Page 116 of Spurred On

“Sidney is a cliff?”

“She’s too much like you, Cody. You both avoid commitment. You both are afraid of settling down.”

“I’m not afraid of settling down.” He wasn’t. Not anymore. He pinned his sister with a solemn glance. “What’s this all about, Claire? What’s it really about?”

She heaved a great sigh and clomped around the room a bit before she said, almost in an undertone, “You were supposed to marry Porsche.”

What the actual fuck?Cody gaped at his sister. Where the hell was this coming from? “What?”

“You were supposed to marry Porsche.”

“Says who?” he sputtered.

Claire leaned against the counter and flicked a look at him from beneath her lashes. “We’ve planned it since grade school.”

Planned it? Seriously?“Did it ever occur to you that I don’t love Porsche? And frankly, she doesn’t love me. Have you seen the way she ogles Brandon?”

Claire’s growl undulated between them. “That is your fault.”

“My fault? They look happy together.”

“You brought him here.”

“Technically, Cade hired him.”

She ignored this patent truth. “You threw them together.”

“And this is an atrocious thing because . . . ?”

“Because you were supposed to marry her. We were going to be sisters.”

“Claire, you gotta be kidding me, right?” This was nuts. But damn it, she wasn’t kidding. There were tears in her eyes. He cupped her cheek and wiped them away and sighed. “Claire,” he said, holding her gaze. “I am head over heels in love with Sidney.”

“But—”

“I’ve been head over heels in love with her since high school. And finally, finally now we have something great. Something that matters. Something that could last. And I’m holding on to it with both hands.”

She stared at him as his words sank in. Her expression deflated. “But Porsche is so cute,” she said in a small voice.

“I do adore Porsche,” he said. “But she’s like a sister to me.”

“She’s like a sister to me too.”

“There you go. You adopt her and make it official.”

“Don’t be flip. I’m brokenhearted here.”

“I’m sorry to disappoint you, Claire, but my heart is lost. And”—he nodded out the window where Porsche and Brandon had just emerged from his trailer next to the barn and were staring into each other’s eyes—“I think hers is too.”