Chapter 13
Nathan looked utterly confused: “Why should I hide from her?”
He brazenly started walking out to meet his sister.
I grabbed him and planted a quick kiss on his lips: “Behave yourself. We’re not officially back together yet. I’ll lose the bet.”
His eyes darkened with lust as he tilted his face: “Kiss me again before I lose
control completely.”
I smacked his arm lightly, but he pulled me in by the neck and kissed me deeply before ducking into the storage room like a teenager hiding from parents. Emma had come to shop with me at Bloomingdale’s after my shoot.
We walked several laps around the mall with Nathan trailing behind us in dark. sunglasses and a baseball cap, occasionally texting snarky messages:
You two seem close. I’m starting to ship you and my sister. Should I be jealous? I snorted, about to type a reply when Emma grabbed my arm.
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“Why do I feel like someone’s following us?” she asked suspiciously, looking over
her shoulder.
I panicked internally but played it cool: “No way! You’re being paranoid.” That damn Nathan, I told him not to follow us. He was about as subtle as a
rhinoceros in Macy’s.
But soon I noticed something strange myself.
“Emma, I think I just saw my brother near the Starbucks.”
She was texting someone and looked startled at my words, nearly dropping her
phone.
“How… how is that possible? He’s definitely handling a case right now. In court.
Downtown.” She seemed oddly specific.
I narrowed my eyes, reminding her with suspicious double standards: “You haven’t forgotten our bet, have you?”
She nodded twice: “Of course not. Whoever caves first does the other’s laundry for
a year.”
“Right.”
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12:01 PM Fri 11 Apr
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Damn, if I get caught, I’m making Nathan wash those gym socks.
Just then, another thought occurred to me.
“By the way, Emma, when did you tell your brother I didn’t like kids?”
“Huh?” Emma looked up, thinking for a moment. “I never said that.”
“Oh wait, I remember now. Back in college, we watched those TLC documentaries
about childbirth, right? We both said we hated the idea of having kids.”
“But that was just casual conversation! My brother remembered that all this time?” She suddenly brightened as if discovering a state secret. “Hold up, does that mean
he was into you back then? You were always at our house during college!”
Was he?
