Page 116 of Painted Truths

I pull back to find her pupils blown wide and her chest heaving, tits thrust hard against my own breathless chest before I slip my hand into the hair at the back of her neck to draw her closer, raising my head higher to drop a soft kiss on her forehead.

"Aww!" The girls can't hold back their simpering as Peach ducks off my lap, tossing me a promising wink before taking her leave.

"Looks serious, Ri."

Raising my head, my eyes meet his remarkably unusual ones questioningly.

He has a half-smile aimed at me playing across his lips, something I've waited forever and a day to see again, but never thought I would.

"I didn't use your nickname in error, if that's what you're thinking. I've been gravitating toward a reconciliation for quite some time. Since before I even started at the company, if I'm being candid, having discovered for myself that my mother is… well, she is who she is."

He casts his eyes downward as though unable to meet mine.

"Look." He wrings his hands anxiously in his lap. "I… I don't know why I fought it for so long or why I interfered between the two of you. All I can say, I suppose, is that old habits die hard and, for that, I'm truly sorry."

He lifts his head, meeting my eyes. “Once she told me how important you were to her—that you were the one—”

He cuts himself short upon spying my puckered forehead and grins ever so slightly. “Ah, I see. Did she tell you she called you McHottie when she didn’t know who you were?”

I nod, realisation dawning. “She spoke of me after that night?”

“Spoke of you? No. Not if she could help it. Mooned over you… well, as her best friend, I have no comment.”

We exchange small smiles as my heart feels both lighter and fuller than it has in longer than I can remember.

"I can see it in your eyes, you know. How much you care for her. It makes me happy—for you both, Ri."

Straightening up in my seat, I hold my free hand out in a gesture I've thought about so often over the years but have been too afraid to complete for fear of his absolute refusal.

For fear of what I'd see in his eyes, but right now, I can almost hear Liv and her adorable euphemisms egging me on.

It's now or never.

Without missing a beat, my brother reaches his hand out to grip mine tightly, pumping it up and down twice, a lopsided grin on his features that used to make me want to move the earth and lasso the moon for him when he was a kid.

Before all that had been stolen from us.

"I don't know if I'll ever fully move past… you know—what I saw, but—”

My grip tightens around his hand. The move is wholly subconscious as my body tenses in an almost fight-or-flight mode, unwilling to go into this right now.

"No."

His eyes narrow in confusion as he tugs his hand from mine.

"Pardon me?"

"I won't get into this today with you, Alex. Maybe never. If you truly want to put the past where it belongs, now is the time."

His face is reminiscent of a confused child, all big eyes and furrowed brows.

"Jesus Christ, Henry. I'm confused as all fuck about the whole thing—I can't move past it without getting answers. Without knowing what happened. I need to understand!"

His tone brings me back to his fifth birthday when he couldn't fathom why his mum wasn't home for cake, and it was just the staff and I who sang him Happy Birthday as he blew out his candles.

My reply is my stony silence.

"Have you told Liv?"