“You sure?” Gavin asks, turning back to Dallas and prompting me to contemplate strangling him.
My brother reaches behind his head and rubs his neck. “Yeah, man. I’m sure. Just, uh, don’t be too long. We all need our rest for tomorrow.”
They exchange a look loaded with something I can’t read from where I’m standing. But I can make an educated guess. Typically the three of us stay together. Gavin and I grabbing dinner alone, without my brother, shouldn’t be a big deal. And yet, I see it. The warning in my brother’s eyes any time Gavin and I do something without him chaperoning us. It says “sit across the table, don’t let her have any alcohol, and keep your hands to your damn self.”
Gavin nods at the unspoken agreement and we both call out to my brother that we’ll see him later.
Walking the two blocks to the restaurant is an exercise in patience and restraint. Gavin walks close enough that I can feel the heat from his arm swinging next to mine. Just as I’m about to say to hell with it and link my arm with his like it’s 1926 and we’re strolling along the promenade instead of a cracked sidewalk on the run-down industrial side of town, a horn blows and we both jump. Glancing over my shoulder I see my brother drive by and throw his hand out the window.
All I can think is, the ass did that on purpose. Gavin tosses my brother a quick two-fingered wave as the van pulls away toward the hotel. I cut my eyes to his profile. He’s walking an extra foot away from me now and I already miss the warmth. The horn blast was a reminder: Keep your distance.
Chapter 4
GAVIN KEEPS AT LEAST AN ARM’S LENGTH BETWEEN US FOR THE rest of our walk to the restaurant. It leaves me more than slightly irritated with my brother.
Deep down I know that it’s not that Dallas wants to hurt me, or that he wants me to be unhappy. Just like I can feel his constant anxiety about the band’s future, I know that he hasn’t missed my burgeoning feelings for Gavin. And I suspect he knows what could happen if I act on my feelings and get them crushed under the heel of Gavin’s boot like so many other girls have.
My brother doesn’t subscribe to the same belief system about love that I do. He seems to have very little faith in the magic ability of it to make everything better, or at least bearable. His high school girlfriend, Robyn, left for college at the University of Texas the summer after graduation and they did the long-distance thing for two years before calling it quits. From the bits and pieces I caught of their final days together, Robyn wanted to make it work. But for reasons my brother won’t discuss, they broke it off. Robyn Breeland was gorgeous and funny and smart. And real. And most important, she was nice to me. Always. No matter what drama she and Dallas were dealing with, she was always there for me. She still checks in with me from time to time. She’s like the big sister I never had.
Any time I’ve tried to pry my brother for information about what exactly happened between them, he has shrugged it off and grumbled some nonsense about long-distance relationships and priorities. But I was doing laundry the last time we were home and under his bed was a box Robyn had given him in high school. I glanced inside and my heart swelled when I saw the sweet pictures of them together. They looked so pretty and shiny in their homecoming and prom photos. The little notes she’d written him weren’t covered in hearts, but I could tell they were private by how tightly they were folded, so I didn’t read them. Just the fact that my brother still had the box nearly three years after their breakup told me that he still cared about her. He wasn’t the type to hold on to things, ever. Even Mom and Dad’s belongings hadn’t held much sentimental value for him.