when I push his hand off me.
“Fine,” I say, making a show of moving around and pulling the seatbelt across
my body roughly. “I’m all loose. Now go away.”

He keeps laughing as he shuts my door and
tosses our bags in the backseat. “You’re going to love this.”

Damn it. I hope not.

* * *

“Oh hell no,” I shriek, looking out the window in anguish. He’s
so
wrong about me loving this. So damn wrong. “Turn this car around now,
Bracken,” I add, looking over at him.

He puts his truck in park and glances over at
me in amusement. “Problem?” he questions.

“Yes, problem.” I signal out the window.
“This … it isn’t happening.”

It’s dark outside, and we’ve been on the road
for almost four hours. My anxiety was increasing with every passing mile about
where the hell he was taking me. I’d been expecting something different, but
definitely not this.

“Last time we were here you enjoyed it,” he
argues, unable to hold back his smile.

“Last time I was a dumbass,” I correct.

He laughs and runs his hand through his
beard. I cock my head to the side when he holds up two fingers. “You have two
options, babe. You can sleep out here, or you can jump your sexy ass out and
follow me into that nice, heated building.” 

“I’m not going in there with you,
period.”
I cross my arms. “Take me home.
”

He steps out of the car, ignoring me, and
grabs our bags. My mouth falls open when he heads towards the entrance doors. Asshole.

It’s only thirty-five degrees out. I have no
choice but to follow him.

I stand a few inches back, watching him as he
approaches the woman standing behind the counter with a smile on her face.

“Reservation for Casey,” he tells her, his
voice husky.

I look around the place. I don’t remember
much about the lobby, but what happened in the room I’ll never be able to
forget. That memory will forever be burned into my brain.

Why is he doing this?

Taking me down memory lane?

Why is he recreating all of the times I let
him in?

When I was vulnerable?

He’s trying to win me back with memories.
There’s nothing worse than having all of the reasons you loved someone who hurt
you shoved in your face, suffocating you.

I stumble forward and follow him when he
takes the key from the woman. I stay silent in the elevators and continue to
let him show me the way.

“Can you believe they actually gave us the
same room?” he asks, unlocking the door and going in. “I mean, what are the
chances of that?”

I stop in the doorway and a surge of memories
powers through me. The beds, the TV, everything is the same. “You seriously
remembered what room we were in?” I ask.

He drops our bags to grab my hand and pull me
into the room. “Of course I did, babe. You might not believe me, but I remember
everything about us.” He sets me down on the bed. “Now, do you want to go to
dinner or order room service?”  

“Are we hanging out in here all night?”  

“Hang out? Go to dinner? Make love to you until
you forgive me?” He shrugs. “All of the above.” He unzips his bag and drags out
a bottle of wine. “I brought this.” Next comes a stack of cheap plastic cups.

I snort. “Wow, you sure know how to wine and
dine a chick.”

He laughs, holding up the bottle. “Call me
Mr. Romance. We can go somewhere, out to dinner, to a movie, but I thought
hanging out here would be more entertaining. We can talk, work shit out, enjoy
a drink in privacy.”

I give him a faint smile. “That’s actually
perfect.”

Minus the talking part. I will do anything to
stop that from happening.

* * *

I pop the last bite of pizza crust in my mouth and put my
plate on the nightstand. The hotel’s room service menu was limited to grilled
cheese and frozen cheeseburgers, so we decided to order a pizza and have it
delivered to our room.

“So what’s after this? Student-teacher porn?”
I ask.

He looks at me from across the bed with a
boyish smile. “Is that what you’d like to do next?” His eyes flash over to the
remote. “That can easily be arranged.”   

The heat rising along my cheeks embarrasses
me. Why does talking about sex with him make me feel so … inept? I feel just as
inexperienced as I was our first night.

“I … uh …” I stutter, trying to come up with
the right words. “I was under the assumption that we were recreating the whole
stranded in the blizzard night. Role playing … or whatever.”

I hold in a breath, watching him as he stands
up and grabs the pizza box. He sets it down on the desk and comes back to me.

“We can do whatever you want, baby,” he
answers. His keen eyes sharpen on me. “But I think before we do anything we
need to talk.”

“Talk?” I repeat. That’s the last thing I
want to do right now. Talking opens up too many bottles – too many
emotions – too many memories of betrayal.

The room starts to grow hot as he stands only
inches away from me. “Yes, talk. I want you to hear me out. I’m not touching
you again, fucking you again, or doing anything until you listen to what I have
to say. Then you tell me what I have to do to earn your trust and heart again.”
I nod in response. “I’m sorry,” he goes on. “I’m so fucking sorry. I was young
and dumb. I ran away from my problems, and I know this sounds stupid as fuck,
but I thought I was helping you in the long run. I didn’t want you to lose your
family because of me.”

That pisses me off. “That’s bullshit. My
family would’ve never left me. I don’t understand why you would even think
something like that.”

He looks me straight in the eye. “If Simon
were to say pick me or him – who would you have chose?” I shrug. “Back
then, in the days when you wanted to be with me more than anything, who would
you have chosen?” I shrug again, even though I know the answer to that.

I would’ve chosen him over anything and
anyone. I was so in love with him I would’ve walked through fire to get him to
look at me. I would’ve stabbed a knife through my own foot for him to love me.
As much as I love my family, the lovesick girl always chooses her heart over
everything.

“Exactly,” he says. “And my stupidity back
then would’ve ruined us somehow. I was afraid you’d turn your back on them and then
be left with nobody.”  

“You were also afraid of Simon.”

“I wasn’t afraid of Simon. I was more afraid
of Simon wanting nothing to do with me. He was my best friend for years. I
walked away because I didn’t want to hear him say how much I betrayed him.”

 “People don’t change. What makes you
think I’m going to believe you won’t walk away when something goes wrong this
time?”

“I promise you I will never walk away. I’m
here now, fighting for you, harder than I ever have. This is me telling you
that no matter what happens between us, I’m here for good. Always. There’s no
running. We have a problem? We’ll yell at each other, slam some doors, and
make-up. No bags will be packed. No calls ignored. I won’t abandon you. I give
you my word.”

I blink, trying to hold back the tears
surfacing. “Wow,” I breathe out. “I wasn’t expecting all of that.”

“And I wasn’t expecting to fall in love with
my best friend’s annoying ass little sister.” He laughs when I slug him in the
arm.

“Now I have a question for you.” We might as
well get this shit over with. He looks down at me, causing my heart to beat
faster. I point next to me. “But first sit down, you’re making me nervous.”

I’m forced to scoot over when he plops down
next to me. “Better?”

I nod, wrapping my arms around myself.
“Better.”

“Now what’s your question?”

“The necklace.”

“What about it?”

“What does it mean?” I’ve wanted to know this
for years. I’ve racked my brain, going over our past conversations, but could
never figure it out.
Step one.

“I bought it before Simon found out about us
and planned to give it to you for Christmas. After I left, I knew that wasn’t
an option, but I still wanted you to have it. I hoped it would let you know
that even though we couldn’t be together, what we had was real. I wanted to
make sure you knew that you meant something to me – even when I was a
mess.”   

“So you took the cowardly way out and mailed
it? Did you honestly think I’d figure that out?”

“Yeah … that probably wasn’t that smartest
thing I’ve ever done.”  

“What does it mean?” I press. I want to know
more. “Step one?”

“It means moving forward. I was ready to take
that first step with you. I was ready to step to the line of commitment and
have a relationship. I wanted you as my own, and I wanted to be yours.”

I look away from him, bitterness slowly
crawling into me. “But then you chickened out. You took all of that energy to show
me you were ready and then bailed like a wimp.” 

“Look at me.” His voice is thick, but
pleading. I don’t. I can’t. “I’m not going to answer shit if you can’t even
look at me.”

Nervousness coils through me. I hesitate for
a moment. This is venturing into too much uncharted territory. I slowly turn my
head to look at him, noticing the look of concern on his face.

His hand locks onto mine. “You’re right. I
was a
wimp.
” He laughs at the term. “I was an immature guy who thought
he knew everything and was afraid to deal with real life consequences. But
that’s not me anymore. I love you, Nautica. Forgive me for being a dumbass, for
hurting you, for walking away like a damn coward. Give me another chance. Dig
deep and drag out all of that love you once had for me.”