Page 82 of All for Love

MERCEDES

My legs were killing me from spin class, but that wasn’t the reason why I felt like my knees were going to buckle. The tension in Kody’s office was palpable, and it looked like they’d almost come to blows.

Kaden and Kody were standing only about two feet apart, and although Brooke had put herself between them, Kody still looked like he was going to put his fist through the wall while Kaden was glaring at his brother like he was going to throttle him as soon as Brooke got out of his way.

As an only child, I’d never experienced sibling rivalry, and I had no idea if, as adults, these two would actually come to blows. While I had no doubt they’d gotten into a few scuffles as kids, this was different.

This was serious. They could get hurt—at the hand of their twin.

Was that something they could ever forgive each other for? Something they could work through? Ever?

I honestly didn’t know. To my mind, people who physically came to blows couldn’t end up being overly friendly with one another, much less as close as these two had been, but perhaps I was naïve. Maybe it was a thing with brothers.

I stayed rooted to my spot, though. Completely unsure of my place in this. I didn’t want them to smack each other around, but Kody was Kaden’s brother—not mine. Whatever they had to work out, it was between them.

I would try to do damage control, but ultimately, I refused to get between them. Their relationship was much too important and, right now, much too fragile for careless intervention. No matter how good the motivation behind it.

“You didn’t take my warning,” Brooke said, stepping out from between the two brothers and cocking her head at me, her eyes narrowed in thought. “Why not?”

I met her gaze without wavering. “I did take it. Or at least, I tried to. Kody and I ended things and we tried to stay away from each other, but we couldn’t. Is that what this is about?”

Brooke inclined her head in a tight nod, but Kody scoffed. “No, that’s not what this is about. This is about Brooke being unable to keep her nose out of our business.”

Kaden growled and tried to step toward his brother again, but Brooke stopped him with a sharp look, and he sighed, turning to face me instead. He looked furious. His jaw clenched so hard it was ticking and a vein bulged underneath it. Streaks of red lined his cheeks and his hands were now rolled into fists at his sides, his chest heaving.

“No one gives a shit what you tried to do. Your relationship is inappropriate and it needs to end. Now.”

I stared back at the man who’d always been so even-tempered with me. So friendly. He wasn’t either of those things now, but I had a feeling there was more to this than just the quick summaries I’d been given by Kody and Brooke.

Clearly, this confrontation had been going on for a while, and if they couldn’t even see eye to eye on what it was about, then I really had my work cut out for me. At the heart of all this was obviously the fact that Kody and I had started up again.

The rest was just noise. A literal he-said, she-said we would never get to the bottom of without inciting further argument.

That wouldn’t serve any purpose, so instead, I focused on what I felt was the real heart of the matter. “I understand that our relationship might seem inappropriate from the outside, but what harm are we really doing?”

Kaden opened his mouth to argue, but Brooke just rolled her eyes and shook her head, her hands flying to her hips. Wow. They really are all worked up.

I hurried to get the rest out before they interrupted me. “Our parents forced us to spend time together planning the wedding. I had no say in the matter. I had to help and participate as she wanted to start things off on the right foot.”

“You didn’t have to sleep together,” Brooke argued. “Spending time with a person doesn’t automatically lead to jumping in bed with them.”

“I never said it did.” I was starting to understand why Kody looked like he wanted to put his fist through the wall. Brooke was putting words in my mouth already and I’d only just walked in. “We were forced to spend time together, and as we did, we got to know each other. One thing led to another and here we are. It doesn’t mean our feelings don’t exist or that we can just switch them off.”

“Exactly,” Kody agreed. He’d turned his back on us to breathe through the rage, but he was facing us again now, the red flush that’d been on his cheeks when I’d come in receding. “That’s what I’m saying. We need to talk about this logically instead of making demands, lecturing, and pretending that it’s cut and dried. It’s not.”

“Logically?” Kaden swallowed a laugh as he spun toward his brother. “Logic left the building when you decided to fuck your stepsister. Stop pretending that we’re the ones being unreasonable here. We’re not. We’re just trying to get you to understand that what you’re doing isn’t as harmless as you seem to think.”

“Whoa,” I said, my heartbeat speeding up as I stared back at him. “Since when is it you against us or us against you? Have you really drawn a line in the sand here? On the opposite side of your brother? Your twin?”

“Yes,” Brooke said firmly. “We’re standing up for what’s right, and what you’re doing isn’t.”

Kody sucked in a breath and glanced at Kaden. “So that’s it? You’re going to let her speak for you? About this?”

Kaden looked at Kody and paused, the column of his throat moving up and down as he swallowed hard and then nodded. “She’s right. What you’re doing is wrong. I don’t want to be on the other side of the line, but that’s where we’re at right now.”

I took a step forward, realizing that we needed to change this up. They were refusing to see this from our side, which was understandable, but that meant I had to try a different approach. “What if your father had happened to marry Brooke’s mother instead of mine? Would you just stop caring about each other? Because that’s the exact situation we’re in. That’s what you’re asking us to do.”

Brooke scoffed. “Our relationship still would’ve predated theirs. We’ve known each other a long time. It’s different.”