“I think I’m drunk,” Lucien whispers, reminding me he’s beside me.
My heart is telling me to go after Rosie, but my heads telling me to take care of my brother first. I know no matter what anyone tells me that Hunter has eyes for Rosie, but I’m going to trust her. There is also a slithering of guilt working its way inside me for keeping her awake on and off during the nights. I can’t get enough of her. But it’s odd that she’d head back to her place without saying something to me. We haven’t slept apart since we got together. Is something else going on? Ugh! I need to stop imagining problems when there probably isn’t anything to imagine.
“I think I’m going to hurl,” Lucien blurts, bringing me back to the present.
“Not out here you’re not.” I quickly punch in the security code and shove him through the door.
Luckily, he makes it to the bathroom in time to pray to the porcelain gods. Leaving him to it, I head into the kitchen and grab him a bottle of water from the fridge while I send Rosie a text to make sure she’s okay.
“That for me?”
Lucien takes the water from my hands and taking a long gulp, he drops down onto the sofa. Shaking my head, I root around in a cupboard for the bottle of Tylenol and shaking two out, pass them to a nearly passed out Lucien.
My levelheaded brother being drunk is a surprise and makes me wonder what’s happened or been said between him and Sabrina. We all know he’s fighting an attraction toward her and vice-versa. What I can’t understand is why he isn’t doing anything about her. Well, I can understand from his screwed up way of thinking. She’s a beautiful young woman and half the time she looks lonely, which she tries to hide. This is something Mom’s noticed and the reason why she’s trying to mother her and includes her in anything we do as a family.
Glancing at Lucien who’s decided to sleep on my sofa, I kick his feet, startling him. “What’s going on? And don’t give me shit.”
“Can’t you leave a guy to drown in his sorrows?”
“You’re not just a guy, you’re my brother so the answer is no I can’t.”
Sitting down opposite him in my recliner, I hold his glare and keep my sigh of relief to myself when I see him give in.
“She’s on a date.” He sits up and leans forward with his arms resting on his thighs, which gives me a minute to take in what he’s just said.
This surprises me because I thought they were gradually getting to the point of something happening between them. Still I knew the possibility of someone else coming along for Sabrina would happen if my brother didn’t make a move.
“She looked…hot…sexy…beautiful,” he whispers, covering his face with his hands. “I watched her meet him at the restaurant. He kissed her, and she let him.” He leans back into the cushions, resting his head on the back of the sofa with his eyes closed. “I’ve never felt like this about anyone before, and seeing her with someone else is killing me. I can’t have her so it isn’t fair to expect her to stay alone, but it’s eating away at me.”
He keeps saying that, using it as an excuse. “Why can’t you have her?”
His eyes snap open. “Look at me.” He holds his arms out to the side leaving himself open.
“I am you bastard,” I reply feeling my anger start building. “Stop using your scars as an excuse. I’ve seen the way she looks at you when you aren’t looking and I’m telling you she doesn’t give a damn about them. She sees you. You thinking the way you do is starting to really piss me off. What are you frightened of? Tell me.” He’s frustrating the hell outta me.
“I can’t give her what she needs. What any woman needs from a man,” he says so quietly it takes me a minute to realize what he’s said. But I’m confused.
What the fuck is he talking about?
“What. I don’t understand. Explain it to me?”
“Fuck! You really are going to make me say it out loud.” He wipes his hand down his face in a weary gesture. “I can’t get erect.”
I just stare at him. “What?”
“Fuckin’ hell, Ruben. I can’t get a fuckin’ erection.” All the anger drops out of him as his words hit me.
“Since when?”
“The fire.”
He’s left me stunned. I don’t think any of us had any idea this was the reason he’d stopped dating. We all just presumed his scars were the reason he was hiding. How wrong were we? I honestly don’t know what I’m supposed to say to him. I can’t imagine not having an orgasm again, and he’s gone years without one.
“Well that shut you up,” he observers.
“I don’t know what to say. I mean, are you sure?” I ask then start to laugh. “Sorry, of course you are.”
“The doc said he’s eighty percent positive I’ll always be like this from now on. But…”
“But what?” I ask when he cuts off mid-speech.
“It doesn’t matter.”
Like hell! “Spit it out Lucien.”