Page 22 of My Brother’s Best Friend

Istared in shock.

Was Jordy—beguiling, gorgeous, mysterious Jordy—asking me out?

Well, no. He had no reason to think I liked guys, and if he did, he wouldn’t be inviting me to spend more time with him. He’d made it clear he wasn’t interested.

But he was offering to spend more time with me, weird as that seemed. And the longer he watched me, those quick, dark eyes of his focused on my face, the more my heart sped up, the improbability of this moment swirling around me.

“Sh—sure?” I croaked.

“I just figured, if we’re both at loose ends,” he said with a shrug.

“You’re sure you don’t have something you’d rather be doing?”

Jordy barked a laugh and muttered something that sounded strangely like, You have no idea. But when I peered down at him, wondering if I’d misheard, he just said, “Not really, to be honest.”

Which was how I found myself following him out to The Port Hole’s back patio five minutes later, beer in hand. There were four wooden picnic tables under a canopy of palmettos and string lights. A gnarled muscadine vine clawed up the brick wall of the building next door, its tendrils finding purchase in cracks in the mortar.

Jordy led us to a table in the corner. The sun wasn’t down yet, but it was low enough in the sky that this part of the patio was in the shade. The table was mostly occupied, so we ended up squished together on the same side.

I straddled the bench. Jordy bent one leg at the knee and faced me, and I found myself studying his eyes, the way they seemed lit from within. There were flecks of gold in that brown, radiating out. His lashes were long and black, and freckles danced across his cheeks. I wanted to run my finger across them, counting each one.

Even in waders and a T-shirt, he looked incredible. He was just so alive, so comfortable in himself. He took a sip of his beer, then grinned. His lips drew out a little farther to the right than the left, giving his smile a roguish feel. It set my heart racing all over again.

It didn’t make any sense. Just a few minutes ago, I’d been depressed that Miller hadn’t shown up, and now it was hard to remember the guy even existed. It was hard to remember anything but Jordy.

“So,” he said, after another sip of his beer. “Tell me her name, so I can tell you all the reasons you’re better off without her.”

“What?” I’d lost focus, staring at his freckles again, but he just laughed.

“Don’t worry, I was kidding. I know you’re too much of a gentleman for that.”

“Oh, right. Yeah, probably best not to get into that.”

If for no other reason than that I didn’t want to have to keep track of a fake personality for my fake crush for my fake foiled date. A thought occurred to me, then.

“Would you mind not telling your brother what happened, though? It might keep his matchmaking skills at bay a little longer.”

Jordy laughed again. “That, I promise I can do.”

“He can just be a little enthusiastic sometimes.”

“Try a lot enthusiastic.”

“It’s not that I want to lie to him,” I said. “It’s just that sometimes, he gets so excited about helping you—”

“That he forgets you never actually asked for help in the first place?” Jordy finished. “Trust me, you’re preaching to the choir.”

“How so?”

His lips twisted, and I was about to apologize when he spoke. “I guess there’s no point in not telling you.”

“I really wasn’t trying to pry.”

He shrugged. “You already know I’m home because of a breakup. There’s not much to hide. My ex, Harvey, cheated on me, dumped me, and was pretty much ready for his new boyfriend to move in before I’d even packed my bags.”

“Yikes.”

“The thing is, I’m grateful to Levi for giving me a place to stay. But he tries so hard to be supportive, and he’s so mad at Harvey that he just ends up reminding me of everything that went wrong, instead of letting it fade, you know?”