Almost.
While the others began picking up painting supplies, and Rue turned the tables on them, asking about their lives, Liam pulled Ethan aside.
“What is going on here?”
Well, that took about six seconds longer than he expected. “What do you mean?”
“You seem terrified of that woman.” Liam, to his credit, didn’t seem to be mocking Ethan. He seemed concerned.
For once, Ethan would rather be mocked.
“I’m mostly just terrified of you all being in the same room,” he said truthfully.
“She’s a woman,” Liam said. “Here. With you.”
“Yeah, I got that.”
“And I’ve never seen you more uncomfortable.”
Ethan glared. “I got that, too.”
“But when she’s across the room and you’re watching her, you have this goofy half smile on your face.”
Jerking his attention to his brother’s face, Ethan all but sputtered, “I do?”
Liam smirked. “Spill it.”
“Nothing to spill. We’re dating. End of discussion.”
One of Liam’s eyebrows lifted. “Only you insisted you weren’t dating a couple of days ago.”
“And now we are,” Ethan said evenly.
Liam adopted the kind of shit-eating grin Sawyer usually wore. “So she’s your girlfriend?”
Ethan took a deep breath. It should have smelled like paint—even so-called odorless paint carried the telltale odor—but the only scent he caught was apples. He prayed it was because it lingered on his shirt, and not because she lingered on his mind. “If I was in middle school, maybe. Do adults even say that?”
“Say what?” Liam was one snicker shy of hitting the floor in barely suppressed laughter. He wasn’t even trying to hide it, which did nothing for Ethan’s ability to get through the cross-examination without throwing up his hands and vowing to join a monastery.
There was supposed to be a nice one in Barcelona. He’d bet his brothers had never even heard of it, although Rue had probably been there, BASE jumping.
“Girl.” He meant to say girlfriend, but his jaw clamped shut.
“Girl?”
Ethan had never had such an urge to punch anyone. “Girl. Frie. Nd.”
“Good God, this might be the most pathetic thing I’ve ever seen.” Liam shook his head, not bothering to hide his smile. “And this isn’t you. I don’t buy it.”
Which was a problem, because Ethan definitely needed to sell it. “What don’t you buy? She’s here. She admitted it.”
Liam held up his fingers and started ticking them off. “First, she’s a woman. Years go by without you even touching one, and this one is in your apartment and your pants?”
“She had her hand in my pocket. She wasn’t in my pants,” Ethan mumbled, even though his pockets were in his pants, making his point moot.
“What else would I mean?” Liam asked, grinning. “Second, the two of you can’t possibly have anything in common. I don’t think you’ve even been on a plane, and she’s jumping out of them.”
Ethan rolled his eyes to distract from the fact that his brother had a point.
“Third, and this is the big one, I see the way you look at her, and it’s not like you look at Estelle or Kelsie.”
“In my defense,” Ethan said, a bit shaky because he was afraid Liam might be right, “I think we’re all still shocked about Kelsie. Not only that Sawyer actually settled down, but that a woman like her gave him the time of day.”
“They’ve been engaged a year and a half. And if you looked at either of them the way you’ve been looking at Rue, Sawyer or Crosby would have hurt you.” Liam’s grin slipped a few notches. “Seriously, man, I wasn’t kidding when I said you’re looking at her like you’re in awe or something.”
Of course he did. Who wouldn’t? “Did you hear what she said? The woman climbs volcanoes.”
“That’s wasn’t the look of a man who’s dumbstruck because a woman walked up a hill.” Liam extracted the chocolate cake from the cabinet and helped himself to a big slice.
Ethan glared. Liam had taken a third of the cake. Their mother sorely needed a new hiding spot for her desserts.