Chance(17)

I narrow my gaze. "He does. You don't."

He can't control the smile that tugs at the corner of his lips. "You don't think I'm a good person?"

It's a loaded question. I don't doubt that Caleb has the capacity to be kind and giving. I know that he does. Those parts of him have just become buried beneath his drive to prove that he's the best at what he does, both in his professional and personal lives. "You've changed."

"You're wrong. I haven't changed. The people around me have changed."

I don't fall into the radius of the people he's referring to. I know that I don't. I've heard him tell me too often that I'm still the same girl he remembers from when he was a kid. He's talking about his brothers. "You mean Asher and Gabriel?"

"Money changes people." He glances towards the conference table. "Once you give people a taste of it, they can't control their need to have it."

If I didn't know better I'd swear he's talking about himself more than either of his brothers. "I don't have a lot so I don't know."

"You're fortunate." He leans back far enough that I finally feel as though I can breathe. "You can trust your brother. I don't have that luxury anymore."

There's a pain woven into the words that can't be ignored. "They're still your brothers, Caleb. They'll always be your brothers."

"They are my brothers." He nods as his eyes dart to the door I just walked through. "They're also ruthless, Row. You need to watch yourself around them. They'll use you to get to me."

It's a callous remark meant to intimidate me. "Not everything is about you. My friendship with Asher has nothing to do with you."

"It has everything to do with me." He leans so far forward that his lips flutter against the side of my ear. "He told me yesterday when they were handcuffing him that if push comes to shove, you'll choose him over me."

The words resonate the same way they did when we were children and the brothers were picking teams for basketball at the park. We're not doing a schoolyard pick for teams anymore. We're adults and as I watch Caleb raise his arm to summon in a group of his employees into the room I can't help but wonder whether Asher is right. If I had to take sides, I doubt that I'd be standing next to Caleb when the dust finally settled.





Chapter 13


"Which one have you slept with?" Ivy's hand races over the screen of my laptop. "Was it this one?"

I stare at where she's firmly planted her finger over the image of Gabriel's face on the Foster Enterprises website. "No, that's Gabriel. He's the oldest. I've never even thought about him that way."

"He's totally my type," she whispers as her eyes dart around the crowded diner we're sitting in. "Don't tell my husband I said that."

I laugh out loud. "I won't tell Jax a thing."

"It has to be this one then." She slides her finger over the screen towards Asher's picture. "He's more your type."

"I haven't slept with any of them." I reach to grab the edge of the laptop's screen. I'm not even sure why I brought up the Foster brothers when I agreed to meet Ivy for a coffee after work.

"You're talking technicalities." She gently pushes my hand away. "Do you want to sleep with this one?"

"No." I shake my head from side-to-side. "That's Asher. He's definitely not my type. He's my pal."

"You have a pal that looks like that?" She cocks a perfectly sculpted blonde brow. "None of my pals look like that."

I pull my hand over my mouth as I try to stifle a raucous laugh.

"It's the one in the middle then." She nods towards the screen. "Caleb. Caleb Foster."

I pick up the now cool mug of coffee that I'd ordered when we first arrived. I'd listened patiently for twenty minutes while Ivy told me about a custom designed engagement ring she'd been working on all day. I admired the pictures of the piece on her phone and had asked, out of genuine curiosity? about the man who ordered the ring.

As soon as she asked me about my day, I'd launched into a disjointed accounting of my time with both Asher and Caleb. She wanted a visual, so I showed her the brothers' profile images on their site.

"It's that one, right?" she pushes. "He's gorgeous. You've known him how long?"

"I can't remember a time when I didn't know him." I shrug as I place the mug back on the table. "We lived next door to his family when I was growing up."

"So he's like a brother?"

"No," I shake my head fervently. "It's never been like that. We've just been friends."

"Do you want to be more than friends with him?"

My best friend in middle school and a friend in college both asked me the very same question. I've always fallen back on the same answer I'm going to give Ivy now. "I used to have a crush on him but that passed."

The expression on her face makes it clear that she's not buying into a word of what I'm saying. "How old is he?"

"Caleb is thirty."

"Does he want to get married?"