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He grabbed him by the arm and stopped him. “What the fuck, Dillon?”
“I know, Bren.” He ran his fingers through the blond hair on top of his head, making a mess of it. “I’m a dick—an asshole. I feel like shit. I didn’t mean to say that.”
Not out loud anyway.
“You’ve got to get over it and get your shit together, brother.”
“My shit’s together, man.” And he stalked off.
Brendan made his way over to their booth by the bar. Bo and Kit lounged against the back of it, sipping on their drinks as they watched the erotic theatrical troupe on the raised stage perform a daisy chain. He glanced up at the big-screen and felt the blood rush to his dick. All that pussy.
Beautiful.
Where the fuck is Dillon?
He reclaimed his seat in the booth and poured himself a finger of whiskey. “You see my cousin?”
“Saw him leave,” Kit lazily drawled, absently staring at the girls on the stage.
“He looked pissed, man,” Bo added. “What’s up with him?”
Brendan shrugged. “Might’ve been something I said.” It wasn’t for him to say. Dillon had said enough already.
Bo nodded. “Yeah, you can be a real asshole.”
Truth.
“I know.” He winked and took a sip of his whiskey.
“You look tired, B.”
He was. Most nights, by the time Brendan finished up at the club it was four or five in the morning. Then he’d drag his ass out of bed to help his cousins in the office, or Taylor and the guys with the studio. They were in the process of converting the last three-flat building on Park Place into offices for their business, a recording studio for Venery, a gym, and a guest apartment.
“You saying I look like shit, Bo?”
“Naw, B. You’re still pretty.” He snorted out a laugh.
Kit joined in. “Yeah, pretty fucking ugly.”
“Seriously…” Bo gripped his shoulder. “…give yourself a break, man. And a facial or something, ’cause you got bags under your eyes.” He chuckled.
Brendan nodded, snickering. “Maybe Chloe can hook me up.”
“Maybe.” Bo smirked.
He killed the whiskey in his glass and set it down on the table. “I’ve got some stuff to finish up in the office.” Brendan stood. “Catch up with ya later.”
Sitting at his desk, he kicked up his feet, and shot off a text to Dillon that he knew would go unanswered. Truth hurts sometimes. He wasn’t trying to be an asshole. He’d never been in love, didn’t plan to ever be either, still Brendan understood where Dillon’s heart was at. His longing for…for the impossible.
‘Always gonna love you, sweet girl.’
A sweet girl can fuck you up. Your head. Your heart. So he kept far away from them. Except for the one he never saw coming. And with just one kiss she’d been able to fuck with his head. He could still feel her. Taste her. Smell the sweet scent of jasmine.
Brendan thought he’d never see her again, except in his dreams, and she appeared in them often. But a few weeks after the eve of the solstice, well into July and the dog days of summer, there she was. He had just stepped out onto First Avenue after cutting through the park on his way to the club. The old man at the food cart put an Italian ice in her hands. He recognized her instantly.
She was beautiful in the dark, but that afternoon, with the brilliant rays of the sun shining down upon her she was breathtaking. Beguiling. Her long straight hair reached past the middle of her back. Its varying shades of blonde mixed together and swayed in the breeze like ripe wheat in the field. Long toned legs in a short denim skirt. Curves he already knew fit perfectly in his hands.
As if she had sensed he was there, she looked up at him with those enchanting eyes that were neither blue nor green, but the color of a turquoise sea. And she smiled. She stood on her tiptoes as high as she could reach and lightly kissed him beneath his jaw. Brendan remembered thinking for a fleeting moment that if any girl could bring him out of the dark it was this one. He reached out to touch her hair, but much like the sunlight, he couldn’t hold onto it. The silky strands slipped through his fingers.
