The Avoidance of Love (The Daniels' Sisters Book 2) (16 page)

“No.”

“Are you guys together?”

This was getting tedious. “No.”

“So what’s your game, Mara? You clearly don’t want him. Why can’t you stand aside and let us be together?”

“Brielle, I’m not sure how many times we’re going to have this conversation, but I will tell you that this is the last time we discuss this. Jace and I are not together. We are not an item.” I chose this point to get right in her face to emphasize my point. “However, if I decide to fuck Jace every which way from Sunday then that is my damn choice. I do not need to explain my sexual habits to you. I do not need to explain my relationship status to you. I do not need to clear any fucking thing with you. Just stop irritating me. If Jace wanted you, he’d have you. Maybe you need to think about that.”

Brielle stood there gaping at me. I took her silence as an opportunity to call a taxi and get out of there as soon as I could. She didn’t say another word to me and eventually Jace came back into the room. He was surprised to see Brielle there, which reassured me a little because in the back of my mind, I was wondering whether he’d invited her over. I needed time to think, and I was glad when Jace didn’t pressure me into stay when I told him I was going.

“I need to get to my grandparents’ house. They’ll be wondering where I am. I’m never late for dinner.”

“I get it; you’ve not done the relationship thing before. Neither have I and it scares me a little. But please, Mara, believe me when I say that I’ll be a good choice for you.”

“Jace, I’ll think about it.”

While it wasn’t raining or snowing outside, the winds were icy. The taxi had said he was outside when clearly he wasn’t, and now I was freezing my ass off even in my jacket, trying to rub my arms to keep warm. Jace pulled me into him and tucked me under his arm. I think I could literally get drunk off his scent. The way he breathed in and out so slowly was soothing. I imagined falling asleep on his chest every night and never getting tired of it. He turned me to face him so I couldn’t look anywhere but into his eyes; I couldn’t catch my breath when I saw the carnal intent in them.

I could feel his erection up against my stomach and I was having a hard time resisting the urge to rub up against it like a cat in season.

“I figure if you spend more time with me then I might be able to convince you to be with me. I want you to come away with me again. I’m doing a charity race in France. No work this time. I just want to do the race and then spend some time with you. The two us. Alone. No distractions. No interruptions. We could even just stay in our room the whole time and just order room service.” He wiggled his brows in suggestion and I rolled my eyes in mock disgust.

It was at that point that the taxi chose to pull up. As I pulled away from him, I spotted Brielle watching us through the window. She wasn’t even trying to be inconspicuous.

“I’ll think about it. In the meantime, what are you going to do about her?” I gestured toward the window, but he didn’t bother to turn around.

“I don’t know why she’s here. Like I said, she’s a friend, nothing more.”

“Hmmmm.”

Jace started to grin. “Are you jealous, BonBon?”

“Of what?”

“You’ve got no competition there at all. I’m all yours. You’ve just gotta realize that.” I started to get into the taxi after he opened the door for me. “Since I now know you want to fuck me every which way from Sunday.”

My head snapped up with embarrassment. I didn’t think he’d heard what I’d said to Brielle.

“Just so you know, BonBon, you shout really loudly when you get pissed. Good job my dad was already asleep.” With that, he gave me a peck on my nose and shut the taxi door. He gave the car a pat on the roof to let the driver know that he could go. I spent the whole journey back to my car in a state of mortification and confusion. I still didn’t know what was holding me back from Jace but I knew it wasn’t just my aversion to commitment.

I KEPT GOING over and over the things that Jace had said to me. I wanted to be with him, but I was afraid. I felt the fear right in the pit of my stomach. I knew I was tired of fighting.

By the time I got to my grandparents’ house, I had even less festive spirit than usual. I didn’t want to eat, drink, or even be around family. I played with the food on my plate as I thought about Jace and the potential of an
us.
I hadn’t realized everyone else had finished and were leaving the table until Granddad asked me if I was done because he was clearing the table.

Every year my grandmother, sisters, and I usually cooked and my granddad cleared away and washed up. Every year, I offered to help and every year, my granddad told me to go and sit down with the rest of my sisters in front of TV. I didn’t sit with them this time. I sat away from them all. In the room, but not really with them and that’s how I felt. I was surrounded by people but intrinsically alone. My grandmother and my sisters had tried engaging me in conversation but with no luck. I didn’t want to talk to anyone.

It wasn’t long before they abruptly turned off the TV and I heard, “Mara Annabelle Daniels.” Nothing worse, even at this age, than being called by your full name, by your grandmother. “I know you girls occasionally think that I don’t see what you are up to, but let me just inform you that I see everything. Lana, I am aware that you have set your sister up. While I don’t know the details of what you have done. You. Will. Fix. It! Mara, you just remember who you are.” Then she pointed to all of us. “All of you remember who you are and where you come from. We are strong women. There isn’t a man out there who can bring us down and keep us there. You all must stay true to yourselves and never forget that. As sisters, you need to look after each other and support each other.”

My sisters were all looking at me now and their concern was grinding me down. I felt myself snap, and the tears were falling before I even realized that I was crying. When I felt my sisters’ arms move around me, I completely shattered, and suddenly I understood what had been bothering me about Jace and what was causing some of the other baggage that I had been carrying around with me.

Lana came up in front of me and moved my hands away so she could wipe away my tears. “I’m sorry, Mara. I thought I was helping. I’ll fix this. My heart was in the right place, I swear. I love you and I love you all, too. You know that right?”

“I know, Lana. You’re just a fucking fruit loop sometimes, but this time I don’t even know what to do with the mess you got me in.” I wiped the tears from my face as I noticed my grandmother had slipped out from the room to give us space.

Tara and Lana took a seat either side of me, and Dana perched on the arm of the chair. Lana turned to swing her legs onto my lap like she used to when we were younger and used to watch movies together.

“So what’s going on between you and Jace?” For one of the few times in my life, Lana looked genuinely concerned and wanted to know what she could do to help.

“Where do I even start?”

“Start with sex. Stories are always better when they start with sex.” Lana was clapping her hands together in excitement. I wondered about that girl sometimes.

“I know you had sex. I can practically smell it on you.”

“Ewwwwwwwww.” Dana and Tara jumped back away from me in disgust.

“We did not just have sex so there’s no need to behave like I’ve got the plague.”

I didn’t really know where to start. I thought at the beginning might be best and maybe I could try to understand it all myself. I described the first day I had met Jace and how forward he was. I skirted around the subject of us sleeping together enough for them to get the gist without any dirty details, much to Lana’s dismay.

“Why are you doing this to yourself? You clearly have strong feelings for him, so why play the martyr and sacrifice your happiness when there’s no need?” I turned to Dana who had just spoken and refrained from telling her to sip some advice from her own cup. I thought about what she said and suddenly it all slipped into place. For so long, I had thought I didn’t want to let anyone in for fear I would lose someone else close to me if it didn’t work out, but it wasn’t that.

“It’s you.” I looked at them all and they looked at me back in confusion. “Jace comes with so much additional baggage that I don’t think I can take on because I’m always clearing up behind your shit. I’d be another support crutch for someone and I can’t do it anymore. I’d be another tool for someone else with issues. His dad isn’t going to go anywhere; I can’t be that crutch for the rest of my life.” I felt selfish to my core for saying it but that was how I felt.

“That’s not true, Mara. You can’t blame us for you not living your life.” Lana genuinely looked affronted, but she and the rest of my sisters needed to hear this.

“It is true. All of you are so wrapped up in the dramas and little trivial incidences that happen in your lives, you never see the bigger picture. It’s been like this since we were kids. At first, I did it because I thought that was what a good older sister was supposed to do, but now it’s just all got out of hand.” I took a deep breath and off-loaded things I’d wanted to say to them for years.

“Lana you’re so caught up in being the center of the party you never notice the negative effects it has on others. Remember when you took Grandma’s car to some house party with your friends the night before the school fashion trip to Paris? She specifically told you that if you got in trouble one more time that week you wouldn’t be able to go, but even that didn’t make you hesitate.

“Not only did you take the car, somehow, you managed to scratch the whole side of the car on God only knows what. You were completely shitting yourself, but not once did you question why you never got in trouble for it.” Realization dawned on her face, but I wanted to make sure she knew.

“I took the blame for it and paid for the damage with the money I would have used to go on the girl’s holiday back when I actually had friends. You all stood there saying that it was because I was just so unsociable and I never went anywhere. No, it was because of you. You were able to go on the trip of a lifetime, where you probably learned many of the skills that make you so good at your job now, and I slowly fell out of touch with my friends and became the loner you always thought I was.

“I would love to say that was the worse stunt you ever pulled, but it wasn’t. There were the late night ridiculous phone calls because you’d dumped your boyfriend or your boyfriend had dumped you, so I would have to come out late in the middle of the night to come and get you or listen to your drunk ramblings when I should have been at home studying or catching up on sleep because I had an exam or work in the morning.” Her mouth snapped shut, and that’s when I knew she’d accepted that I was right. Lana used to tease me rotten as kids and still does but when she was caught up in her shit, she always called me to come and save her ass. I knew that most of these issues were things I should have let go a long time ago but I hadn’t and now it had made me bitter.

“Then we’ve got Tara. I’m not going to comment on the shit you do in the evenings. If it makes you happy and you’re safe so be it, but let’s face it, your little hobby did not start out that way.” Tara averted my gaze, but I didn’t care. If she was ashamed of what she was doing then maybe she shouldn’t be doing it. “But you know what the main thing with you is? Growing up you were so focused on getting your top scores, you roped me in every time to be your study buddy. You completely ignored the fact that we didn’t study the same topics and I needed to spend just as much time on my classes.

“You still fucking do it, knowing I work long hours in the office and don’t get much time to myself. You just naturally assume I don’t want me time to just relax and chill the fuck out. It never once occurred to you to think that maybe you should find someone else because I might have my own workload. Then you had the audacity to say that you couldn’t understand why I never had any work/life balance.

“Last but not least, we have Dana, who decides to do the royal fuck up.” I cringed a little inside when I saw her flinch, but I was on a roll and this needed to be said. “Dana, I love you, but dear God you did a brilliant one. I love my nephew beyond words, but maybe when you’re giggling along with tweedle-dumb and tweedle-dumber over there, you’d like to remember who sacrificed nights out with her few remaining friends.

“I babysat him so that he didn’t wear out our grandparents and you could study for your exams and enjoy the last remnants of your teenage years. That’s right; it was me.

So when Jacob is moaning about spending time with me because I’m boring, maybe you want to remember that I’m just a little more structured around him because his father is a psycho bastard and our grandfather is retired. He doesn’t have that many male role models around him to give a good work ethic, so I try to show him what I do to instill some of that inside him.” I slumped back in the chair. It felt so good to get that off my chest. I think I’d resented my sisters for a long time for all of the things I’d sacrificed for them even though they weren’t aware of it.

Dana, the more levelheaded of us, spoke first. “I’m sorry, Mara. You’re right. We’ve all been selfish. However, you’re a Grade-A idiot yourself. You should have spoken up about how you felt instead of letting it brew inside of you like that for all these years. We can mull over what you’ve said about us later and hug it out some more, but we weren’t the reason you were just crying. You’ve told us the basics with the Jace situation but what’s the real issue.”